Today, at the start of the “holiday season” we have Black Friday, the epitome of the American consumerist culture. We are are continually bombarded with what to buy. We are presented with the dominant cultural narrative that owning products somehow …
Reducing Your Impact on the Planet: Ten Tips to Get Started
As we quickly approach the most consumptive season of the year, I wanted to post about ways that you can reduce your overall impact on the planet. I think its critically important that we, as druids and other earth-centered spiritual …
Gardening into December: Hoop House Updates, Chickens, Composting, and More!
I wanted to post another update about the progress of the hoop houses and other gardening activities in mid-November in my Zone 6 climate in South East Michigan. As I wrote about in earlier blog posts, I have been experimenting …
Druidry and Citizen-Research: Arbor Day Hazelnuts and Project BudBurst
When I attended the East Coast Gathering, one of the talks that really stood out to me was John Michael Greer’s talk on “Reclaiming Science.” In the talk, he argued that science has become rather corrupt, and the funding for …
The Crane Bag: A Druid’s Working Tool
One of the practices that is fairly consistent across different kinds of druidry today is a druid’s crane bag. Traditionally, a crane bag was made from the skin of a crane, and served as a spiritual working tool for the …
The Mystery of the Stumps and The Spiral Path: A Story of How I Became A Druid
Each of us has a story–a story of how we ended up doing what we do, believing what we believe, walking the path that we travel. These stories are often like richly woven tapestries, and I believe that there is …
Moving Sustainability from the Fringe to the Mainstream: The Case of One University
One of the greatest challenges we, as a culture, face is transitioning to sustainable practices and making those practices mainstream rather than fringe activities. In some parts of the country, even access to local foods is not possible; in others, …
Story of the Ancient Maple: From Loved Seedling to Forest Guardian
On this Samhuinn eve, I would like to share a story. This was a story that was given to me. Behind our sacred grove, about 50′ feet into the forest to the north west, is an ancient maple. She grows …
Shaping the Land and Shaping Ourselves
When you are flying* across the country, as I happened to do this week, it gives you a chance to observe the landscape in ways that we cannot otherwise see. When we are on the ground, we are able to …
Druidry and the Art of Sustainable, Meaningful Offerings
In druidry and in other earth-centered religions, its customary to make offerings to spirits, the ancestors, guides, outsiders, etc. We usually do this as part of ritual or solitary practice. Recently, the issue of what to use as offerings came …
Natural Building II: Rocket Stoves!
Earlier this week, I blogged about my visit to the Strawbale Studio. In this second Natural Building post, I’m going to talk about the rocket stove workshop itself. I’m quite excited about rocket stoves, because they use simple materials to …
Natural Building I: The Strawbale Studio
Yesterday, I attended a rocket stove building workshop at the Strawbale Studio and the sustainability-focused work of Deanne Bednar. In this post, I want to spend time highlighting the Strawbale Studio and Deanne Bandar’s work as an excellent example of …
Oak Knowledge: Value of Bardic, Ovate, and Druid Knowledge
In the ancient Celtic world, the word “druid” meant “oak knowledge” or more broadly “deep knowledge” (Cunliffe, 1997). This likely referred to the wide variety of activities that druids participated in and the knowledge they held–the knowledge of the law, …
Chickens and Sustainability
Chickens as part of a sustainable system. Raising chickens has become an activity of growing importance within permaculture/sustainability movements. Most backyard chicken owners raise their birds for eggs, meat, companionship, manure, happiness, and natural pest control. Chickens can form one …
Sustainability, Climate Change, and Inaction: A Stasis Theory / Rhetorical Analysis
One of the most frustrating issues in the sustainability and environmental movements today is the lack of serious discussion or action of any kind on the part of world governments and leaders. While we have stunning examples of people enacting …
Building Outdoor Sacred Spaces, Part III: Other Small Projects
Welcome to my 3rd blog post about building outdoor sacred spaces. In my first post, I discussed stacking stones or stone cairn building. In my second post, I discussed building larger spaces, like stone circles and spirals. In this post, …
OBOD East Coast Gathering 2012 Review
“Breathe deeply and enter through your heart’s door Where Stag and Salmon leap; where Hawk soars o’er the tor Where Starry Bear journeys from dusk till dawn. Spiral the heavens! Time Untime lingers on.” –Barb Pott (Crescent Birch Grove, …
Raised Garden Beds from Salvaged/Found Materials
A lot of gardeners today use the raised bed method to grow plants. I have been doing pseudo-raised beds in the garden for two years now. The raised beds are higher than the ground (since my local dirt is deficient …
Know Your History to Save Your Future
I attended a talk, titled “Local Food Starts at Home” and sponsored by two knowledgeable friends of mine, that focused on increasing awareness of local foods and building a sustainable foodshed in the future for our area. At the beginning …
Making Berry Inks (Huckleberry, Raspberry, Blackberry, Pokeberry, etc.)
Ink making is a wonderful way to use up some of the fabulous berries that you can forage for outdoors or grow in your garden. With berry ink, you can do wonderful water washes, use a dip pen and write …
Seed Saving 101: Spinach & Lettuce Seed Saving
Before Monstanto, before Walmart, and before any modern hybrid seeds available in convenient packets, humans saved seeds from season to season. This brought us closer to our land, to the cycle of life, death, and rebirth, and to our own …