Association Kokopelli — Semences biologiques, libres de droits et reproductibles

What Permaculture got Wrong — Dispelling Five Common Myths Many people who are new to small-scale organic farming come in with a lot of expectations and assumptions on how things are going to be. The romantic idea of living off the land and farming within a sustainable community has lured them closer to taking action and getting something going, whether it be a small farm, an off-grid homestead or perhaps just an ambitious garden. A lot of these folks have been inspired by the Permaculture movement, read the books of Bill Mollison, watched YouTube videos with Geoff Lawton and dreamed up enough ideas about herb spirals and forest gardens to make your head spin. I was exactly one of those people when I started my farm, I was inspired by Mollison and Lawton immensely and the idea of a self-sustaining farm was my dream and I was going to make it a reality, no matter the cost. I’d like to start with some definitions of terms that are going to be helpful to understand if this article is going to be effective.

I’m Starting a Seed Library at My Library This is the Press Release or this project. I will post more details for folks interested in starting one. But really, the best instructions for starting a seed library come from Richmond Grows. They have instructions, videos, and everything you need to put yours together. The Urban Homestead® - A City Farm, Sustainable Living & Resource Center, A Path to Freedom towards Self-Sufficiency In the mid-1980s, our family set out to do the seemingly impossible: To create a new revolution in sustainable urban living. Finding ourselves owning a run-down circa 1917 craftsman-style house in the metropolis of Pasadena (the 7th largest city in Los Angeles County) and just 15 minutes from downtown Los Angeles with the intersection of 134 and 210 freeways 30 yards from our home, we shelved our dreams of idyllic country living and "five acres and independence" and decided to do what we could, with what we had -- RIGHT NOW. No one thought it was possible. Residents in our low income, mixed race neighborhood thought we were the "crazy white folks." We forged ahead, calling our project the Urban Homestead® model and with no small means of blood, sweat and tears, we worked to transform this ordinary 66' x 132' urban lot [LINK: Comparison Diagram of Property ] into a self-sufficient city homestead with an organic garden that now supplies us with food year-round.

Planting oxygen / Research Arthrospira microalgae Planting oxygen 15 December 2017 When resources are limited, you have to work with what you have – especially in the harsh environment of space. A Community-Run Seed Library - Shouldn't Every Library Loan Seeds? (Video) Image credit: BASIL (Bay Area Seed Interchange Library) We already know that saving seeds is critical to fighting climate change, yet seed libraries can prove tough to maintain. But what exactly is a seed library, and how can you use one? Here's a great primer on one such project in Berkeley.

Lettuce Produces More Greenhouse Gas Emissions Per Calorie Than Bacon Does Bacon lovers of the world, rejoice! Or at the least take solace that your beloved pork belly may be better for the environment in terms of greenhouse gas emissions than the lettuce that accompanies it on the classic BLT. This is according to a new study by researchers at Carnegie Mellon University who found that if Americans were to switch their diets to fall in line with the Agriculture Department's 2010 dietary recommendations, it would result in a 38 percent increase in energy use, 10 percent bump in water use and a 6 percent increase in greenhouse gas emissions. The reason for this is because on a per-calorie basis, many fruits, vegetables, dairy and seafood—the foods the USDA pushes in the guidelines over sugary processed food and fats—are relatively resource-intensive, the study finds. Lettuce, for example, produces three times more greenhouse gas emissions than bacon. That's not to say all vegetables are bad.

Millennium Seed Bank Partnership - Saving Plants For Our Future Curation The collections are curated to international gene bank standards, at every stage of the process. These are not always applicable to wild species collections; so we used our considerable experience to set global standards across the partnership. These are used across the MSB Partnership to ensure that collections are of optimum quality and form the basis of our training programmes. We look at: Rice farming up to twice as bad for climate change as previously thought, study reveals Rice farming is known to be a major contributor to climate change, but new research suggests it is far bigger a problem than previously thought. Techniques intended to reduce emissions while also cutting water use may in fact be boosting some greenhouse gases, meaning the impact of rice cultivation may be up to twice as bad as previous estimates suggest. Scientists at the US-based advocacy group the Environmental Defense Fund suggest the short-term warming impact of these additional gases in the atmosphere could be equivalent to 1,200 coal power plants. Join Independent Minds

Seed Savers Exchange Seed Savers Exchange logo. Seed Savers Exchange, or SSE is a non-profit organization based near Decorah, Iowa, that preserves heirloom plant varieties through regeneration, distribution and seed exchange. It is one of the largest nongovernmental seedbanks in the United States.[1] The mission of SSE is to preserve the world’s diverse but endangered garden heritage for future generations by building a network of people committed to collecting, conserving, and sharing heirloom seeds and plants, and educating people about the value of genetic and cultural diversity. Since 1975, Seed Savers has produced an annual yearbook of members’ seed offerings, as well as multiple editions of The Garden Seed Inventory, and The Fruit, Nut and Berry Inventory. SSE also publishes Seed to Seed: Seed Saving and Growing Techniques for Vegetable Gardeners.

021: Peter Ballerstedt - Dispelling Meat Sustainability Myths Dr. Peter Ballerstedt (@GrassBased) has been a huge influence on many minds and myself personally when it comes to meat sustainability. He uses his expertise in Agronomy to offer an interesting counter argument to the claim that ruminant agriculture is destroying the environment. Peter has an extensive background in forage production, utilization and forage-based livestock production systems and was the forage extension specialist at Oregon State University from 1986 until 1992. Peter's personal experience has led him to re-examine human diet and health.

Seed Libraries Crop Up Just as one seed can produce many seeds, one idea can change many lives. Free public libraries were revolutionary in their time because they provided access to books and knowledge that had not previously been available to a large segment of the population. A free seed lending library can also provide people with a chance to transform their lives and communities by providing access to fresh, healthy food that may not otherwise be available. The East Palo Alto seed library is a lot like a traditional library in a number of ways.

86% of livestock animal feeds do not compete with food! Worldwide, 86% of feeds used for livestock animal productions are not edible to humans and thus not competing with food. This is part of the conclusions of a study by Mottet et al., 2017 Animal productions represent 18% of energy (kcal) and 25% of global protein consumed by humans. They provide high-grade protein and micronutrients (e.g. vitamin A, vitamin B-12, riboflavin, calcium, iron and zinc) that cannot be readily obtained from plant-source foods alone. In addition, animal productions contribute a range of economical, environmental and social services. Why Your Supermarket Only Sells 5 Kinds of Apples John Bunker Séan Alonzo Harris Every fall at Maine’s Common Ground Country Fair, the Lollapalooza of sustainable agriculture, John Bunker sets out a display of eccentric apples. Last September, once again, they covered every possible size, shape, and color in the wide world of appleness. There was a gnarled little yellow thing called a Westfield Seek-No-Further; a purplish plum impostor called a Black Oxford; a massive, red-streaked Wolf River; and one of Thomas Jefferson’s go-to fruits, the Esopus Spitzenburg. Bunker is known in Maine as “The Apple Whisperer,” or simply “The Apple Guy,” and, after laboring for years in semi-obscurity, he has never been in more demand. Through the catalog of Fedco Trees, a mail-order company he founded in Maine 30 years ago, Bunker has sown the seeds of a grassroots apple revolution.