Jun 10
16
Nourishment
Theory and Practise: We began in 2008. A response to the challenge of future food production. Creating a domestic scale back-yard nursery for medicinal and food producing trees. Some of the seedling trees are traded to finance further research and cultivation. The remaining are to form a bequest towards; PhysicWoods Trust: Socio-Bio Sculpture. A/some “to be agreed” location(s)/site(s) that will form aesthetic and nutritional holding place(s) for nourishing futures.
From here you can point to anywhere
We will be attending the Green Fayre at Coventry on 21 August bringing a selection of container grown trees. Hope to see you there.
Perenial Foods Health from the Greenwood
Future nourishment with perennial foods.
Apr 12
18
Eco acoustics
Specifically, the floating auditorium includes “three inter-connected sonic instruments which mix traditional craft and digital innovation. They draw water from the River Tyne, passing it through a series filters, lasers and sensors, which bubble, beep, hiss, creak and groan.” For at least one instrument, the resulting sounds are determined by the salt-content of the water: “A wooden mechanism then dips a series of electrodes into the jars and creates a series of sounds. The pitch of the sounds will be modified depending on the salinity levels of the water.”
The installation is thus also a kind of lo-fi river research station, supplying data about the water it floats within (in the designers’ words, it uses “a range of traditional and new technologies to monitor key environmental details, including water temperature, speed, salinity, and pollution”)….More at Hydro-Electro-Musical MachineryA floating tidemill on the UK’s River Tyne has been filled with “electro-acoustic musical machinery,” powered by the river itself. The building, a collaboration between Owl Project andEd Carter, called Flow, is “a floating building on the River Tyne that generates its own power using a tidal water wheel.”
The acoustic machines inside, powered by CNC-milled wooden gears and timber pistons, “respond directly to the ever-changing state of the river. The sounds created by each instrument can also be manipulated by visitors to the millhouse.”…More at Hydro-Electro-Musical Machinery
Something humbling about waterwheels and there is a great tradition in European and Eastern Art to use water to create musical sounds.
Perenial Foods Health from the Greenwood
Apr 12
17
“Wildflower Patch Spring 2012″
We have enjoyed the unseasonable warm days of March bringing the temptation to sow lots of seeds and plant things out. Then as so often April returns with a frosty bite. Some of our winter stratified seed is starting to germinate Hawthorn and the first of the Apricots, exciting! We have also taken over care of a friends allotment and have taken the opportunity to create a ‘Widflower Patch’. We will record our progress and here is the first video episode.
Perenial Foods Health from the Greenwood
Mar 12
21
Apricot Flowers @ Vernal Equinox
March the 21st. a special time when day and night balance. There is a sense also of being “over the hump” with the promise of lengthening days and warmer times. A day to lift the spirits and look forwar to new harvest.
What Happens at the Equinox?
Far from being an arbitrary indicator of the changing seasons, March 20 (March 21 in some years) is significant for astronomical reasons. On March 20, 2012, at precisely 1:14 A.M. EDT (March 20, 05:14 Universal Time), the Sun will cross directly over the Earth’s equator. This moment is known as the vernal equinox in the Northern Hemisphere. For the Southern Hemisphere, this is the moment of the autumnal equinox.
Read more: Vernal (Spring) Equinox — Infoplease.com http://physicwoods.info/wp-content/plugins/url-cloaker/url.php?id=aHR0cDovL3d3dy5pbmZvcGxlYXNlLmNvbS9zcG90L3JpdGVvZnNwcmluZzEuaHRtbCNpeHp6MXNLbzQ0MmRB
Equinox Means “Equal Night”
Translated literally, equinox means “equal night.” Because the Sun is positioned above the equator, day and night are about equal in length all over the world during the equinoxes. A second equinox occurs each year on Sept. 22 or 23; in 2012, it will be on Sept. 22 at 10:49 A.M. EDT. This date will mark the autumnal equinox in the Northern Hemisphere and the vernal equinox in the Southern (vernal denotes “spring”).
Read more: Vernal (Spring) Equinox — Infoplease.com http://physicwoods.info/wp-content/plugins/url-cloaker/url.php?id=aHR0cDovL3d3dy5pbmZvcGxlYXNlLmNvbS9zcG90L3JpdGVvZnNwcmluZzEuaHRtbCNpeHp6MXNLbmowYkZ4
Reasons for the Seasons
These brief but monumental moments owe their significance to the 23.4 degree tilt of the Earth’s axis. Because of the tilt, we receive the Sun’s rays most directly in the summer. In the winter, when we are tilted away from the Sun, the rays pass through the atmosphere at a greater slant, bringing lower temperatures. If the Earth rotated on an axis perpendicular to the plane of the Earth’s orbit around the Sun, there would be no variation in day lengths or temperatures throughout the year, and we would not have seasons.
Read more: Vernal (Spring) Equinox — Infoplease.com http://physicwoods.info/wp-content/plugins/url-cloaker/url.php?id=aHR0cDovL3d3dy5pbmZvcGxlYXNlLmNvbS9zcG90L3JpdGVvZnNwcmluZzEuaHRtbCNpeHp6MXNLblhBQ21W
Perenial Foods Health from the Greenwood
Feb 12
19
Go Green Week at Warwick University
There are lots of events on at Warwick University next week, but we have been particularly invited to hear Caroline Lucas (Green MP for Brighton) at 6pm on Thursday 23 Feb in the Physics Lecture Theatre (Library Road – go up the bridge by the library, turn left over the bridge, then go through the doors, carry straight on, and it’s a big lecture theatre on the left: PLT). For other events, click here.
Perenial Foods Health from the Greenwood
Jan 12
14
Road for the Future
More news from “Road for the Future”
Perenial Foods Health from the Greenwood
Jan 12
13
Transition Towns Coventry
CLICK IMAGE FOR WEBSITE
Coventry Community Supported Agriculture Scheme
We had a very positive meeting last night with Gareth Davies (from Canalside Growers and South Warwickshire Local Food) to get the Coventry Community Supported Agriculture scheme off the ground! All very exciting! This scheme will be on land rented from Garden Organic at Ryton Gardens. Garden Organic are being very supportive, and willing to help out in various ways to enable the scheme to get off the ground.
Now we need a BIG TURNOUT for the public meeting:
Thursday 9th February
7.30pm – 9.30pm
Methodist Central Hall, Bull Yard, Warwick Lane CV1 2HA
We need to publicise this meeting, so I have attached a flyer – please send it to anyone you can think of who might be interested in coming along! We reckon we need 50 members to sign up to make the project viable. If you have access to any email group which includes people from Coventry, Wolston, Binley Woods, Ryton, the west side of Rugby, then please send it out.
So how will it work? Buy a share – get a share!
The idea is for people to become members of the scheme (that means paying an annual membership fee. This is so that we do not fall foul of complex trading laws, and can actually receive the veg!), and then commit to:
paying a regular amount per week (a ‘share’)
helping out for few sessions of physical help per year
Each member then receives a share of the harvest! This regular income means that growers can be employed (on a decent wage). Rather than growers having to take all the risks of growing, the members share the risks (so if it is a bumper year, everyone gets a bumper share! Similarly, if there are crop failures, everyone gets less of a share).
We need to think carefully about how we can get people over to Ryton – perhaps we could have a set time on a weekday and/or Saturday morning for people to meet at the Park & Ride car park to share lifts, or hire a minibus regularly, or use some of the low carbon vehicles being developed at Cov Uni, or borrow the Council ones… There are possibilities. There is also the 86 which goes to Wolston, and then a mile walk to Ryton Gardens. Or family bike rides out there. And we could have a pick up point for shares in Coventry, in a community centre or church hall. What we do know is that we need a lot of such schemes to get going all around Coventry to help feed the people of Coventry in the best way possible. Hopefully, this scheme once up and running will result in more schemes being set up, in the same way that Canalside has inspired this one!
For more information on CSAs (Community Supported Agriculture schemes) have a look at http://www.makinglocalfoodwork.co.uk/about/csa/index.cfm
To find out how it’s working at Canalside Growers, have a look at: www.canalsidecommunityfood.org.uk
As this is the first opportunity we have been asked to take on as Transition Coventry, we hope that we can rise to the challenge! Come along and find out all about it!
There will be an opportunity for anyone with any spare cash lying around to pump prime this project… we will need some initial injection of cash to get up and running. If anyone is willing to consider this, please get in touch (by replying to this email)! We will also be trying to get some grant funding, but soft loans from interested individuals come with far fewer strings attached.
Coventry Ryton CSA initial meeting flyer
Perenial Foods Health from the Greenwood
Jan 12
11
Green QR Codes.
greenqrcodes
Greenpeace UK has worked with mobile marketing company Textlocal to promote the launch of the Rainbow Warrior III ship using QR Codes.
Greenpeace sent 90,000 supporters in UK an invitation to the event containing a QR code, which was scanned on arrival to track attendees.
Molly Brooks, digital marketing coordinator at Greenpeace, says: “Using QR Codes meant that Greenpeace staff could easily use mobile phones to track who attended. Being able to track everyone electronically through the Textlocal reporting system worked perfectly for us, as we were able to follow up with our supporters accordingly to say thank you for coming, or reach out quickly those that couldn’t make it with a separate message. Mobile made the whole process fast and accurate, and without doubt this method reduces the need for paper forms at the event and is therefore kinder to the environment which is what we’re all about.”
Perenial Foods Health from the Greenwood
Nov 11
21
Permaculture
Perenial Foods Health from the Greenwood
Nov 11
10
Eco Dome
This film shows how a pile of earth, dug out from the building site, is turned into a small house called Eco- Dome (moon cocoon model), using the Superadobe technology. It documents how professionals and students from many countries training at Cal-Earth Institute built this structure. It is intended for use with materials and tools developed for instruction during the apprenticeship retreat at Cal-Earth. Superadobe technology was first presented by the architect to NASA for lunar habitats, and can build single or clustered homes on earth which are resistant to fire, floods, wind storms and earthquakes.
Perenial Foods Health from the Greenwood
Sep 11
17
Transition News
Looking forward to this event.
Perenial Foods Health from the Greenwood
