followers are also leaders....

In the blogosphere most blogs have followers - call them what you will.

When a new follower clicks on I like to go visit and see what they are bringing to their realm.  Over and over again I am inspired and for so many different reasons. I had a sensationally busy June and July and that's when I had new followers coming along for the ride both here and at my other blog and was finding it hard to keep track.

Can I say welcome to all who have signed on.... its great to be part of a expanding dialogue.

Today there was a new blogger on board and I was so thrilled to see he had posted a story that I also discovered last week and had not yet got round to posting on. He has more than one blog and is doing the most fascinating projects. This one here: The artist as family links with the Museum of Contemporary Art in Sydney, as well as a residency in Newcastle previously and currently yet another engaging one.

FOOD FOREST - OUR CURRENT PROJECT

Artist as Family has been working on a public food forest in Sydney. We proposed this project after being invited by the Museum of Contemporary Art to make a new work for the exhibition In the Balance: Art for a Changing World. We have been documenting the developments of our Food Forest here as it transitions from artist's concept to community asset. This blog will also link to like-minded activities, thinkers, communities and cooperatives around the world who are making intense, creative and joyous transitions to more ecologically embedded ways of living.

Enjoy life, get active, fight the private-capital-pollution ideology that has caused ecological crises!

The other blog which I discovered first is called  Permapoesis and links you to other projects by this industrious artist Patrick Jones. Of course I was immediately drawn to this image...

Twelve Russian scientists famously chose to starve to death rather than eat the unique collection of seeds and plants they were protecting for humanity during the 900-day siege of Leningrad in the second world war. But the world's first global seed bank now faces destruction once more, to make way for a private housing estate.

Read on here.

This was the same story I found at Civil Eats last week:

Development Threatens One of World’s Oldest Fruit Seed Collections

• ENVIRONMENT
• FOOD ACCESS
• TAKE ACTION

August 9th, 2010  By Paula Crossfield

As droughts threaten the wheat harvest in Russia, resulting in a ban on exportsthere this year that is driving up prices abroad, something entirely different now threatens one of the world’s most extensive collection of fruits and berries at the Pavlovsk Experimental Station, a seed bank 19 miles southeast of St. Petersburg: development.
Perhaps one of the oldest in the world, the seed bank was started 84 years ago by Nikolai Vavilov, who died of starvation in one of Joseph Stalin’s labor camps in 1943. His seed bank was famously guarded by 12 scientists who eventually starved to death during the 900-day Siege of Leningrad, despite the fact that they were surrounded by edible seeds. Now, a court will decide on Wednesday if the “priceless” collection of 4,000 varieties from all over the world–which includes 1,000 types of strawberries, and 100 varieties each of raspberries, gooseberries and cherries–will be handed over to the Russian Housing Development Foundation to be cleared for housing. READ MORE

An interesting thought from Patrick's blog by Jiddu Krishnamurti to leave you with:
"It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society."

local indigenous foods...

After the previous post which featured a newly published bilingual book on plants from a region in the Northern Territory this is something occurring in the Brisbane region in early September which showcases indigenous foods and plants and for me is a first for an event of this kind.  I'll be keen to get along and see whats being presented. At the start of the residency the desire to become aquainted with local indigenous plants - particularly foods - was foremost in my mind as they are not part of common everyday knowledge for many people in the region yet are more readily suited to this location and climate than much that is grown here.

Do read the previous post if you have time and thank you to Marilena for this excellent link!

Website:  www.dreamtime.auz.net

Marri Ngarr & Magati Ke plants and animals

I was listening to AWAYE yesterday on Radio National  - the program on the Koori Heritage Trust also featured a story on the newly published book  - see post title - a "comprehensive book filled with bio-cultural knowledge of plants and animals in the Wadeye (Port Keats) and Daly River region was launched earlier this year, helping to keep culture alive. 

Awaye - which means 'listen up" in the Arrernte language of Central Australia is an aboriginal art and culture radio program has been going for over 17 years now:

Awaye! 15th anniversary season

5 July 2008 - 16 August 2008
Awaye! celebrates its 15th anniversary, with a selection of its best programs - ranging from the handback of Uluru Kata-Tjuta National Park to its traditional owners to the extraordinary story of the Gija people of the north-east Kimberley, and their struggle to keep their community and culture alive. Learn about the history of Awaye! and its presenters over the years. [find out more...]

As soon as I hear the introductory call of this show it takes me somewhere and I have to stop and listen... think what I am doing... "listen up" indeed!

Why I was keen to feature this book on the Homage to the Seed Blog is that I am thinking it may be the first bilingual book of its kind... covering carefully accumulated knowledge from up to 40 different people...one of whom is said to be the last one to speak a particular language important to this book. As such it is an enormously important book. Something I have come to appreciate far more this year is that plants and people are intimately involved and often where a species is becoming endangered so may a language be disappearing ( or have gone).

From the start of the residency I was curious about the plants indigenous to this region...especially edible species for the fact they have been so ignored. We may know what is to be found commonly growing in this region that could be perhaps planted in the garden or at least identified on a walk - but far less focus has been on edible plants... early settlers may well have known more than we do now... but that curiosity did not last for the main...as food became more available it seems most sources of indigenous food were overlooked.

This book has renewed interest already it seems for certain plants... and I think will be well worth a read.

Aboriginal knowledge of flora and fauna from the Moyle River and Neninh areas, north Australia

Marri Ngarr & Magati Ke plants and animals is the largest ethnobiology ever published in the Northern Territory. It is the result of extensive work by over 40 people and contains the Marri Ngarr and Magati Ke traditional names and ecological knowledge for over 660 plants and animals. It also includes the scientific names, English common names and the Murrinhpatha names.

Author: 

 Ngarul Jimmy Nambatu

 Palibu Patrick Nudjulu

 Lungung Johnny Nama (deceased)

 Kurrangu James Munar (deceased)

 Dittin Aloysius Kungul (deceased)

 Larri Rex Munar

 Killinang Benedict Tchinburrurr

 Mawanyngu Jeannie Jongmin (deceased)

 Yilimu Bernadine Kungul

 Patricia Marrfurra McTaggart

 Mark Crocombe

 Glenn Wightman

Desktop Publisher: 

 Russell Hanna

Also available at this Publishing Company:

Kunjba wardan baki kunjba jingkal ngambalangi munji munji

Karrwa bush foods and medicines

A group of Borroloola women produced this book to share their knowledge of Karrwa bush foods and the Karrwa language with others. The book is bilingual in Karrwa and English and includes an audio CD of plant names in Karrwa.

Iwaidja shell poster

This poster of shells found on Croker Island and the Coburg Peninsula in the Northern Territory features photos and names in Iwaidja and English

seedheads...

great images from crownology

from garden fool now - an echinacea seed head. Em is a wonderful photographer who would never claim that  as her profession is altogether in a different direction - but for well over a year I have been inspired by visiting her blog and see what is occurring in her fabulous garden in the state of New York.... 4 seasons with very distinct changes... for someone in the sub-tropics this is a revelation!

clematis roguchi seed head - gf

dandelion - gf

 Of late my camera has not been working too well... and i have been having a mid year break. Back soon!

le chemin des grands jardins...

working directly from nature ... Roger Dautais - view more at the blog here.