Groundwork Blog

Meet a new vegetable! Stem lettuce, also called celtuce, is a Chinese specialty. Coming from the same species as regular old lettuce, these plants are grown for their large edible stems rather than their leaves. Stem lettuces are the aster family’s answer to kohlrabi. I first tasted stem lettuces in Yunnan Province in 2019, and fell in love. They have a great flavor. Mild and enjoyable: a little lettucy, a little asparagusy. This variety comes from Kitazawa Seed Company, and lives up to its claim to fame: […]

Continue reading >>

This conversation from the podcast “The Way Out Is In” is about applying mindfulness and wisdom in environmental and social movements. This week, our world had the two hottest days ever recorded. In the middle of the summer heat, it’s easy to feel overheated and overwhelmed as both heat and news cycles tax us and our communities. We chose this piece for this newsletter’s inspiration because it feels like a soothing balm for people who are working for a better future in any setting, whether it be as […]

Continue reading >>

Listen to a conversation between Groundwork’s director Jeff Wagner and Kelly Moody, an incredible botanist, teacher about people’s relationship with land, and instructor for Groundwork’s field programs. Kelly interviewed Jeff for her Ground Shots Podcast. The conversation focuses on the Colorado River, industrial food production, and how the Colorado River is a microcosm of the U.S. relationship with the natural world. Listen Now

Continue reading >>

All our ancestors, no matter where they originated, created intimate relationships with their home places, including place-based skill traditions. In the modern world, those skills and relationships are in decline. Groundwork’s folk school is a space to share and learn traditional non-industrial skills as a way to… Preserve and expand ancestral and traditional skills, helping humanity prepare for a less industrial future. Build relationships with place and foster the emergence of more localized culture. Explore values and ways of life the oppose capitalism, industrialism, and […]

Continue reading >>

It’s 6am, and I’m wide awake, my body refusing to forget the farm harvest schedule. I’m sitting in my brother’s high rise apartment, looking down at the bustling street of people beginning their daily grind. Coasting down highway 70 away from a blazing sun, my heart felt full as I headed into Denver this weekend. Being in the city is like night and day from life at Groundwork. The values we practice day to day at the farm have seeped their way into my mind […]

Continue reading >>

At the end of May, Lance Swigart, Jill Spears, and Lulu Volckhausen visited Groundwork’s educational farm for a tour and interview. We chatted about Groundwork’s educational farm programming and the work that needs to be done to inspire young leaders in environmental and agricultural fields. You can listen to the interview on KVNF’s website by clicking here. The interview is split across the radio hour into segments, which begin at about 17:00 and 40:00. Click here to see more of Groundwork’s interviews and articles in […]

Continue reading >>

I applied for this fellowship because… I recognize that change must happen sooner rather than later. A movement to localize our food systems has taken root throughout our local communities and the world. I want to play a larger role in ensuring its success by focusing on the food systems that provide sustenance to communities all the while engaging in a healthy relationship with the land, people, and earth as a whole. While learning is vital, making connections is equally important. Understanding other cultures as […]

Continue reading >>

How can we create a sustainable relationship with the land? Nikki Hill and Kelly Moody are both teachers for Groundwork’s field courses studying ecology, botany, and human-landscape relationships in Colorado. Kelly is also the force behind the Ground Shots Podcast, interviewing all kinds of people who work with plants and ecosystems. The core question this conversation orbits around is this: how can we build a sustainable relationship with the Earth, rather than substituting one kind of over-consumptive culture for another? This interview with Nikki comes from […]

Continue reading >>

I applied for this fellowship because… I want to create meaningful change toward a socially and environmentally just future. There are many, many ways to do this and I’m still trying to find my place in the movement, but over the last year I’ve grown especially curious in how local and organic farming can embody that future. I learned about Groundwork through its ties to Pun Pun, an organic farm and seed saving center I was volunteering at in Thailand, and applied because of the […]

Continue reading >>

How are great open-pollinated vegetable varieties created? Through years of careful tending, a certain amount of cross-pollination, and careful selection for the plants that thrive. Our friends at Wild Mountain Seeds in Carbondale, Colorado, bred the Sunfired Flare tomato. They often work with a plant breeding method known as “grex gardening”. Last month, we shared a little about carefully-controlled F1 hybrid breeding. Grex gardening is the other end of the spectrum from industrial F1 hybrids. “Grex” is Latin for “flock”, and refers to a population of plants that will […]

Continue reading >>