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At this particular moment in time, I’m getting close to wrapping up another semester of horticulture courses. I was checking out the various certificates Cabrillo College Horticulture Department offers and ‘lo and behold I am actually earning a second certificate, and sooner than my arboriculture cert! At the end of Spring ’26 I’ll have a certificate in Permaculture Design. How ’bout that! I’m actually also buttoning up a major permaculture project, so I’ll also have a product to display here soon that showcases how I can upcycle and tie elements together and blend edible landscape with ornamental and so forth.

I’ve been chipping away at a conservation book, Braiding Sweetgrass, written by an indigenous botany professor, Robin Wall Kimmerer. There’s a chapter about goldenrod and asters, which gives a mixed account (of science, general aesthetic, ecological, and personal) of why their contrasting colors work so well together. She writes, “As it turns out, though, goldenrods and asters appear very similarly to bee eyes and human eyes. We both think they’re beautiful. Their striking contrast when they grow together makes them the most attractive target in the whole meadow, a beacon for bees. Growing together, both receive more pollinator visitors than…

Gardening and landscaping, it seems to me, are making a slow but large shift in definition, mindset, and desire. At risk of taking a great quote out of context (from a larger analysis on lawns in Second Nature and Michael Pollan’s subtle disagreement with them), he writes, “Gardening, I had by now come to appreciate, is a painstaking exploration of place; everything that happens in my garden- the thriving and dying of particular plants, the maraudings of various insects and other pests- teaches me to know this patch of land more intimately, its geology and microclimate, the particular ecology of…

It seems appropriate for me- having done this sort of work for several years now, and with ambitions to keep expanding what I know and can do- to reference Michael Pollan’s first book Second Nature and fashion this first website post in that literary naturist “throw-back” spirit. In the context of going through great pains to rectify his inability to grow a good carrot, he writes, “Of course a real green thumb would have done everything I did without having to think about it so much. But you have to start somewhere” (Pollan, 1991, p. 120). I feel this encapsulates…