Hipster Compost

An updated, urban version of the soil food web. In the nearly sixteen years we’ve lived here we’ve seen our local stretch of Sunset Boulevard go from boarded up storefronts and auto body shops to restaurants, bars and cafes. Along with those new businesses and artisinal facial hair, comes a great new set of compost sources. Some of my enterprising neighbors, one in particular, have been creating what could be called hipster compost or, at least,...

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Got a Critter Question?

...Our guest on the next episode of the Root Simple Podcast will be Lyanda Lynn Haupt, author of The Urban Bestiary: Encountering the Everyday Wild. We’re interviewing her tomorrow (Thursday) so if you have a question about coyotes, moles, raccoons, opossums, squirrels, rats or any of the other creatures that visit our urban backyards, leave a comment....

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Author William Powers to Speak in Los Angeles

...s explores the viability of Slow Food and Slow Money, technology fasts and urban sanctuaries, rooftop gardening and beekeeping. Discovering a colorful cast of New Yorkers attempting to resist the culture of Total Work, Powers offers an inspiring exploration for anyone trying to make urban life more people- and planet-friendly. Skylight Books (a big supporter of our two books, by the way) is located at: 1818 N Vermont Ave Los Angeles, CA A conflict...

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Saturday Tweets: Thanksgiving Weekend Edition

...ned – Urban Digs Farm https://t.co/8HWF4jgCVL pic.twitter.com/826NcJzCe2 — Urban Agriculture (@UrbanAgRRicult) November 28, 2015 HGVs: designed for the open motorway & inexplicably now commonplace on crowded city streets. pic.twitter.com/DqpIhb3F7o HT @Cycle_Kix — KarlOnSea (@KarlOnSea) November 28, 2015 How do I get my agapanthus to flower? @AlysFowler has the answer #askalys https://t.co/hBbUMnainM pic.twitter.com/y4KdI1toNB — Guardian gardening...

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Fish Don’t Fart

...ve it closer consideration. Aquaponics is profiled in the pioneering urban homesteading book, The Integral Urban House: Self Reliant Living in the City and Scott Kellogg and Stacy Pettigrew’s book Toolbox for Sustainable City Living: A do-it-Ourselves Guide which comes out of their work at Austin’s Rhizome Collective. What all of these efforts have in common is a permacultural design principle of turning a waste product into a resource and closing...

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