The Healthy Soils Initiative for Home Gardens

A recent On Gardening column draw attention to California’s Healthy Soils Initiative, which is part of “California’s strategy to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by increasing carbon sequestration in and on natural and working lands. “ The Initiative is part of the state’s Climate Smart Agriculture programs, which include coordinated work on efficient water usage, conservation of farmlands, capture of methane emissions, and alternative practices for manure management.

California funds Climate Smart Agriculture and other Climate Change Strategies through its cap-and-trade program, a market-based regulation designed to reduce greenhouse gases (GHGs) from multiple sources. Cap-and-trade sets a firm limit or cap on GHGs and minimizes the compliance costs of achieving the state’s goals for reducing GFGs. The legislature and Governor Brown are working toward extending this program beyond 2020.

The Climate Change Strategies target large-scale operations in several industrial fields, but all could be implemented on an individual level. The Healthy Soils Initiative has particular relevance for individuals. It doesn’t offer public funding for home gardeners, but it aligns completely with the best practices for sustainable and more successful gardening.

The payoffs include improving plant health and yields, increasing water infiltration and retention, sequestering and reducing greenhouse gases, reducing sediment erosion and dust, improving water and air quality, and improving biological diversity and wildlife habitat.

Here is an overview of recommendations to develop healthy soils:

Protect the natural structure of the soil. This is easy because means avoiding or at least minimizing tilling of the soil. Some gardeners have adopted the practice of turning over the soil regularly, using a mechanical device or a shovel or garden fork. “Breaking up the soil” has been equated with improving it by mixing in amendments and facilitating the spread of plant roots. While these seem like desirable outcomes, tilling actually pulverizes soil aggregates which are groups of soil particles that bind to each other more strongly than to adjacent particles. Spaces between the aggregates provide pores for retention and exchange of air and water. Tilling, therefore, adds excess oxygen to the soil and increases respiration and carbon dioxide emission. It also disrupts fungal communities.

Increase soil fertility. For vegetable gardeners, this involves growing cover crops during periods after harvesting one crop and planting another, digging in the cover crop to add nitrogen and other nutrients to the soil. The same practice is recommended when ornamental gardens are being renovated. Other methods for increasing soil fertility include adding compost and animal manures to restore the plant/soil microbiome. A three- or four-inch layer of such amendments will contribute nutrients without digging it in. This practice includes avoiding uses of synthetic fertilizers, which distort soil microbial communities, in addition to consuming energy for production and distribution, migrating into water resources and the atmosphere, and accelerating the decomposition of organic matter.

Build biological ecosystem diversity. For farmers, this practice includes rotating crops, avoiding mono-cropping, and planting borders to accommodate bees and other beneficial insects. For the home gardener, the parallel actions include losing the lawn (which is mono-cropping), providing foods, water and habitats for birds, bees, butterflies and beneficial insects and small animals. A helpful related resource is the National Wildlife Federation.

Manage grazing for soil regeneration. The parallel practice in this area for home gardeners applies only to those who grow chickens, ducks or rabbits, or perhaps other smaller creatures. The basic idea is to move them around the property for their own health and the production of healthy soil. For growers of commercial livestock, it’s a significant part of soil regeneration.

You can read more about these ideas on the websites of the California Department of Food and Agriculture or Regeneration International.

Garden Faire Celebrates Sustainable Gardening

The first day of summer, June 21st, approaches rapidly, marking an annual astronomical event (the Summer Solstice), the annual Garden Faire (more about that below), and perhaps a time for gardeners to review their calendar calendars.

For each year since 2005, the Garden Faire has convened in Scotts Valley as a regional celebration of sustainable gardening, water conservation, and healthy living, The program varies a bit each year, but there are certain constants:

First of these is consistent—and greatly appreciated—support of local water providers, specifically the San Lorenzo Valley, Santa Cruz, Scotts Valley, and Soquel Creek water districts. Their interest in the Garden Faire reflects official reports that close to 50% of residential water use happens outdoors, largely for garden irrigation. That usage is ok when it is done wisely, which generally includes:

  • Using landscape plants that are appropriate for the local environment, particularly plants that are native to California or at least to our summer-dry climate, and avoiding tropical climate plants that require a lot of water; and
  • Providing only the amount of water that plants need, by using drop irrigation, turning off irrigation after a rainy spell (or during!), and directing water to the plants rather than to paved surfaces.

Water conservation makes sense during periods of drought and is always good practice. Drought considerations could return at any time, so we should make wise water usage a matter of habit. Our payoff comes in the form of smaller water bills.

Our water districts also prioritize the protection of the watershed. As we consider the water cycle, we appreciate the importance of keeping synthetic chemicals out of our groundwater. For gardeners, good practice means using only organic fertilizers, herbicides, and pesticides in the landscape. These products are best for our water supply as well as for the quality of our soils and the wellbeing of all forms wildlife: mammals, birds, insects and, lest we forget, the incredible diversity of organisms that make up the soil food web.

Gardeners and water providers have common interests: practices that are consistent with water conservation and watershed protection are also strongly preferred for garden cultivation.

This year’s theme, “Cultivating Community in Times of Change,” a variation on previous themes, emphasizes timely and interconnected issues: growing plants and society, and the opportunities and challenges of current environmental and political conditions.

The Garden Faire presents messages along these lines in various ways, without preaching. The event includes knowledgeable Main Tent speakers on various aspects of sustainable gardening, in the Main Tent, and Nutrition Tent speakers on healthy foods. The Faire also includes vendors that have been selected for their compatibility with the Faire’s theme, and that offer a variety of garden-related products and services. Community groups also participate in offering information related to sustainable gardening and healthy living.

The occasion also includes musical entertainment and healthy food choices. All these elements combine to provide a pleasant, low-pressure environment to celebrate gardening, learn a bit about sustainability, and enjoy a sunny day among friendly members of the regional community. For more information, visit the Garden Faire’s website.

The Garden Faire is a free-admission event, made possible by local sponsors, modest fees paid by exhibitors, and a hard-working team of volunteers. Still, you will want to be prepared to purchase plants for your garden.

IF YOU GO

What: The 12the Annual Garden Faire

Who: The Garden Fair, Inc., a non-profit corporation.

Where: Skypark, Scotts Valley

When: 9:00 to 5:00, Saturday, June 17, 2017

Cost: Free admission, free parking.

Information: http://thegardenfaire.org

Achieving Resilience in the Garden

I have written enthusiastically about the book Planting in a Post-Wild World: Designing Plant Communities for Resilient Landscapes, by Thomas Rainer and Claudia West

To review my two recent columns about this book, visit “Designing Naturalistic Landscapes” and “Resilient Plant Communities.”

Regular readers will recall the “essential messages” of this book, as boldly summarized in this column:

  1. Good planting design results from harmonious relationships of plants to place, plants to people, and plants to other plants.
  2. Combine plants in interlocking layers, as they occur in natural plant communities:
  • structural/framework plants (10-15% of the total)
  • seasonal theme plants (25-40%)
  • ground cover plants (50%)
  • filler plants (5-10%)

I wanted to overhaul my own garden right away along the lines recommended by the authors.

After a very brief period of planning the next steps, I realized that putting these ideas in place would involve a good deal of thought and study. I had already written, resilient plant communities “require planning and knowledge of specific plants to put into practice.”

I was not alone in this assessment. The others who have read the book also praised its ideas and observed that they would not be easy to apply. In fact, several reviewers concluded that Rainer and West were not writing for home gardeners but for professional landscapers, especially those with exceptional knowledge of plants.

Thomas Rainer replied: “The book clearly acknowledges the complexity of creating plantings that function more like a naturally occurring community. But it doesn’t look at this complexity with despair, but instead, attempts to systematically describe how to do this in practical steps.”

He does recommend planting the four layers in four steps and provides practical advice about site preparation, but the missing pieces are lists of plants for each of the layers for each of the archetypical landscapes, along with knowledge of how plants look and grow together.

These are not small matters for home gardeners, for landscapers, and almost all garden designers.

Emulating Nature, it turns out, is not a simple matter. But one should not be discouraged.

The aspiring creator of a resilient plant community has access to very useful books. I previously recommended Designing California Native Gardens: The Plant Community Approach to Artful, Ecological Garden, by Glen Keator and Alrie Middlebrook, and Thomas Rainer recommends Garden Revolution: How Our Landscapes Can Be a Source of Environmental Change, by Larry Weaner and Thomas Christopher (Timber Press, 2016).

Garden Revolution

For the next step, we have Rainer’s tip: “Real design happens in the field. Take time there to get the layout right. Arrange all plants first, then go back and adjust location and spacing.”

I will report overviews of my progress from time to time, without, as they say, “getting into the weeds.”

Resilient Plant Communities

In a recent column, I referred to a book by Thomas Rainer and Claudia West: Planting in a Post-Wild World: Designing Plant Communities for Resilient Landscapes. Rainer and West present landscape design ideas that are worth applying in home gardens, and indeed in all kinds of gardens. Their ideas are intended to result in gardens that are “more robust, more diverse, and more visually harmonious, with less maintenance.”

To review that recent column, visit ongardening.com, click on “Essays 2017” and then “Designing Naturalistic Landscapes.”

The ideas presented in this book ring true to nature and good sense, and require planning and knowledge of specific plants to put into practice.

This column cannot replace reading the authors’ thoughtful review of familiar landscaping practices and groundbreaking recommendations, but w can consider their essential messages.

Rainer and West indicate that good planting design results from harmonious relationships of plants to place, plants to people, and plants to other plants.

The first of these relationships recalls the “right plant in the right place” axiom, which often refers to locating the plant where it will have the soil, exposure, and moisture that it needs to thrive. To these aspects of place the authors recommend locating plants in the grassland, woodland/shrubland, or forest environment that is their natural home. A garden, as a built environment, should look and function like a “distilled version” of one of those archetypical landscapes.

Consideration of the relationship of plants to people addresses the visual appeal of the landscape. The authors state that plant communities need not be limited to a naturalistic style and can exist within any other style. There are too many garden styles to list, but the basic idea is that the gardener can develop any preferred style and still maintain the plant’s relationships to place and other plants.

Rainer and West feature the relationship of plants to other plants and write about the “levels of sociability” of plants. In nature, some plants grow as individuals, or in groups of various sizes, or in large areas. For example, plants that tend to grow separately from other plants would be candidates for containers, and some plants propagate across vast numbers in large fields (see photographs of this year’s superbloom of wildflowers).

The authors recommend combining plants in interlocking layers, as they occur in natural plant communities. This approach allows plants to support each other, form a diverse and lush garden (as distinct from swaths of a single variety), and provide natural mulch that retains moisture and blocks entry of weeds and invasive plants. They categorize plants in four layers:

  • structural/framework plants — trees, shrubs, upright grasses and large leafed perennials that form the visual structure of the planting (10-15% of the total)
  • seasonal theme plants — mid-height plants that dominate the scene when in bloom, and provide supporting companions to the structural plants when not in bloom (25-40%)
  • ground cover plants — low, shade-tolerant plants that cover the soil, control erosion and provide nectar (50%)
  • filler plants — short-lived species, e.g., annuals, that fill gaps and add short seasonal displays (5-10%)

The authors describe this plant community approach collectively as resilient gardening. The benefits include growing healthy plants, minimizing maintenance (always a popular objective), and providing a systematic approach to developing an attractive, full grouping of plants.

I have been vaguely dissatisfied with a garden that separates plants from other plants by mulch. Developing layered plant communities will require reviewing plants already in place, searching for new plants for the needed layers, and allowing time for growth. The authors have not provided tidy “recipes” for plant communities because there are too many possible variations, including personal preferences, to put in a book. Instead, they have left the design process to each interested gardener.

Enjoy your garden, and consider learning about—and developing—resilient plant communities for your garden.

Communing with Nature

Good gardening practices almost always equal “working with Nature.” That is simply because natural processes have emerged after many eons as the Earth’s flora and fauna developed strategies for successful survival and propagation.

We write “almost always” from an excess of caution: it would be safe to say “always,” except for the use of the slippery term, “good.” The term “best” would also be debatable.

Still, all gardening practices that are beneficial for air, water, soil, plants and animals turn out to be time-honored, natural practices.

Not surprisingly, these practices are also beneficial to the gardeners, because we are also members of the animal kingdom, and tool-users as well.

Some of the gardener’s benefits are physical: everyone can gain health from exercise that is appropriate to one’s age and ability. Some are economic, providing either an inexpensive form of recreation or, for those with backyard nurseries, supplemental income.

Most benefits, however, are psychological, generating positive feelings, mental peace (according to Denver anxiety therapist), and the release of “happy hormones,” e.g., serotonin and dopamine. Admittedly, the latter benefit could be called a physical benefit, but it affects the psyche.

Working with Nature, therefore, works best for gardeners and literally everything in their surroundings. This concept can and should guide the gardener’s response to questions that arise in the garden. “What would Nature do about [insert gardening issue here]?”

This concept also works in reverse. Many commercially motivated gardening practices might appear to save time or increase productivity, but they often create harm in the long run, and sometimes even in the short run.

The worst of these practices involves bringing synthetic chemical fertilizers or pesticides into the garden. Non-toxic, effective organic products are readily available and should always be preferred.

Another avoidable and unnatural practice is the use of power tools in the garden, with gas-powered devices being the most problematic. The most common of these are gas-powered leaf blowers, which contribute faster than cars to climate change and air pollution and disturb the peace that we value in our gardens and neighborhoods.

The usual arguments favoring leaf-blowers include (a) our desire for tidy surroundings and (b) the operator’s interest in making the surroundings tidy as quickly as possible.

We should acknowledge, firstly, that Nature is not tidy. When trees drop their leaves in natural surroundings, the leaves decompose in time and add nutrients to the soil. When trees drop their leaves on pavement, we perceive untidiness. This suggests that we should plant trees only where their leaf drops would be beneficial.

If that is unrealistic (many people like street trees and patio trees), we should use manual methods to remove dropped leaves. Rakes and brooms work quite well, and in capable hands can be as efficient as leaf-blowers, and certainly much easier on the environment and our psyches.

Ken Foster of Terra Nova Landscaping demonstrates an alternative to leaf blowers. Photo by Dan Coryo, Santa Cruz Sentinel

Ken Foster of Terra Nova Landscaping demonstrates an alternative to leaf blowers. Photo by Dan Coryo, Santa Cruz Sentinel

For these reasons, many communities have already banned gas-powered leaf blowers, including Carmel and Santa Barbara to our south, and Palo Alto, Los Altos, and Menlo Park to our north. The Santa Cruz Coalition for a Healthy and Safe Environment (CHASE) has launched a petition favoring a local ordinance to ban these unnecessary and harmful tools. Check it out at http://preview.tinyurl.com/kvgws3d .

 

Soil is the Solution

A crucially important trend in climate change news focuses on soil.

In the United States, the greatest contributors to climate change have been the energy and transportation sectors, so federal responses have focused on emissions that result from burning fossil fuels. The resistance to regulated changes has come from private interests with business models that depend on fossil fuels (and politicians that support them).

The U.S. priority on fossil fuels makes sense, and it engages a good fight, but it’s not the entire story.

For at least the past ten years, public interest organizations have been pointing to Nature’s plan for moderating climate change. That plan depends on forests and soils, both of which are very good at absorbing and storing (sequestering) carbon.

Climate change has been accelerated by cutting down vast areas of forest to free land for agriculture. The negative effects of deforestation have been recognized, and initiatives (never enough) have been launched to control this practice and let the trees do their work.

Nature’s plan also as been compromised by agricultural practices, beginning with deforestation and continuing with a variety of poorly conceived land-use and land-management practices.

The good news on this front is that almost all the countries that have joined in the Paris Climate Agreement have stated that they will improve agricultural practices in their efforts to curb climate change.

According to the World Resource Institute, agriculture contributes 13 percent of greenhouse gas emissions and, with land-use changes, 24 percent of net emissions.

Agriculture is not as important as a climate change factor in the U.S. as I developing countries, but it’s still a significant contributor. California, which has a huge role in agriculture, has recognized this reality and initiated the Healthy Soils Initiative, discussed in a recent column (see ongardening.com/?p=2680) .

In this regard, California has been well ahead of the federal pace: U.S. Department of Agriculture has recommended that farmers voluntarily adopt carbon-capturing practices, but has done little more in deference to policies on energy and transportation.

In more good news, the U.S. position is changing, In December of 2016, the National Science and Technology Council (NTSC) released the report, “The State and Future of U.S. Soils: Framework for a Federal Strategic Plan for Soil Science.” The NTSC is “is the principal means by which the Executive Branch coordinates science and technology policy across the diverse entities that make up the Federal research and development (R&D) enterprise.”

To see this report, visit www.whitehouse.gov and search for “soils.”

In related actions, on January 11th, Regeneration International, a coalition of consumer groups, launched its “Soil is the Solution” briefing for members of Congress. A team of experts will seek opportunities to talk to our elected policy-makers (or their staffs).

Also, on January 19th, Former Vice President Al Gore will unveil a sequel to “An Inconvenient Truth,” his 2006 climate-change documentary. The new film surely will emphasize the role of agriculture in climate change. The sequel will debut at the Sundance Film Festival, and will be released in theaters later in 2017.

Efforts to control climate change must begin with large-scale actions, but they are also appropriate for home gardeners. We all have a stake in the future!

Future Uncertainty

As the inauguration of Donald Trump approaches, we enter a historically extraordinary period in which a single political party controls the House, the Senate and the White House.

“Control” should be taken with a grain of salt, because little is absolute in our nation’s capital.

While absolute control doesn’t happen in Washington, the political arena does have constants. During the past several years, a great constant has been the confrontation between opposing perspectives.

Under the new administration, that confrontation focuses on the struggle over the separation of power written into the U.S. Constitution. The incoming political majorities seem determined to reduce the power of the executive branch of government, meaning to constrain the president’s ability to use executive orders and the authority of administrative offices to write and enforce regulations based on legislation.

The lobbyists are out in great numbers, speaking on behalf of either public or private interests.

There are many issues on the table. A recent report in the New York Times observed, “The most powerful and ambitious Republican-led Congress in 20 years…plans to leave its mark on virtually every facet of American life…”

With that in mind, we examined the Competitive Enterprise Institute’s December 2016 report, Free to Prosper: A Pro-Growth Agenda for the 115th Congress. This 193–page report addresses many aspects of American life, and consistently calls for the reduction of federal regulation with the intention to “unleash America’s entrepreneurial, wealth-creating potential.”

In this column, we focus on issues related to gardening, a topic that easily includes food, so we will comment on only this report’s section, “Food Drugs, and Consumer Freedom.”

Due to space limits, we can only list the report’s food-related objectives:

  • Ensure consumer access to genetically engineered (GE) foods
  • Streamline (“fast-track”) regulation of (GE) plants and foods
  • Repeal the national standards for labeling GE foods
  • Oppose overregulation of food additives (particularly trans fats)
  • Oppose recommended limitation of sodium (salt) content of foods

This section also contains objectives to reduce or roll back federal regulation of (a) drugs, medical devices, and treatments, especially the new and experimental, (b) tobacco substitutes, (c) soft and pliable plastics (phthalates), (d) flame retardants (organohalogens), (e) online gambling, and (f) sports gambling.

Finally, this section recommends federal defunding of “activist research,” such as research on the safety hazards of BPA (bisphenol a) lining of metal food containers.

These are industry-sponsored objectives, not actual legislation. Their basic message is expressed in the report’s title, which translates to Make Money.

At the same time, consumer groups are vigorously organizing their defense of regulations that are intended to protect public health and safety. In California, the governor and attorney general are prepared to resist federal actions that would obstruct the state’s progress on several important issues.

The debate over the appropriate balance between public and private interests will continue during the coming four years, with an opportunity at the mid-point of this period to review the actions of some of our elected representatives.

Meanwhile, the political environment must be regarded as unsettled at best.

California’s Healthy Soils Initiative

This week, California’s Department of Food and Agriculture reported progress in implementing the state’s Healthy Soils Initiative. This matter might seem esoteric for home gardeners, but it’s worth our attention for several reasons that are listed below.

First, by way of definition, let’s review the initiative’s goals, as stated by the CDFA:

  • Improve plant health and yields —contain important nutrients that improve plant growth and yields.
  • Improve biological diversity and wildlife habitat — at least a quarter of the world’s biodiversity lives in the soil; healthy soils improve habitats and other natural resources.
  • Reduce sediment erosion and dust — improve aeration, water infiltration, flood management and resistance to erosion and dust control.
  • Sequester and reduce greenhouse gasses — carbon stored in soil reduces overall greenhouse gas emissions from agriculture.
  • Improve water and air quality —affects the persistence and biodegradability of pesticides and other inputs.
  • Increase water retention — healthy soil has the ability to hold up to 20 times its weight in water.

These goals encompass a “basket” of interconnected issues: agriculture, an important part of California’s economy; biodiversity; erosion; climate change; water & air quality; and drought. These issues are concerns of several state agencies, all of which are engaged in the operation of this initiative. Promoting interagency coordination and collaboration, which is never easy, is among the principal actions to advance this work.

The state’s 2016 budget act includes substantial funding for the Healthy Soils Program. The CDFA has defined five primary actions for carrying out its responsibilities under this program. Its recent report of progress focuses on Action #2: the identification of sustainable and integrated financing opportunities for (a) promoting greenhouse gas reductions, (b) sequestering carbon, (c) increasing water-holding capacity of the soil, and (d) increasing crop yields. The CDFA has drafted a framework for this program and will be inviting public comments beginning in January 2017.

The Healthy Soils Initiative and Program clearly target California’s agriculture industry. Why should home gardeners find this work interesting?

  1. It addresses issues that are important for every resident of the state, and that require long-term, comprehensive strategies for effective action.
  2. Home gardeners could (and should) adopt their own Healthy Soil goals and action plan to pursue within their respective gardens.
  3. By adopting the Healthy Soils Initiative, California both acts constructively to improve the quality of life within the state and provides a practical model for other states and indeed for the world. Everyone has a stake in this program’s success.

The CDFA has recently updated its website for the Healthy Soils Initiative. This site offers complete and succinct information on this program. Gardeners should visit the site and consider how they could pursue an equivalent program in their own gardens. Unless the CDFA quickly produces a “Healthy Soil Initiative for Home Gardeners,” watch for it in this column. Your ideas will be welcome!

The Invention of Nature

California’s Board of Education has included five environmental principles for the curriculum:

  • People depend on natural systems.
  • People influence natural systems.
  • Natural systems change in ways that people benefit from and can influence.
  • There are no permanent or impermeable boundaries that prevent matter from flowing between systems.
  • Decisions affecting resources and natural systems are complex and involve many factors.

These very basic ideas certainly are important in learning about the environment.

These principles are an updated version of ideas that were expressed in the early 1800s by Alexander von Humboldt (1969–1859), who presented his views of how the forces of nature interact with one another and about the unity of nature.

At the time, Humboldt’s ideas were the leading edge of leading scientists’ understanding of natural systems. He developed these ideas by traveling extensively through South America and Central America, closely observing nature, and, significantly, learning from the wise practices of native populations.

Humboldt was one of the great polymaths of history. He was the earliest geobotanist, studying the geographic distribution of plants (also called phytogeography), but also made important contributions to meteorology, and geology. His greatest contributions are in the area called terrestrial physics, which deals with the dynamic interconnections that comprise natural systems.

A new book by Andrea Wulf describes Humboldt’s momentous journey through life in impressive and readable detail: The Invention of Nature: Alexander von Humboldt’s New World (Knopf, 2016). The book is organized chronologically, in five parts.

Humboldt shared his extensive knowledge and advanced ideas through extensive publications, correspondence, and public lectures. His major work was Cosmos. Sketch for a Physical Description of the Universe. This five-volume work, was widely read and highly regarded, and added to his reputation as the greatest scientists of his era.

Humboldt conversed with many prominent people of his day and directly or indirectly influenced a long list of scientists, authors, and political leaders, too many to list here.

Today, Humboldt might not be known as well as some other early scientist. Author Andrea Wulf has commented that the truth of Humboldt’s views has become so widely accepted that the man himself has become less visible. Still, many admirers have honored him by attaching his name attached to more places and things than anyone else. These include a northern California county. An impressive list of these recognitions is available in Wikipedia’s entry for Alexander von Humboldt. (See also Wikipedia’s entry, “Humboldtian Science.”)

Andrea Wulf, who has also written about other historically important botanists, has provided a masterful, readable, and valuable account of the “formidable genius” Alexander von Humboldt. The New York Times named The Invention of Nature as one of the best books of 2015 and several additional reviewers recognized its quality, This book presents the fascinating story of a man who explained the natural context in which gardening is done.

Eco-culture at The Garden Faire

The Garden Faire, now in its 11th year, originally focused on the best practices of organic gardening, conserving our finite water supply and protecting our watersheds from chemical contamination.

The Garden Faire spreads out on Skypark's playing fields-300

Click to enlarge

The Faire continues to deliver these messages and has added broader perspectives that emphasize the overarching notions of sustainability and stewardship of the environment.

Another, more recent theme in the Garden Faire’s evolution focuses on the nutritional and healthful aspects of our food. Edible gardening predates ornamental gardening by thousands of years, and responds to our fundamental needs for sustenance, while ornamental gardening feeds higher levels of our consciousness. Edible and ornamental gardening are complementary and each is indispensable within its respective sphere.

The Garden Faire continues to change. This year’s theme, Cultivating an Ecoculture, explores ways that humans already partner with Nature and opportunities to strengthen that critical relationship.

To appreciate the timely importance of ecocultural ideas, consider the development of academic pursuits. At some early point in history, scholars categorized knowledge with the disciplines: natural sciences, social sciences, humanities, and arts. They sub-divided each discipline into the numerous subjects we now encounter in formal education and splintered them further into courses within each subject.

The division of knowledge into academic disciplines responds to the human interest in managing and controlling nature and yields certain conveniences. Scholars can pursue specializations, schools can be organized into departments, courses and books can be labeled in ways that are widely understood.

Such arbitrary and artificial divisions also can lose awareness of the connectedness of biological and cultural diversity, and, indeed, of everything comprised by the diversity of life.

The academic disciplines are constructs, which depend for their existence on the minds of the persons who create them. They are not real objects, which are directly observable.

Today, as we are challenged by global issues of economic instability, resource degradation, biodiversity loss and climate change, our responses must be based on real objects, and on an integrative approach to conserving Nature alongside human culture.

In this pursuit, we can learn from the integrative approaches that indigenous cultures have practiced for millennia. These existing eco-cultures honor the unity of people with the rest of nature.

This brief article is not the place to enumerate specific eco-cultures of the world. For the present, it is sufficient to acknowledge that many groups, through many generations, have followed their instincts to achieve sustainability.

Working in harmony with nature is not a new idea. We see applications of that principle in gardening organically, conserving water wisely, consuming natural foods, exercising regularly to maintain body health. These are integrative practices that we can adopt readily as individuals.

As we increase the scale of human activities, however, and consider policies affecting groups of people, distractions and barriers come into play. The academic disciplines might not always support the connectedness of real objects, but they can serve as the basis of developing ecocultural practices. Indeed, many examples of cross-disciplinary and multidisciplinary initiatives can be cited. More would be helpful.

The work that lies ahead involves applying ecocultural concepts widely, in many (perhaps all) areas of human endeavor. The work includes adapting successful practices from the distant past to succeed in today’s fast-paced, complex society.

This work begins with individuals who grasp the concept and help to shape policies that will help to sustain life. It begins with you.

The world needs many conversations to advance the ecocultural perspective.

The Garden Faire supports one of those conversations for the Monterey Bay area, together with expert speakers on eco-culture, as well as gardening, water conservation, and nutrition. There’s much more: garden-oriented exhibitors, small farm animals, a krauting party, yoga and both familiar and exotic music.

***

IF YOU GO

What: The 11th Garden Faire

When: June 18th, 2016, 9:00 to 4:00, music continues to 9:00

Where: Skypark, Scotts Valley – free admission

Information:

The Garden Faire, now in its 11th year, originally focused on the best practices of organic gardening, conserving our finite water supply and protecting our watersheds from chemical contamination.

The Faire continues to deliver these messages, and has added broader perspectives that emphasize the over-arching notions of sustainability and stewardship of the environment.

Another, more recent theme in the Garden Faire’s evolution focuses on the nutritional and healthful aspects of our food. Edible gardening predates ornamental gardening by thousands of years, and responds to our fundamental needs for sustenance, while ornamental gardening feeds higher levels of our consciousness. Edible and ornamental gardening are complementary and each is indispensable within its respective sphere.

The Garden Faire continues to change. This year’s theme, Cultivating an Ecoculture, explores ways that humans already partner with Nature and opportunities to strengthen that critical relationship.

To appreciate the timely importance of ecocultural ideas, consider the development of academic pursuits. At some early point in history, scholars categorized knowledge with the disciplines: natural sciences, social sciences, humanities and arts. They sub-divided each discipline into the numerous subjects we now encounter in formal education, and splintered them further into courses within each subject.

The division of knowledge into academic disciplines responds to the human interest in managing and controlling nature, and yields certain conveniences. Scholars can pursue specializations, schools can be organized into departments, courses and books can be labeled in ways that are widely understood.

Such arbitrary and artificial divisions also can lose awareness of the connectedness of biological and cultural diversity, and, indeed, of everything comprised by the diversity of life.

The academic disciplines are constructs, which depend for their existence on the minds of the persons who create them. They are not real objects, which are directly observable.

Today, as we are challenged by global issues of economic instability, resource degradation, biodiversity loss and climate change, our responses must be based on real objects, and on an integrative approach to conserving Nature alongside human culture.

In this pursuit, we can learn from the integrative approaches that indigenous cultures have practiced for millennia. These existing eco-cultures honor the unity of people with the rest of nature.

This brief article is not the place to enumerate specific eco-cultures of the world. For the present, it is sufficient to acknowledge that many groups, through many generations, have followed their instincts to achieve sustainability.

Working in harmony with nature is not a new idea. We see applications of that principle in gardening organically, conserving water wisely, consuming natural foods, exercising regularly to maintain body health. These are integrative practices that we can adopt readily as individuals.

As we increase the scale of human activities, however, and consider policies affecting groups of people, distractions and barriers come into play. The academic disciplines might not always support the connectedness of real objects, but they can serve as the basis of developing ecocultural practices. Indeed, many examples of cross-disciplinary and multidisciplinary initiatives can be cited. More would be helpful.

The work that lies ahead involves applying ecocultural concepts widely, in many (perhaps all) areas of human endeavor. The work includes adapting successful practices from the distant past to succeed in today’s fast-paced, complex society.

This work begins with individuals who grasp the concept and help to shape policies that will help to sustain life. It begins with you.

The world needs many conversations to advance the ecocultural perspective.

The Garden Faire supports one of those conversations for the Monterey Bay area, together with expert speakers on eco-culture, as well as gardening, water conservation, and nutrition. There’s much more: garden-oriented exhibitors, small farm animals, a krauting party, yoga and both familiar and exotic music.

***

Tom Karwin is president of the Friends of the UC Santa Cruz Arboretum, president of the Monterey Bay Area Cactus & Succulent Society, and a Lifetime UC Master Gardener (Certified 1999-2009). Visit ongardening.com for links to information on this subject, and send comments or questions to gardening@karwin.com.

IF YOU GO

What: The 11th Garden Faire

When: June 18th, 2016, 9:00 to 4:00, music continues to 9:00

Where: Skypark, Scotts Valley – free admission

Information: http:/ /thegardenfaire.org