Career Services Office is Open

Image via WikipediaI have many time repeated ["Everything!" my bride says quietly enough for all to hear loudly] that the best advice for young people today is to "Know how to grow your own food or to be useful to those who do."

Looks like I'm on to something. A scholarly LOVESalem correspondent/friend sends:

http://www.bls.gov/opub/ooq/home.htm

I haven't had a chance to read it yet, but the cover story in the Fall 2010 issues of OOQ is about "careers in organic food production."

[OOQ is "Occupational Outlook Quarterly."]

Mother Earth News Garden Planner

A while ago I participated in a survey with Mother Earth News on garden planners and I was fantasizing about a system that would keep track not only of your climate but also your garden history so that it would warn you when you were thinking of planting things from the same families in the same places (which encourages diseases and reduces yields) . . .

Lo and behold, they must have listened, because they have come up with an awesome web-based garden planner application. I'm going to play with the free trial all through December and then join after January 1 ($25/yr). I can't wait! LOVESalem HQ really needs this.

More like this, please! Tax-foreclosed lots to urban garden space

Image via WikipediaHat tip to Portland Mercury and Sightline Institute for noticing this, a great idea that could easily be replicated in Marion County:

Gone to seed

Scattered around Multnomah County are 384 vacant lots that stick out like little scars of a lousy economy. For years, the county has been trying to figure out what to do with these lots - empty land seized through property tax foreclosure. But now the county has finally hit on a new idea to bring life to the abandoned lots: turning them into urban gardens. Portland Mercury 11/28/2010