Awareness of Grass

I was blown away by the weekend workshop on 'native grassland reclamation/restoration' at Clear Sky. I couldn't help but think of a Buddhist tenet that applies very much to land stewardship as well....

See the wholesome for the wholesome, and make efforts to encourage it.  See the unwholesome for the unwholesome and make efforts to drop it. 

I used to look out the windows at the Rocky Mountain scenery, and dwell in a kind of idealistic feeling of beauty. Now..i realise..theres a huge problem in the so called 'wild' Rocky Mountain Trench where I live.  Fire supression has put the ecosystem off balance & forest ingrowth now means that wild & ranched inhabitants of the trench are losing out on good food.  

At the same time, invasive plant species are moving in- sulphur cinquefoil, orange hawkeweed, cheatgrass, kentucky blue grass and so on. They are slowly taking over and outcompeting the nutritious, drought tolerant native plant communities.  It astounds me how invasives came from far and wide -cheat grass comes from the mediterranean and is growing outside my back door in snowy canada!

Its amazing what a bit of education, understanding and awareness can do - I used to just walk over the weeds completely oblivious, or spread them further.  Now I'm looking forward to mapping our land, preparing a 'master plan',  reducing forest ingrowth through tree thinning, and coming up with ways to encourage the remnant native plant communities, while discouraging the unhealthy invasive plants already here, from spreading.


Heres to awareness, and encouraging the wholesome.