Taking Control Of A Small Piece Of The Planet A new re-zoning plan has promised that it will become a park, but nothing is happening yet. On the water front, there is a chain-link fence that has a sign with the little maple leaf that signifies a city park, but it's locked. There are a lot of fenced-in areas in the neighborhood. And so the city is going to have to rely on citizens stepping up and taking care of their own surroundings.' 'They are not going to be able to take care of everywhere in the city. 'We are at the end of a development boom, and it is clear that the city's resources are going to be constrained,' he says.

Michael Freedman-Schnapp, one of the co-chairs of Neighbors Allied for Good Growth, says that community gardening and the 'guerrilla gardening movement' of the 1970s 'was a reaction to all the abandonment in the city at the time.' But with the economic crisis, a lot of development is now on hold. There has been lots of development and little attention to open space. The Brooklyn neighborhoods of Greenpoint and Williamsburg have been gentrifying. The seeds used in Brooklyn are mostly wild cornflowers, lovely blue daisy-like flowers often seen by the roadside. After three to five rains, the balls break down and the seeds germinate. The mud and clay protect the seeds from being eaten by birds and rodents. The group then puts them in bags and distributes them. The mixture is rolled into little balls, which then has to dry. It is important to use the red terra cotta, because other kinds have different chemicals in it that affect growth.' We mix those together, and then we knead it like bread into a red terra-cotta clay. 'We try to pick a seed that is native to the area and can withstand drought.

'First, we mix the mulch and a seed mixture,' Gallagher says. They drop the balls on dirt piles and throw them into abandoned lots.Įmily Gallagher, a NAG member who specializes in open space issues, says it's easy to make seed balls.

They are members of a local group called NAG, or Neighbors Allied for Good Growth. In the Greenpoint neighborhood on a recent Sunday afternoon, a small group of activists walked the streets carrying paper bags filed with little balls made from clay, compost and seeds. The technique has worked its way to Brooklyn, N.Y. It's a technique for planting in abandoned places and often inhospitable land that was developed in Japan by Masanobu Fukuoka, a pioneer in 'natural farming.' that want to improve the environment are using a surprising weapon: seed balls. Neighborhood organizations across the U.S. Jeremy Levine/Courtesy of Neighbors Allied For Good Growth Emily Gallagher, a NAG member who specializes in open space issues, says that seed balls allow people to take control of their small piece of the planet - and that's why so many people are getting involved.

Cube world seeds red rogue