The Green Backyard

Thanks, Colette!

This is so timely, as I’m working with some neighborhood youths to apply for an available local grant for youths aged 15-20 to improve our neighborhood. My idea? Plant fruit trees in a ho-hum park down the street to beautify the space and provide food security for our town.

I had asked for the grant-required youths “to just show up at my door,” and yesterday, they did just that! Three were congregated outside our back gate, and we started talking. It turns out that one of the guys had actually asked our landlord if he could plant fruit trees on this property after our landlord cleared away most of the overgrown, neglected trees last year. I had hoped to find youths that would be willing to engage this project as a community service or for college application building, but this young man is passionate about Nature. He’s actually been wanting to plant fruit trees in our neighborhood, and he wants to get his girlfriend and friends involved, too. Here’s hoping the synchronicities continue all the way to grant qualification, planting, community building, and (eventually) harvesting!

The video below illustrates some of the ways that gardening and beautification ripple out into the community.

From the YouTube description:

“This is the story of a once neglected urban wasteland in Peterborough, recently transformed into a much loved community resource by a crew of eager volunteers, led by the father and daughter team of Rennie and Sophie Antonelli. This is a light-hearted and candid portrait of this garden that brings together its flora, fauna, people and activities in a symbiotic fashion. Through its simple approach to placemaking the green backyard carries a bigger environmental message for our urban areas and highlights that it is often the simpler things in life that carry the most meaning.

For more information please contact me I am currently based in Amsterdam, but interested in new projects wherever they may be.”

email daryl [at] dmau.com
or on twitter @darylmul

More about The Green Backyard here http://thegreenbackyard.com/