Guestblogger: GardenRant
I’ve been enjoying the well-written and funny-as-hell GardenRant blog of late, and Susan Harris, who runs the site jointly with two other women, is guest-posting about why she wanted to start a blog that focuses on ecologically intelligent gardening. Check it out!
Why Gardening Matters
by Susan Harris of GardenRant
When uppity women come together to create a website, the first thing they do is tell the world who they are. So EcoChicks have their Raison D’Etre and the women of GardenRant have a Manifesto, which declares that We Are:
In love with real, rambling, chaotic, dirty, bug-ridden gardens.
Appalled by chemical warfare in the garden.
Gardening our asses off.
And so on. But first on the list is “Convinced that gardening MATTERS” and we’re on a Rant to tell everyone why. Conveniently, examples abound from the our own rants and raves and comments by our community of opinionated gardeners and friends. Consider a few.
It’s about using our land to grow food. Here and here.
It’s about switching from turfgrass to a diversity of wildlife-attracting, water-absorbing, soul-enriching plants. Here and here.
It’s about changing our cities. Here, here and here.
It’s about what Home Depot and Scotts Miracle-Gro are doing to independent nurseries. Here, and here.
It’s about plant immigration – are you for it or against it? Here, and here.
It’s about guerrilla gardening breaking out everywhere. Here and here.
It’s about getting MUCH smarter about how we use our water. Here, and here.
It’s about quacks on PBS hawking their toxic homemade concoctions. Here.
As GardenRanter Amy Stewart once wrote: This isn’t needlepoint, people!
Starre Vartan
Starre Vartan is founder and editor-in-chief of Eco-Chick.com and the author of the Eco-Chick Guide to Life. She's also a freelance science and environment writer who has published in National Geographic, CNN, Scientific American, Mental Floss, Pacific Standard, the NRDC, and many more. She lives on an island in Puget Sound with her partner and black cat. She was a geologist in her first career, and still picks up rocks wherever she goes.
