us

Who, What, Where, and Why we are (and When to visit)

SeeMore Green (aka Seymour Green) is a collective garden on Dalhousie campus, behind the big blue house numbered 1411 Seymour, (between Coburg and University). It is not a community garden the way most think of a community garden, with the little plots that belong to individuals; we garden together and learn from each other. Gardening nights are Tuesday from 5:30 to 8:30 and are on a casual, drop-in, all-welcome basis. There will be a phat list of fun things to do so you can chose the activity you are interested in. Sometimes expertish-folk will come by now and then to share with us their wisdom; those dates will be posted on the calendar. If you have some expertish-ness to share and are interested in running a workshop, please email us at mycelium (at) nspirg.org, and let us know what you’d like to share and when you’d be available. Give us a month’s notice and we can likely find you a spot.

A map of SeeMore's immediate surroundings - click for MapQuest!

Workshop attendees and collective gardeners of all levels of ability and experience are welcome. There is an annual vegetable area of the garden, perfect for super-beginners who want to learn how to plant a seed and grow a tomato. We are also beginning a permaculture-style forest garden of native woodland plants. Putting in these perrennial gardens will give folks an opportunity to learn about edible and medicinal native plants; fibre, dye, and art-supply plants; as well as permaculture principles and techniques. The site also has rainbarrels, a green roof, a strawbale shed, and container gardens as do-able examples of greener living.

The site also wants to function as an urban agriculture hub; a gardening free-store, or bio-depot of sorts. The community is invited to bring any containers, seeds, plants, soil, amendments, or tools that they can spare to the site. Hopefully there will be big piles of available free things for good folk who are up to good work to use. In this way, we can support the many people involved in urban agriculture in Halifax.

When you come to the site you will see the bulletin boards with garden happenings, resource lists, and other juicy tidbits of inspiration and information. You can post notes to each other – there, or on this here blog. It is hoped those bulletin boards become ad-hoc art exhibits. Maybe even the art will stretch out beyond the garden, into the surrounding streets, inspiring more beauty and provoking thought on how we can be better animals to our landbase.

We need to stock our cities full of food and medicine. As my friend John said, “Basically, the survival of our species depends on our ability to feed ourselves.” There is a lot of talk about food security, the importance of local-organic food, and preparing for the energy descent to a post-oil world. Whether we think it is coming sooner or later, we know that our present way of living is unsustainable, and destructive. And we know that good food and good health is … well, good. Let’s do it. The more food, medicine, and other biological resources we have available, and skills, the more graceful our future will be.

The Mailing List: Lots of gardening info is shared, and discussions pursued, on the GardenHalifax mailing list (listserve). To join and start receiving emails telling you about gardening events in Greater Haligonia, browse to https://lists.riseup.net/www/subscribe/gardenhalifax. You can also read the mailing list archives.