Get Irrigation Tips with LA Master Gardeners!

The Master Gardeners return to the Green Booth with special guest Deni Friese, irrigation expert!

Stop by this Sunday to get your questions answered about what irrigation method will be most water efficient for your garden and advice on how to do the conversion. They will also be offering free seeds and seedlings. If you have a surplus of something, feel free to bring them to share with others (in a labeled container).

Since 1978, UC Cooperative Extension's Common Ground Program has made gardening possible for many Los Angeles County residents, particularly low-income and traditionally underrepresented families. The program goals are to improve nutrition; increase access to fresh, low-cost produce; offer gardening education; build bridges between neighbors and communities; help create employment opportunities; and encourage a cleaner, greener Los Angeles.

Families learn how to garden, grow their own food and prepare it in a healthful manner. In addition, the program trains community volunteers and Master Gardeners, who in turn, volunteer their time to community and school gardens.

This is a wonderful program - you may even want to explore signing up for the Master Gardener volunteer training program!

Green Gardeners in training!

Ready to go drought resistant with your landscaping and wonder where to find help?

Commissioner Paula Daniels of the Department of Public Works has recognized the problem and is doing something about it. She is developing a program that will retrain and certify the gardeners that do landscape maintenance so that they are able to support our efforts to replace turf lawns with drought resistant landscaping. This program is also vital so that they have continued employment. You played a part by completing the survey that we circulated in July.

Christopher McKinnon of the MVCC has been working closely with the Commissioner and shares his recent experience with the team developing this program -

I had met Mario Lopez and Raul Anorve of IDEPSCA at a Green Gardener organizing meeting hosted by Public Works Commissioner Paula Daniels and offered my yard as an example of what future green gardeners would have to learn in order to get hired by the ever growing numbers of citizens who are removing their turf and replacing it with water wise plants and hardscape.

On a sunny morning a few weeks ago about 40 trainees in IDEPSCA’s green gardener training program stopped by our yard to view the drought tolerant mostly California natives that had replaced our lawn front and back. IDEPSCA is the Institute of Popular Education of Southern California in Spanish, a non-profit which educates low income Latina and Latino immigrants concerned with solving problems in their own communities.

Little did I know that I would be professor for the next two hours. Luckily I had before and during pictures of the turf removal and had practiced oratory about the process at the Mar Vista Community Council green booth a few Sundays ago.

We were do it yourselfers so I have an innate sense of what it takes to make the lawn removal to green transition. My wife Pat and I were peppered with non stop questions that participants had on their worksheets that we were not privy to. How much did it cost, what is the name of that plant, you have vegetables, what kind of sprinkler system etc. We were also able to showcase and demo the city installed rainwater harvesting pilot program rain barrel. We simulated rain with our hose aimed at our roof.

After the barrage we toured around the block to view from the street four other green garden showcase participants and others. We stopped off at the Beyond The Lawn vegetable garden of Yvette Roman and Fred Davis and Fred gave impromptu info on their lawn to vegetable oasis.

We ended up on Marcasel Avenue side of LA Fire Department #62 along the 300’ bare wall. I pointed out the missing plants and vines and the invasion of weeds and grass. I received a pledge from Mario that his group would volunteer to help weed and replant if we got permission from LAFD to install drought tolerant California native vines and plants.

I believe it was of help in the education and transition of garden workers to the “new” Los Angeles landscape.

Worms and Trash!

Do you want to start worm composting and don't know where to begin?
Stop by the MVCC Green Booth this Sunday. Rob Kadota will have a couple of worm composting demonstration boxes so you can determine what options work best for you and learn how to get started. This is a great opportunity to get advice on which form of composting will work best for your family.

Rob will also do demos on trash sorting. Sounds easy, but how often are we putting something in the trash that could actually go in the compost bin or in with recyclables?

Bring a container - if you successfully complete the trash sort challenge you could even win worms to start your own bin!


Photo courtesy of Loree Bryer

Learn what we can do to save our oceans

Join us Sunday to meet Anna Cummins of Algalita Marine Research and discuss lifestyle changes we can all make now to reduce the problems caused by plastic pollution in our oceans.

The Algalita Marine Research Foundation (AMRF), in partnership with Livable Legacy will conduct the first comprehensive global study on plastic pollution in the world’s oceans. For over ten years, AMRF has been recognized as an authority on the study of plastic pollution in the North Pacific Gyre. Since Algalita’s first published paper in 1999, the organization has documented a twofold increase in the density of plastic particles in the North Pacific, as well as alarming new evidence of plastic in the food chain through ingestion by marine wildlife. There is however a lack of research and information on plastic pollution in the gyres of the North and South Atlantic, the South Pacific, or the Indian Ocean.

With two upcoming expeditions to the North and South Atlantic Gyres, and a “travel trawl” program lending research equipment to other vessels of opportunity, the 5 gyres project will collect global data on plastic marine debris, and will establish a clearinghouse for information on plastic pollution worldwide, through the 5 gyres website. The goal is to bring the issue of plastic pollution to a wider audience, and engage the public in solutions.

Mar Vista Goes Clean!!!

We did it!!! Last night the MVCC Board adopted the Green Committee proposal on clean electricity!

Whereas coal-burning power plants deliver 44% of Los Angeles DWP electricity and yet coal-burning is widely recognized as a major contributor to climate change; whereas significant federal and state funding are available in California to make clean energy solutions such as photovoltaic solar panels affordable for residents and businesses; and whereas 84 Mar Vista residents have signed the petition to repower Mar Vista with 100% clean electricity by 2018; Mar Vista hereby adopts a goal to develop a roadmap and achieve net 100% clean electricity utilization within the Mar Vista community as a whole by 2018.

Thank you for making this happen! We invite everyone interested in contributing to join us at the December 6th Green Committee meeting.

Here is our first step - make sure you have signed up for Green Power with the LADWP. For only 3 cents more per kilowatt hour you will be purchasing renewal energy. Please encourage your neighbors to do the same. House by house, block by block, this is the first step in converting Mar Vista to 100% clean energy. The more we support this program, the more that the DWP can invest in developing clean energy sources.

Check out this great article in Scientific American!

Stop burying treasures!

Why bury treasures in a landfill when they can be reused?

Meet The ReUse People and learn how deconstruction can help the environment - and save you money! Arthur Renaud, a Certified Green Building Professional and Regional Manager of The ReUse People of America, Inc. will be our guest at the MVCC Green Booth this Sunday.

For over 15 years, architects, contractors and building owners have relied on The ReUse People to keep reusable and recyclable building materials out of overburdened landfills. By de-constructing (instead of demolishing) a building, TRP is able to salvage up to 80 percent of the materials and channel them back into the marketplace through donations and sales at its network of retail outlets. These services are among the first steps in the green building process. Furthermore, tax-deductible donations of reusable materials to TRP, a nonprofit 501(c)3 corporation, provide a faster payback and better return-on-investment than any other product or service offered by the green building industry.

In addition to deconstruction and building-materials salvage and sales, TRP offers deconstruction training programs and "best practices" consulting through The ReUse Institute. Together, these products and services combine exemplary environmental practices with sound economic policies, to the benefit of communities and individuals everywhere.

After they deconstruct a building, the salvaged materials are delivered to one of their regional retail-warehouses, where they are open to the public. Here you can find quality material and appliances at great prices - - And, you will be helping the environment!

Through the efforts of The ReUse Deconstructon Company (a division of TRP) and those of their TRP-Certified Deconstruction Contractors, over 260,000 tons of reusable materials have been diverted from our landfills. Photos above are two homes that have been deconstructed with materials going to their LA store.