Inside Urban Green

Dear Mr. President

Update: As of 9:05 am ET January 29 there are 3,967 questions about marijuana and only 1 about what I posted about. There are obviously a lot of people who are well organized (and funded) around pot growing but don't get it about urban food growing.

Is marijuana our national priority over new job creation, hunger, better nutrition, obesity and childhood lead poisoning? If it is, we have bigger problems in this country than I realized.

 Many of you may know that the White House sent an email invitation to post a question to the president on YouTube. I did! This is a screenshot (no live links) of my question to President Obama in 250 characters and spaces or less.  Both the "watch video link" and the bit.ly link go to the logo video on TEDxManhattan.

To find the question scroll down to the Search box on the right and search on the word SIPs or sub-irrigated. Please do yourself and all the children you know a favor by giving it a thumbs up, Tweet it and do whatever else you can do in the great big wide world of social networking to share the question with others.

I truly regret not having my social networkng act together yet, but I will very soon! The Dear Mr President question is only the start of things to come. A new activist web site to get modern methods into the so-called Peoples Gardens including the White House Lawn garden is in the very near future.

With no demonstration of a dirt garden alternative like SIP beds and boxes they should be called the Some of the Peoples Gardens.

Thanks to the UN FAO organization, The Growing Connection, there are a few EarthBoxes in the USDA Peoples Garden in D.C. Other than this rather anemic demonstration that few Americans know about the rest of the gardens are all about top-watered dirt boxes.

These inaccurately named Peoples Gardens are certainly not gardens for all the people who live in concrete jungle cities, particularly inner city neighborhoods of color. 

Here are some very smart people who get it and deserve your recognition.

Rick Bayless, chef extrordinaire and a favorite of Barack and Michelle Obama grows vegetables on the roof of Frontera Grill in EarthBox SIPs. Smart chef! Smart Chicagoan!

Vikram Bhatt, Director of the McGill School of Architecture’s Minimum Cost Housing Group (MCHG) initiated the McGill Edible Campus. This award winning campus garden was created by students who made the SIP planters from recycled materials. The campus is a joy to behold. Smart educator, smart students! Smart Canadians!

The Rooftop Garden Project in Montreal is the grand daddy of rooftop gardens all over the world. It has been a proving ground for many different sub-irrigation and simple hydroponics methods for many years. The young people who staff this and other gardens provide fresh vegetables to the Santropol Roulant kitchen. Read their rooftop gardening guidebook. Watch a video about the project. Smart rooftop gardeners! Smart Canadians

Ken Waagner, unsung hero of modern urban gardening, managed to get EarthBox SIPs installed on the granite steps of the Museum of Science and Industry and the rooftop deck of the Smart Home. Smart business man! Smart Chicagoan! (smart museum CEO and smart architect too!)

Ron Wolford, Madiem Kawa, of the U of IL Extention Program and Cook County Master Gardners are the ones who create, manage and maintain the innovative gardens, including EarthBox SIPs on the grounds of the Museum of Science and Industry & Smart Home. Smart educators! Smart Chicagoans!

Johanne Daoust in Toronto discovered SIPs last year, converted her entire rooftop garden (including traditional raised beds) and heard the applause of all of her friends. Smart professor! Smart Canadian! Read a prior post here.

Long time penpal Heidi Hough who created the SIP acronym, has been growing in SIP buckets for years. Smart editor! Smart Chicagoan!

Helen Cameron, co-owner of Uncommon Ground restaurants in Chicago grows some of her rooftop vegetables in EarthBox SIPs and also created a sidewalk garden with them. Smart business woman! Smart Chicagoan!

Lorraine Gibbons of Garden State Urban Farms founded a socially responsible business serving the needs of New Jersey urbanites of all stripes, including Newark Mayor Cory Booker. She grows in many EarthBox SIPs as well as a hydroponic greenhouse. Smart business woman! Smart New Jersian! Smart Mayor!

Larry Hall invented a very creative way to use SIPs and rain gutters to make an auto-irrigated gardening system. This SIP system has enormous potential for urban food production, school and community gardens in particular. Larry has done this for social good. Smart inventor! Smart Minnesotan!   

There are many, many more smart SIP gardeners across the country and around the world. We just haven't organized yet, but we will!

 

 

Michelle Obama Betrays Women With Book Deal

Here is just what we need, yet another gardening (also insert houseplant) book written by someone with no more than anecdotal experience on the subject.

If we ever get into book burning in this country, this is where we should start.

My name is Bob. I publish this blog. I know about the '50's because I was there watching Father Knows Best and I endorse this message.

via thestir.cafemom.com

When I heard Michelle Obama was finally going to write a book, I can't be the only American woman who had high hopes. A powerful woman and a feminist icon gets a book deal; I could hear it being shouted in the streets. Finally, one of the most inspiring women on today's political scene will put pen to paper and wow us with her thoughts ... on gardening?

Wait, that's ... it? We have a First Lady who graduated from Harvard, and all you'll let her write about is the White House garden? Paging 1950, you can have your first lady back. We'd prefer our version be allowed to tackle something a little more meaty.

A White House Urban Greenscaping Perspective

These aerial views of the White House complex show that there are many locations for sub-irrigated container plants both edible and decorative. There is no need for tearing up the lawn or tilling the earth. 

The entire complex from East to West Wings could be a demonstration of 21st century urban greenscaping and an example for cities across the country. 

                                                          All photos are from the White House Museum

Note the 3rd floor promenade and sun room and 2nd floor Truman balcony.

A closer view of the sun room and promenade/patio where President Eisenhower cooked on his grill. 

A promenade view from the north. 

A satellite view of the entire White House complex. 

An early post card view showing trees growing in containers. 

A Modern 21st Century Garden on the White House Roof

There is a better way than tearing up the White House lawn. 

                                                           The White House Museum

This is not a straw hat president. He’s a thoroughly modern man.

                                                    Jim Young/Reuters

And thoroughly modern Michelle is committed to raising awareness of eating nutritiously  

                                                                                          The White House Museum

Yes, that is President "Ike" Eisenhower sometime in the late 1950s.  

Fast forward to the 21st century and replace those old-fashioned planters with sub-irrigated grow boxes (EarthBoxes, for example). 

This picture could be President Obama, First Lady Michelle Obama, or Sasha and Malia Obama picking heirloom tomatoes up on the roof for a family cookout. No problem with security--or soil contamination--up here! 

Sub-irrigated grow boxes could be producing fresh and nutritious personal food for the first family and their friends with no need for shovels and tillable earth. They could even invite Rick Bayless, a  favorite Chicago chef, and his wife Deann to view the new White House vegetable farm. Bayless knows how to grow in EarthBoxes--he has them on his restaurant roof. 

Using 21st-century methods, the first family could demonstrate that we can all grow exceptional food anywhere there’s enough sunlight. We don't need to be farmers and gardeners unless we choose to be. 

What a forward-looking and uplifting message an Obama family photo like this would send to the country and the world. Did you know that the Growing Connection (a UN agency) funds the use of EarthBoxes in under-developed countries and even in some of our public schools? We could use more of them to our collective advantage in the neighborhoods of our largest cities, where fresh food can be hard to find. 

Victory Gardens were a great idea...in 1940. They are a revered part of American history, but they are just that...history. 

I didn't just read about Victory Gardens. I am a Victory Gardener with fond memories from a prior century. It's time, however, to move forward in the modern world. 

Lead the way, Mr. President.