A Life Unprocessed: Wild Foraging in April
Each month Mellow DeTray contributes, A Life Unprocessed, a column about living a frugal and sustainable life in Burien.
I just did my third Edible Weeds class with Melany Vorass (check her blog Weed Cuisine out here!) through Sustainable Burien. There are still lots of greens to be foraged, though as many of them start to flower the leaves become a bit less palatable. While April is too early for berries around here, there were a surprising amount of edible plants that we found on our short walk at this urban park. Some of my photos didn’t turn out so great, so please use this information in combination with Google or Wikipedia to find out how to more thoroughly identify these plants. Pfaf.org is another website where you can obtain info on plant edibility. Also, check out my previous post on edible foraging in February.
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| Melany demonstrates how to remove the “hula skirts” from horsetail stems. This papery layer must be removed from the stalks before they are safe to eat. Younger plants, before they branch out, contain less silica and are safer. (more…) |
Burien’s Environmental Science Center Announces Free Workshop, Don’t Feed the Monster, on March 10th
BURIEN, March 5th – The Environmental Science Center (ESC), Sustainable Burien, Permaculture Now! and Sustainable West Seattle (Tox-Ick.org) with support from the City of Burien, King County, and The Russell Family Foundation are sponsoring a FREE workshop for the public. Please join us in the Multipurpose Room at the Burien Library (400 SW 152nd Street, Burien) on Sunday, March 10th, 2013 from 2:00pm – 4:00pm.
The workshop Don’t Feed the Monster will now include a presentation from Jenny Pell from Permaculture Now! She will speak on ways you can improve your yard to become more functional as well as benefit our watershed. Puget Sound diver, Laura James, will still present on the health of Puget Sound and seven easy ways we can all help protect it. (more…)
Burien urban Garden Tour Takes Place August 12
Your Sustainable Yard – Native Plants and Sustainable Gardening Info Session
Have you ever wondered how to have a beautiful yard even without frequent watering or using harmful pesticides? Using native landscaping and organic pesticides can make that happen.
Sustainable Burien and the Environmental Science Center are holding a seminar on Sunday, March 18th from 2:00-4:00pm in Burien Library‘s Multipurpose Room.
This seminar, meeting during Sustainable Burien’s normal meeting time, will teach landscaping with natural plants, composting yard and organic waste, using natural pesticides, and managing storm water run-off.
Register at outreach@envsciencecenter.org or by calling 206.248.4266.
Participants receive a free native plant!
Your Sustainable Yard
March 18, 2012 2:00-4:00pm
Burien Library Multipurpose Room
400 SW 152nd St
Burien, WA 98166
Update: What Does ‘Sustainable’ Mean to You? Sustainable Burien Wants Your Opinions on July 10th
Just a reminder, today Sustainable Burien is holding a meeting to find out what you think ‘sustainable’ means. The meeting is 2-4pm at the first floor meeting room in the Burien Library. Below is the original article that we posted last week.
Next Sunday, Sustainable Burien wants to know what ‘sustainable’ means to you. They’ll be holding a meeting to hear your thoughts on July 10, in the first floor meeting room at the Burien Library from 2-4pm.
Sustainable Burien sent us an email and had this to say:
“Sustainable Burien wants to broaden its outreach. Please come and help us to brainstorm the key principles of sustainability. We’ll be asking you to share your thoughts on how we can make Burien a place that is resilient, healthy, sustainable, fun… Please join us! We need you!”
Sustainable Burien
Sunday, July 10, 2-4pm
400 SW 152nd St
Burien, WA. 98166
Contact Bill or Rebecca for more info: 206.243.9366
Sustain: Natural Yard Care Event
Each week Michael Stein-Ross contributes Sustain, a column about community & sustainability in Burien.
There’s a free workshop I recommend you check out this coming Tuesday.
Here are three reasons why:
•We are all responsible for the health of Puget Sound (which is essential to our well-being)
•I want Lake Burien to be clean when it eventually opens up for public use.
•The Marine Tech Center at Seahurst Park is a sweet place to visit.
When and where:
Tuesday July 12, 2011 from 6:00p – 8:30p
at the Marine Tech Center at Seahurst Park
2400 Southwest 140th Street, Burien, WA
I’ve written about rain gardens before as a way to divert run-off water from storm-drains to an area that cleans the water as it slowly percolates into the ground water. This workshop isn’t about rain gardens, but I’m betting they mention them.
According to the organizers you will learn “how to incorporate more native plants that use less water, how to attract more wildlife, and how to improve soil and water health, and the overall health of the Puget Sound.” Who wouldn’t want that?
If you want to help keep Puget Sound healthy, register for this workshop. It’ll be a good starting point for positive action, or a nice refresher if you are already on your way. And then a stroll along the beach? Heck yes.
Sustain: Native Plants in Burien
Each week Michael Stein-Ross contributes Sustain, a column about community & sustainability in Burien.
If our goal is to build a sustainable Burien community – adaptable, inventive and resilient in the face of social, economic, or really any type of change – we must look backwards in time to see what has worked over the long term. About 12,000 years ago the ice sheet that covered Cascadia was retreating. What evolved thereafter were the plants and trees that we now call native species. As Jean Spohn, one of Burien’s native plant experts, would say, “they have adapted to play well together.” By working with the other species of their ecosystem, native plants create diverse, strong plant communities and they have sustained these communities for a very long time. The opposite of native species are those that settlers brought with them – the aptly named “non-native species”. Some of them, like English Ivy or Himalayan Blackberry, invade whole areas, reducing diversity and choking out other species in their sprawl. (It’s interesting to note that the culture of the settlers did and still does encourage the same behavior.) According to the Washington Native Plant Society, “invasive non-native plants are one of the biggest threats to native ecosystems, second only to habitat conversion.” In our work towards a sustainable Burien, we need to protect local native plant communities and in so doing hopefully we will learn from them.
Why we need to protect native plants:
- Short on water? Native plants survive on rain – no need to water.
- Short on time and money? Native plants need no fertilizer.
- Worried about bugs? Native plants coexist with native insects – no need for pesticides.
- Want to keep animals around? Native plants provide food, shelter, nesting material for native wildlife – without them native insects, amphibians, birds and mammals will not survive.
- Want clean water in the aquifers? Native plants protect water quality.
- Don’t want the Eagle Landing trail to drop onto the beach? Native plants control steep slopes.
- Like pretty things? Native plants are beautiful.
What we might learn from native plants:
According to Jean Spohn, we will learn to think in terms of greater systems. Native plants are an integral part of the terrestrial and marine food web. Most insects are specialists – meaning they only eat a few species of plants. Native plants evolved dependent on native insects and native animals and birds evolved to eat native insects, etc. Taking any piece out of a system disrupts the entire web and conversely, protecting one strand of the web protects all strands. The more time we spend with native plants, the easier it will be to see the human role in this web, and then to make the necessary changes to our way of life so that the web may be repaired and sustained.
We will also learn to look for local sources of food and supplies – to establish a sustainable lifestyle that is not reliant on goods from far away. Humans who lived in this region before the invasion of humans from Europe used native plants for all sorts of things: food, medicine, buildings, clothing, and artistic endeavors. Minor’s lettuce leaves, flowers and stems can be used in both salads and cooked dishes – It tastes similar to spinach. Redwood Sorrel leaves have a wonderfully lemony taste and can excite any salad bowl. Evergreen Huckleberry, Thimbleberry, Salmon Berry and wild strawberries all produce edible berries and are easy to harvest. Native peoples referred to the cedar tree as the “tree of life” because they were able to use every single part in their daily lives.
One doesn’t have to go to Burien’s more wild places – Seahurst Park trials, Eagle Landing, Salmon Creek Ravine – to find native plants. There are surely some within a two minute walk from where you are right now. Below you’ll find some resources to help you recognize natives (and invasives) and how to integrate them into landscapes:
- A wonderful and comprehensive place to learn about northwest native plants: Starflower Image Hurbarium.
- If you’d rather have a book in hand, try The People of Cascadiaby Heidi Bohan or Plants of the Pacific Northwest Coast by Pojar and Mackinnon. Both describe common native uses for some of the plants in their book and both are available at the Burien Library. (While you’re at the library be sure to check out the town square rain garden and general landscaping. It’s chock-full of native plants.)
- ID plants plus find landscaping plans and how-to articles at the King County Native Plant Guide.
- It’s difficult to find native plants in local nurseries but here is one that keeps adding to their stock: Village Green Perennial Nursery in West Seattle.
Sustain: Interview with Bill Opfermann and Rebecca Dare
Each week Michael Stein-Ross contributes Sustain, a column about community & sustainability in Burien.
For this week’s column I wanted to share the thoughts of a local couple who I very much admire. Bill Opfermann and Rebecca Dare are not the type of sustainability and community activists who would be formally recognized by the city for their leadership, nor are they the type of people who would seek such recognition. While some people know who they are, many many more have been affected by their work without knowing it. They are Sustainable Burien board members and keep an incredibly busy schedule, so it was a real treat to be able to sit in their dining room for a comfortable chat. I’ve transcribed some of the highlights below. (more…)