Rethinking urban gardens

04/06/2021 

Jonathan Bates, a farmer from Tompkins County, will explain how farmers and gardeners can redesign the way they produce food to ensure health, beauty, diversity and sustenance.

Bates’ talk, “Edible Forest Gardens for Dining, Diversity and Drawdown,” will begin at 7 p.m. on Monday, April 12. This event is free and open to everyone, but advance registration is required.

Bates and his family previously managed Paradise Lot, a one-tenth acre backyard garden with more than 40 species of fruit and 70 perennials with edible leaves in Holyoke, Massachusetts.

For more than a decade, Bates has studied, created and worked with rural and urban gardens in the Connecticut River Valley. He and his family are currently living in Brooktondale, N.Y. on a friend’s diversified farm specializing in silvopastured meat and eggs — a deliberate integration of trees and grazing livestock on the same land — and heirloom fruit and vegetable products. Bates also owns and operates the Food Forest Farm website, which provides information on regenerative agriculture and sells seedlings.

Bates co-authored a book, Paradise Lot: Two Plant Geeks, One-Tenth of an Acre, with Eric Toensmeier.

For additional information about this event and other SUNY Cortland sustainability efforts,  email the Sustainability Office or visit the office’s page on the university’s website.

This event is sponsored by the Sustainability Office, the New York State Master Teacher Program, the Garden Advisory Committee and the Campus Artist and Lecture Series.

Prepared by Communications Office writing intern Chelsea Grate