20 food initiatives to get excited about

In the latest issue of Regina's Briarpatch magazine, the staff had a look into some of the country's most exciting food initiatives... and look who made the list!

"Briarpatch is a contemporary issues magazine with a chip on its shoulder and a fire in its belly. Fiercely independent and frequently irreverent, Briarpatchtackles today’s most pressing problems from a radical, grassroots perspective. Publishing bimonthly, Briarpatch conspires to provoke, inspire and empower its readers in their efforts to build a better world..."

20 food initiatives to get excited about

Community kitchens, food costing, markets and more!

BY BRIARPATCH STAFF • AUG 25, 2011 • ACTION

Illustration: Claudia Dávila

A recent study on the Canadian food movement found it to be uniquelydecentralized and self-propagating in comparison to other social movements. Through phone and e-mail conversations with food activists across the country, Briarpatch learned about dozens of inter-connected but independent food-related initiatives that together are crafting a network of more sustainable, democratic and inclusive food systems that challenge our current corporate, industrial model. What follows is a small sampling of the most exciting initiatives we came across.

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18. Landless GardenersFredericton, N.B.The landless gardeners grow organic vegetables communally on the donated lawns of private landowners in downtown Fredericton. They start their seeds in a greenhouse donated by the Conservation Council of New Brunswick. The gardeners are dedicated to promoting and enhancing community gardening in Fredericton and have held numerous public workshops.For more info, e-mail landlessgardeners@gmail.com.

Click here to view the entire article and see what other exciting initiatives are happening around the country!

Landless Under Attack!

The real dirt: City squashes front yard veggie plot

Published October 22, 2010, The Star

What constitutes a “natural” garden to the City of Toronto?

Grass, apparently. Just grass. Plus, perhaps a few flowers. But certainly not vegetables.

That’s what Sylvie and Vic Oliveira discovered this summer after they turned their Bloor West Village front yard into a vegetable garden.

The Oliveiras live at 26 Deforest Rd., on the corner of Runnymede Ave. It’s a big renovated house, which virtually fills their backyard. So last spring, they thought it would be fun for the family (they have four young kids) to grow some veggies and herbs in the L-shaped space that adjoins the sidewalk out front.

The kids were enthusiastic. The Oliveiras got busy. They planted a cornucopia of crops — tomatoes, eggplant, lettuce, cabbage, corn and herbs. And everything grew so well (the past long hot season was great for veggies) that their little corner-of-the-street experiment became a bit of a novelty in the neighbourhood.

“The neighbours seemed to like it,” says Sophie Oliveira. “No one complained to us. One lady even admitted snitching a ripe tomato and I told her I had absolutely no problem with that. The garden was here for all the community to enjoy.”

Their efforts looked so striking and different, I dropped by one night in August to compliment the family. That’s when I heard about The Letter. The Oliveiras had just received it from the City’s transportation services department — a terse missive demanding that they remove all the vegetable plants immediately and...

To access the full article click here.

Short of Land, but Not Ingenuity

Landless Gardeners in the news! HERE magazine sat down with one of our own, Andi Emrich, to talk about the group and our beginnings.


To access the entire article click here.

Bringing Food Home... De la nourriture de chez nous

More garden Wrap Up: Tuesday September 21 ***6:00p.m.***

We had a great day on Saturday digging, pulling and picking in the beautiful September sun and we are now well on our way to wrapping up for the year. Because of the whispers of risks of frost, we harvested all of the tomatoes, cucmbers, basil and other herbs, and the hot peppers... we even took out the rest of the potatoes as they are easy to store.

This means that there are a lot of vegetables for the taking! Loads and loads of potatoes and tomatoes will be brought to the Grey Street garden on Tuesday evening and are up for grabs!

Hope to see many faces out this Tuesday. here are the details:

When: Tuesday September 21 ***6:00p.m.***
Where: Grey Street Garden
What: a bit of harvesting and a lot of taking of vegetables

27 July 10

Our square-foot gardening is becoming a veritable checkerboard of greenery! Every week brings some changes as crops move from square to square, hopping skipping and jumping their way with each harvest and new seeding. This week's big mover - lettuce!



In a dramatic gambit, fresh lettuce transplants from our greenhouse at Conserver House take up three - three! - whole beds, in near-complete lock up of the entire east end of the garden.




Bravely bracing between the lettuce and the tomatoes, the onions stand ever tall



while the red cabbage just keep getting bigger and bigger, thicker and thicker and menacingly Audrey II-esque - be careful!



while the marigolds seem to be suffering from... something weird. Most flowers shine bright yellow, while others look like they've been hit by some kind of anti-marigold death ray. Zap!

The beauty of gardening, of course, is seeing the stuff you usually get on your plate, in its natural environment. Kind of like the special features track on a DVD, or a "making of" special. To wit - An Apiacean Adventure: The Making of Coriander - from plant



to leaf



to flower and seed



Can't you just taste that coriander goodness - how about a coriander pesto chicken salad whilst waiting for the basil to come out? (Speaking of basil - stay tuned, coming soon!)

Urban Gardening Workshop August 14, 2010

Curious about growing your own food? Ever wondered how a plant a garden? Have a

planting project and want to get advice from experts? Then this workshop is for you!

Falls Brook Centre, in collaboration with Landless Gardeners, will be hosting a workshop

on urban gardening. Farming guru, Shannon Herbert, with many years experience in

gardening and animal husbandry, will be leading the workshop. She will be providing

participants with an understanding of the ins and outs of gardening.

Topics covered in the workshop include: companion planting; urban gardening methods

and projects; backyard composting and vermiculture; beneficial insects; seed saving,

and; urban gardening as building activism. The workshop will provide an opportunity for

classroom discussion as well as hands on applications, so that participants can walk away

with the experience needed to start their own gardening projects.

If you have a garden project in mind, be sure to bring your questions and ask the experts.

This is your chance to get advice on how to make your project a success.

This weekend workshop runs from 9-5 both Saturday, August 14th. Registration fee is

$25 for the day. Lunch is not included, but the workshop will be a 5 minute walk from

Fredericton’s Farmers Market, or bring your own. Space is limited, so book your spot

today!

For more information on this workshop and to register, please contact Greg LeBlanc,

workshop coordinator – by email: greg@fallsbrookcentre.ca or by phone: (506) 375-

4310.