Started working on this area underneath a tree last spring. Common blue violet, eastern columbine and wild geranium make up the groundcover.
I planted Virginia spiderwort too, but the cottontails feasted on them 🐇
And an update on my violet post from last year. They're filling in this area nicely under the elderberry:
This is awesome! Love seeing the younger generations getting involved and that your SO lost his mind when he found out lol.
So glad you chose solarpunk as your home on the fediverse :) It was a big reason I chose this instance and I'm happy to be part of the team!
These communities may be helpful:
Look out for seed or plant swaps in your area. Gardeners are usually very willing to share lol. As for specifics, it would depend where you are in the world.
I love Wild Geranium! The leaves just started emerging here in the Mid-Atlantic (with some violets waking up in the periphery):
After planting these last spring, I found Carolina Geranium growing in a sidewalk crack a few feet away 😆
The main argument of the video is that they are human beings who should be allowed to exist in their own right, outside of the mythologies propagated by polluting corporations and western countercultural movements. It is possible to deconstruct dehumanizing stereotypes while celebrating and advocating for the adoption of traditional ecological practices, but promoting these practices while conceptualizing indigenous people as supernatural fauna is big yuck.
The latter half of the video discusses how they were forced into the market economy to survive, how murderous westward expansion destroyed their cultures, with a major conclusion being:
The United States government is the most ecologically catastrophic force on planet Earth since the asteroid that killed the dinosaurs.
I love these update videos! Most of the stuff I planted two years ago finally started to look like something this summer 😆 but seeing all the monarchs, sootywings, fritillaries, skippers, and so many different bees made the growing pains worth it.
I live in a city, but I'll share some programs that/organizers who may provide some inspiration:
BMORE Beautiful - provides trash picking kits and helps residents organize cleanups in their neighborhood. They were incredibly friendly, so might be worth reaching out on how to build a similar program in your area
Weed Warriors - trains participants to recognize and remove common invasive plants, provides training for participants on how to organize efforts in their communities
Community gardening - this video is from an animal liberation podcast, but the guest's opening story of being completely ignorant about gardening but doing it anyway is inspiring. The remainder is about their work on food justice and grassroots organizing
Compost collective - this is the podcast of the guest in the previous video. They interview the founder of Baltimore Compost Collective who works with youth in the city
Guerrilla gardening - this is a classic TED Talk. The speaker discusses growing food in a public space and how they successfully fought their city to keep their garden. They also talk about their volunteer gardening group, planting food gardens at homeless shelters
Maryland Food & Abolition Project - may no longer be active, but an interesting idea nonetheless. Their mission was (is?) to partner community gardens with prisons to provide fresh produce
Echoing @poVoq, don't discount seniors! I used to be a case manager for the elderly and many are more interested than people give them credit for.
The link in the post body has some tips on how to do so responsibly. Might be worth sharing with your neighbors!
Cool beans 😉
No sand spurs here, thankfully 😄 Both pictures show groundcover under low tree or shrub branches, so no humans step there. These type of plantings are meant to be soft landings for pollinators.
Violets can handle moderate foot traffic and mowing, especially when mixed in with grasses like nimblewill, but not heavy play.