Ron Finley, guerilla gardener of South Central LA

[Ron Mauer Sr]

"South Central LA, home of the drive-thru, and the drive-by," Finley says. "Funny thing is, the drive-thrus are killin' more people than the drive-bys. People are dying from curable diseases in South Central LA."

Finley gets it. He's wiser than the FDA, the USDA and all the government policies combined. While President Obama's plan is to put as many people on food stamps as possible so they can spend government money on disease-promoting processed foods, Ron Finley's plan is to get people off food stamps and put 'em on food forests... to teach people to grow their own live foods that prevent disease, inspire communities and give rise to self-reliance.

This idea of teaching people to grow their own food drives control freak government bureaucrats crazy. The city of Los Angeles, in fact, tried to force him to destroy his curbside food forest. As he explained:

I planted a food forest in front of my house. ...The city came down on me, and gave me a citation saying that I had to remove my garden. And this citation turned into a warrant. A warrant for planting food...

With the help of an LA Times reporter and hundreds of petitioners, Finley was finally victorious over an idiotic city policy that wanted to destroy his food forest and turn it back into a curbside of useless weeds.

Now, Ron Finley is on a mission to inspire others to turn vacant lots into food forests, transforming communities and teaching kids the value of growing your own food.

Finley espouses the libertarian idea of self-reliance and defiance against injustice





http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EzZzZ_qpZ4w

[Octavusprime]

I love this vid. I may just go guerilla myself...

[778 neighbour of some guy]

His sh!t must happen, lets make it so.

Great talk

[Reinhard]

Thank you Ron!
This could be the start of a new thread I've thought about initiating: "Small but powerful solutions"..............How do we determine which solution is powerful?......That's easy: when your heart starts 'growing', and your mind is yelling: YEEES......and your imagination starts going wild.........simple!!
..............I've been thinking about it.....you did it.

Reinhard

[Dennis Leahy]

Love this man's passion and mode of operation. Honestly, I think he's the most important person in all of Los Angeles.

I have posted this twice at Fazebook: once was well-received, and the next time I got a couple of responders who were focused on the inner city poor in apartments and the homeless - and basically said this is no solution for those people. Of course, I disagree. I'm not pretending that most urban homeless could subsist strictly by foraging NOW, but if the trend grows like wildfire, then more and more of their needs could be met this way. (The current Elite-vetted, Elite-aligned, Elite-[s]elected officials could care less about the homeless and the poor, so until and unless citizens take over the government, we have to do all we can in every way to help these people.)

I raise my shovel to Ron Finley!

Dennis

p.s. related article: Seattle's First Urban Food Forest Will Be Open To Foragers (http://www.npr.org/blogs/thesalt/2012/02/29/147668557/seattles-first-urban-food-forest-will-be-free-to-forage)

[Bubu]

I have now more than a gallon of fruit seeds I have been saving for this mission. I'm not very busy this coming days so I'll take this post as a go signal and stop procrastinating.

thanks Ron you gave me an idea what to do and not be BORED.

[Bubu]

I will do the seed bombs method. Any thought?

http://www.guerrillagardening.org/ggseedbombs.html

http://www.wikihow.com/Make-a-Seed-Bomb

[Dennis Leahy]

I will do the seed bombs method. Any thought?

http://www.guerrillagardening.org/ggseedbombs.html

http://www.wikihow.com/Make-a-Seed-Bomb

I wonder about soaking seeds overnight, then allowing the seed bombs to dry out. Seems like that would kill some seeds that start to germinate then dry out.

I love the idea of seed bombs! Make plants, not war!

Dennis

[Dennis Leahy]

Here's another cool related idea that probably is OK in Ron Finlay's thread (but Ron M, if you prefer this topic stay with Ron Finlay's work, say the word and this could be a different thread)

Guerrilla Grafters (http://guerrillagrafters.org/)! Grafting fruit bearing branches onto ornamental trees!

Dennis

[Maunagarjana]

"Growing your own food is like printing your own money." - Ron Finley

Right on!

[Ron Mauer Sr]

Here's another cool related idea that probably is OK in Ron Finlay's thread (but Ron M, if you prefer this topic stay with Ron Finlay's work, say the word and this could be a different thread)

Guerrilla Grafters (http://guerrillagrafters.org/)! Grafting fruit bearing branches onto ornamental trees!

Dennis

No issue here Dennis.

[Bubu]

I will do the seed bombs method. Any thought?

http://www.guerrillagardening.org/ggseedbombs.html

http://www.wikihow.com/Make-a-Seed-Bomb

I wonder about soaking seeds overnight, then allowing the seed bombs to dry out. Seems like that would kill some seeds that start to germinate then dry out.

I love the idea of seed bombs! Make plants, not war!

Dennis

thanks for bringing out Dennis I knew this for a fact I'm a farmer at heart. Choose the seeds that starts to germinate longer most perennial and fruit tress starts to germinate 5 days on wards

and thanks for another good idea GG

[CD7]

I love this ted talk ...THANKYOU!!! I visualize tht all over the globe all the time, my heart aches for it

...walls can be made of gardens too!

[Irishmammy]

many thanks Ron for reminding me of how it used to be in the neighbourhood where I grew up. 40 years ago in suburban Dublin, Ireland everyone grew veg and fruit in their back gardens, made jam from the fruit and swapped veg with each other, no surplus went to waste! us kids were healthy and ate apples straight from the trees.
It's so simple really and right under our noses.