All Posts Tagged With: "Bioneers"

Two dear friends, Erin Mitchell of BlueGreen Acupuncture and Tracy Ward, publisher of Urbanite magazine, are live in Marin, CA, at the Bioneers conference. Here is the first of their dispatches.

I am busting at the seams with inspiration here in Marin County, San Rafael California at the 22nd annual national Bioneers Conference. The Agricultural institute of Marin took us on a 9-hour tour of what’s really going on with agriculture, food and farming. I was with a group of about 45 folks today on this tour of Marin County’s farms and the latest in “thrive-ability” projects. Just so you know…the new buzz word is “thrive-ability” to replace its less enthusiastic sister, “sustainability”. One comes from abundance and the other comes from mediocrity. And I assure you the former is what’s happening!!! Thrive-ability!

It’s been less than 24 hours and I’ve already learned so much:

• We will be able to sequester carbon emissions 4 times the amount of our output simply by using organic compost to fertilize grass-grazed pastures.
• We can harvest seeds in weeds that are native to the land for our food supply of necessary complex carbohydrates (and they taste AWESOME).
• Extra virgin olive oil purchased in the U.S. only has to be 10% virgin for it to count as being extra virgin. And that the only thing that can kill an olive tree is too much water (not even fire can kill it)
• Diversifying farms are key to viability. For example, a 140-year-old organic dairy farm (which was only 75% organic for a VERY good reason) has started a pumpkin patch and cheese factory in order to bring in more income to the land.
• From my lessons from Suzie Q I taught the group how to stick four fingers in a baby calf’s mouth and they will suck until the sun goes down – it’s gotta be one of the coolest feelings!
• You can ferment rice to make lactose and spray lettuce leaves to kill microbes and create greens that are full of nutrients instead of eating lettuce that’s only nitrogen and water (even the “organic” stuff may not be nutrient filled. )
• Growing rabbit is a very economical and sustainable way of producing protein and it doesn’t need refrigeration. Imagine.
• We are teaching the Rabbit growing techniques to emerging countries like Haiti. This was started by a mom helping her daughter with a 4H project in school and has now turned into an international model!
• You can be a beginner in change.
• You can stumble into your passion and world work if you stay open.
• What’s most astonishing is that the people who have discovered these things range anywhere from construction workers to software developers to graphic designers to children’s book writers. The common theme with all of them is they decided at a point in their lives not to focus on their failures but rather to focus on what was going right and making their successes thrive.

Quotes from ordinary people today….

“I want all the children to know that underneath the concrete is a beautiful garden.”

“We can measure democracy by what’s on the plate at school lunch.”

“Nature misses us.” (Referring to a native plant/weed that produces a delicious seed and it’s dying off. It only reproduces or grows if you pick it. HA!)

P.S. from Tracy:

Yesterday was equally inspiring with learnings from the CEO of Stonyfield Farms, a guy who started making organic yogurt in his backyard and now has a 310 million dollar company that is profitable and supports local farms. The company has figured out that making decisions that are good for the planet have boosted profitability every step of the way.

And later, we heard from a team of people who have figured out how to manage grazing in such a way to fully restore habitats lost to desertification (due to over grazing), all while increasing profitability, carbon sequestration, and amazingly the land’s capacity to handle more grazing. And, finally, a presentation by a totally inspiring woman from Brooklyn who has started an urban farm that makes me weep with possibility.

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Stay tuned for more updates. We’d love to hear your comments — what inspires you about this news?

This phrase was ringing in my ears yesterday morning. As the youngest of four, I heard it a lot growing up. I usually received it as an indication that I was lacking something, just not quick or experienced enough to catch on to what the big kids or the grownups were talking about.

I’m feeling that way lately. Confused, unsure. Certainly, we are dwelling in a time of great uncertainty. Joanna Macy‘s great keynote at Bioneers 2009 was all about this. Her talk, which, alas, is NOT up on YouTube, was titled, “The Hidden Promise of Our Dark Age: Discovering Our Wisdom, Strength, and Beauty in the Midst of Crisis.” Nobody does dark-and-light better than Joanna!

She spoke very lucidly about the three intertwining stories we are living. The first is “business-as-usual” — the industrial growth society. The second is the story of the great unravelling of living systems on this planet. The third is the Great Turning, from the industrial growth society to a healthy, living, balanced planet, a life-sustaining society.

There are no guarantees here. It strikes me that, in order to choose the third, societies all around the world (particularly our own) will have to grow up, to step out into the unknown, to be courageous and act in faith. In order to stand up to the power structures of the First Story, to take another path from “how it’s always been done” (which is a lie, anyway).

As Joanna puts it, we have managed to get ourselves born into this incredible time! It’s nothing short of a major revolution, along the lines of the agricultural and the industrial revolutions that propelled our species forward in great leaps. This is happening; it’s not theoretical. It is out there in our heart-minds (Joanna’s words, so apt). We can absolutely choose to join our voices with those of indigenous peoples who have always known of our connection to the web of life, our oneness with All.

At the same time, this is not a given. We have no guarantees that the Second Story won’t continue to play out as a result of our clinging to the First Story. That’s where the uncertainty comes in. We are VERY uncomfortable with uncertainty, and we try to avoid or ignore it at all cost.

Macy encourages us to see the gifts in this uncertainty, to get the gold from the dross as an alchemist would. Rather than elaborate on her list, I invite you to come up with your own. It’s rich, let me tell you! I will close with a poem that she read, neatly summing up these gifts. It’s Rilke’s last Sonnet to Orpheus (second section):

Quiet friend who has come so far,
feel how your breathing makes more space around you.
Let this darkness be a bell tower
and you the bell. As you ring,

what batters you becomes your strength.
Move back and forth into the change.
What is it like, such intensity of pain?
If the drink is bitter, turn yourself to wine.

In this uncontainable night,
be the mystery at the crossroads of your senses,
the meaning discovered there.

And if the world has ceased to hear you,
say to the silent Earth: I flow.
To the rushing water, speak: I am.

Living almost anywhere you’re probably familiar with at least one or two abandoned buildings, left unattended for years and years. Here in Baltimore you can scan whole blocks of vacancies. These sore-spots have become the inspiration for small and large efforts to revitalize some of the staggering 40,000 vacant homes and abandoned lots through innovation, idea building and conversation. One such project called Baltimore Infill Survey has just sent me a notification by email this morning. Their idea is, if you had it your way, what would you do with an abandoned lot or vacant space? This project originally came out of an idea which was presented at the 2008 Bioneers Conference this past November. Organized as a breakout session called Urban Economic Development and Visionary Green Design and Development, the project brought together architects, developers and urban critics. They came up with a pre-fab building concept called The Plant which would serve energy needs of the surrounding residents, within a mile radius. Read more about what I wrote in November here or here at Urban Palimpsest.

Make your claim and join the project . Really, what would you do!??

It was an exciting weekend at the 2008 Baltimore Bioneers Conference, held at the Maryland Institute Collage of Art. Julie and I were able to screen our video first thing Friday morning to open the event. A short 8 min. animated slide presentation of the transition from some of the issues Baltimore faces, socially and environmentally, as a post industrial city, combined with inspiring solutions that are cropping up all over town. I’d like to thank everyone for the positive response and we hope to upload a version to the website as soon as we can.
Some personal highlights from the conference came from a keynote by mycologist and author Paul Stamets, and two breakout sessions on Urban Agriculture as Urban Economic Development and Visionary Green Design and Development.

Read more about each one… Continued