Common Ground up-date

*This is moving along quite quickly now. I've had contacts from people from all over NZ and beyond, who like the idea very much, so I'm posting this again for anyone who might have missed it the first time around. This is the 'long version' - the shorter went out on Jon Foote's 'Barefoote Gardener' website and created a lot of interest and I'm now asking other sites, such as Frogblog, whether they'll broadcast it as well. I'll mention 'Common Ground' on RadioLive when next I'm on and the two major gardening magazines are going to print the pithy version for me. Fun and games. Green man on the rise :-)

I'm doing my very best to start a movement. Most people who are likely to be interested in joining will already be actively involved in the business of it, and won't need to change any thing they do in order to further its aims, as they will be their aims too. I've thought long and hard about this, talked with scores of people who are busy making the as-yet unformalised objectives a reality, I've read all sorts of magazines, books and on-line articles and discussions that contribute to my idea and I've travelled as much of the countryside as I could, envisaging the effects of what I'm considering, enjoying the work that has already been achieved by people who feel the same urge to 're-plant the world' as I do. Conservationists already do it. So do farmers, town and city folk, travellers, tourists, council staff, school children, prisoners, the list is almost endless. Anyone who plants a plant is a potential candidate for membership to this movement. They need do no more than they do now, but they might be inspired to increase their planting, be it tree, shrub, flowering annual or vegetable, whatever it is they do now toward improving our various environments with growing things from the plant world.

I firmly believe that a combined and conserted effort to grow more plants will benefit everyone. It's a simple premise and one that's easy to make a reality. Planting things is not difficult. Tens of thousands of us do it already. Those who don't can quickly learn from those who do. The benefits of increasing the number of plants around us are many and I don't think I need to list them. The problems we face, as individuals and communities, of food quality and availability, and the enjoyment we can get from our surroundings, no matter where we live, can all be alleviated through plants. This is the basic tenet of the movement I'm proposing. Become engaged in planting and all of us will benefit. Do more planting, I propose, and do it in places that are unplanted as yet. Join other planters. Encourage those who haven't yet discovered the benefits of growing plants of all sorts, to give it a go. Start a nursery, no matter how modest, at home or at work. Sow more than you can mange and give them away to people who don't yet have the skills needed to grow from seeds, pip and cutting. I don't mean to be directive. You are welcome to do whatever you wish and if I never hear about your activities, it doesn't matter one whit, though it would interest me a great deal if you were to let me know, but if you do believe that a unifying 'banner' under which all planters can 'virtually' gather, you might like to align yourself with me and others of our persuasion. I've settled on a logo to represent the aspirations and attitude of this 'brother and sisterhood' of growers. It's more a stamp than anything, a wood-cut from Europe's past: the Green Man, a figure that represents the vigour of the vegetative world and posessing an atitude of vigour and vitality that I hope will become typical of those who adopt him as their 'mark'.

Here he is:

My proposal is simple; that anyone wanting to align with this initiative, receives a Green Man sticker, and puts it somewhere where they can see it and be reminded that there are others out there in the environment, planting for a purpose, and who want to be actively replanting an environment that has been treated less than ideally.

For my part, I intend to make these stickers available to who ever wants one, write articles around any developments that might arise as a result of this simple act, ask for and action any ideas people might have regarding this 'movement' and pour energy into growing the ideas I've outlined here, so that the number of people planting and the number of plants planted, grows and grows.

You are welcome to contact me through which ever medium you like. The most effective is email, and my address is: rguy10@actrix.co.nz