The first meeting of the year (February was snowed out) saw a packed meeting over with over 40 people attending, five of whom were new members. Welcome back and welcome!
Presentations
Courtesy of awful February weather – and the cancellation of that meeting – the March meeting featured three presenters.
Lorraine Schmid
(Thyme Again Gardens, Organic Farm and B&B)
Lorraine’s presentation topics included What is Permaculture? Why are Ecosystems important? What does it mean to garden sustainably?
Lorraine and Lori discussed how and why, they apply permaculture principles at their farm, and how permaculture has improved their farming experience.
Erin Thomson
Erin is with Upper Canada Fibershed and spoke about the many uses of flax and a special “flax cultivating” project planned for 2019 and they are looking for volunteers. It has been a very long time since flax was grown in Ontario for a fibre market, and they are wondering which species would be best suited to our climate. They are requesting that volunteers plant a square metre of flax seeds provided by Upper Canada Fibreshed, and keep any relevant notes about the season and the growing habits of the plants. Then they will need the volunteers to pull out the plants by the roots so they can be retted and finished. If any member of the PECHS wishes to help that process Upper Canada Fibreshed will happily share these steps. Otherwise, someone from Upper Canada Fibreshed will arrange a date to pick up the pulled plants for the next steps.
Visit the Upper Canada Fibreshed web site for more information.
Don Ross
Don Ross from the County Sustainability Group spoke about his group’s rain barrel fundraiser.
See The County Sustainability web site for more information.
Mini-Show
Design Class: Theme “Welcome Spring”
Display Class: Theme “Earliest Signs”
Click small images to see larger versions.
Photographs © by Bert Jenkins