gloomy dad.

http://www.citypages.com/restaurants/a-plan-to-turn-hiawatha-golf-course-into-minneapolis-first-food-forest/416059773

Imagine a forest filled with edible plants, berries, hazelnuts, and maple trees, bordered by hiking trails. A place where you can learn to forage and harvest while enjoying a beautiful lake and natural wetlands.

Now imagine that the forest is located on the edge of Minneapolis.

This is what Ryan Seibold and Russ Henry are trying to create near Lake Hiawatha.

Parts of the nearby Hiawatha Golf Course have been closed since a 2014 flood, and are expected to reopen this spring. This spurred the Minneapolis Parks and Recreation Board to explore options for rebuilding the course to make it more flood resistant.

Yet these plans stalled when it was discovered that the board was pumping more groundwater from the course – and into the already-polluted Lake Hiawatha – than allowed by the state. The city was left to decide whether to keep pumping or let the former wetland reclaim its territory.

Henry, a landscape designer who is running for a Park Board seat, says replacing the course with a food forest would turn a big problem into a big benefit.

The restored wetland would act as a natural filter, blocking major pollutants from storm water sewers and bringing back animals and plants displaced by the course, he says.

Put simply, a food forest is a woodland that uses native trees, shrubs, and plants that are both edible and medicinal. The city would plant everything from raspberries and blackberries to maple trees and hazelnut trees, as well as shoreline plants like katniss (also known as duck potato) and medicinal herbs like echinacea.

Intended to be low-maintenance and self-maintaining once established, the plants are designed to not only build soil but to attract pollinators. (Plants like milkweed are especially beneficial for bees and monarch butterflies.)

According to Seibold, the plants would be available for people to forage and harvest as needed. The idea is to teach people to understand the connection between plants and animals, as well as learn when to harvest sustainably.

“You’re growing the food, but you’re also growing the community around the food,” Seibold says.

There would have to be some sort of foraging training to ensure the plants are available for everyone, Henry adds.

When he got his first job in a nursery 20 years ago, Henry says plants were just green things he couldn’t begin to tell apart. Since then, nature has opened up to him, and he would love for the kids of Minneapolis to have the same opportunity.

By learning more about what they’re able to take from nature, Henry says that people might feel more empowered to grow food in their own yards, to embrace nature and sustainable development, and to encourage friends and neighbors to do the same.

Seibold and Henry say they’ve been getting positive feedback. The park board has until July to decide what to do with the land, but Henry says it may have already decided to reconstruct the golf course.

Either way, the men will continue their work.

1. Dracula Parrot. This thing pisses me off like, a bunch

2. King Vulture. the felted craft project equivalent of a haunted ventriloquist dummy

i will never not resent this bird 

 3. Jacana Bird. This is the most unnecessary cursed nonsense. i deserve an apology for having to look at this. I can feel its fingers stroking my ears

No it does not have SIX FREAKING LIMBS. it’s carrying its stupid creepy spawn under its wings. A+ parents but still, piss off. even the normal 2 legged version isn’t much better

put those AWAY.

4. The Shoebill, which i’m sure we’re all sick of hearing about. this thing is the epitome of a crappy photorealistic cgi disney villainy. i despise this bird.

also this is what they look like standing up. i just feel like i shouldn’t have to deal with that, i really do.

5. Inca Tern. truly, hipsters ruin everything

6. Tragopan. it looks like a star wars species, which i dislike on principle 

7. The Secretary Bird. it wears yoga pants.

also i’m uncomfortable with the length of its eyelashes

8. finally, i really dislike this one specific parakeet