Awesome organization, founded by former pro-basketball player and MacArthur genius grant recipient Will Allen:

Growing Power is a national nonprofit organization and land trust supporting people from diverse backgrounds, and the environments in which they live, by helping to provide equal access to healthy, high-quality, safe and affordable food for people in all communities.  Growing Power implements this mission by providing hands-on training, on-the-ground demonstration, outreach and technical assistance through the development of Community Food Systems that help people grow, process, market and distribute food in a sustainable manner.

Info on the organization’s programs, including aquaculture and bees, http://www.growingpower.org/

Perhaps these guys say it best… Streetsblog SF, San Francisco Chronicle, the Design Blog, Yelp, Trendhunter Magazine, PSFK. And we also say it on the SFMOMA’s blog.

We are developing “Walklet”–a plug-and-play system that makes it easy to instantly create a pedestrian public space in a parking lane (which San Francisco is developing a new permit for as we write). Retail inquiries welcome as we are going into production now. Email us through the product’s new website.

City Goats climb, chew and entertain.

Along Cargo Way in southeastern San Francisco, a herd of 80 goats lives on a 10-acre site ringed by the SF Bay Railroad and a cement recycling plant.

City Grazing, the local “rent-a-goat” service, introduces an alternative to weed control and land restoration. Currently, the goat herd is outgrowing its existing shelter, which consists of a series of shipping containers and feed structures.

To accommodate herd growth, improve living conditions for the animals, and to make caring for them easier for their human guardians, Rebar has developed an economical solution that simultaneously references the shelter’s industrial location and uses a variety of repurposed, prefabricated materials. This efficient, low-impact accommodation will serve this herd of urban goats for many generations to come.

Proposed Shelter design includes re-purposed shipping container, K-rail highway separators and W-rail highway guardrails.

On Earth Day weekend  SFBR welcomed the new members into the herd and hosted a “Goat Naming” party. Few city goat representatives were sent to graze and entertain at Heron’s Head Park EcoCenter opening, where they got plenty of  love from the visitors. All black with a white stripe, one goat in particular was destined to represent the Rebar studio across the great goat-trodden lands of San Francisco.

Young Rebar is looking foward to new shelter and an abundance of sites to graze, plus plenty of play time with his buddies: Madonna, Lady Gaga, Spike, Frisco, Fudge, Noodle, Poopsie , Marshmallow and Columbo. If you see him out and about in the city, be sure to say hi.

For more pictures go to our Flickr Set.

All black with a white stripe this baby goat was destined to be Rebar's new mascot.

David Gavrich talks about his herd.

Rebar is grazing at Heron's Head Park.

Young fans get the goats back home at the end of the day.

From Gregory, our man on the site at 45 Lansing:

The Urban Wildflower Meadow is almost complete! One last push this Sunday should do it. As you may have noticed, the wildflowering of this large vacant lot in downtown SF has not been a small undertaking, but we’ve made some fantastic progress this month. With your help we should be able to move the rest of the mulch, finish the irrigation and plant the remaining seeds this weekend. Come anytime between 10 and 5 and stay for as long as you want.

We will again have water, snacks and gloves on hand. Be sure to bring boots a hat and lunch (if you’re staying through midday).

If coming by car, parking is best done on Harrison in front of the lot (btwn 1st street and Essex street). Never mind feeding the meter as it will be Sunday.

Here is the location:

View Larger Map

The entrance is off of the northwest side of Harrison.

The neighborhood won’t know what hit’em.

Gregory

If you are interested in helping out while learning more about gardening, irrigation and how to attract pollinators, then come on out Thursday, April ^15th anytime between 10am-5pm.

Some of what we will be doing includes:

• Finishing up the mounting 4’ pollinator plywood silhouettes (giant butterflies, hummingbirds, beetles etc.) on posts above the garden.

• Creating more planting circles filled with sheet mulch, compost and soil.

• Installing more drip irrigation.

• Seeding more CA native wildflowers.

The location:

Large lot on Harrison between 1^st and Essex streets.

Time and Date:

Thursday April 1^5th 10 am-4:30pm

We promise to once again make this fun.

RSVP to Gregory if you think you can make it,..even if just for an hour or so.

And as always, feel free to call or email with any questions you may have:

Gregorykellett@gmail.com 415.260.242

Lansing Street pollinator

From our partner Gregory, who’s leading the planting of a pollinator garden at Rebar’s interim use project at 45 Lansing in downtown San Francisco:

Rebar and the Pollinator Partnership are putting a CA native wildflower meadow downtown. The idea is to repurpose a fallow lot into a beautiful living habitat for humming birds, butterflies and other pollinators.

If you are interested in helping out while learning more about gardening, irrigation and how to attract pollinators, then come on out Sat. April 3rd.

Some of what we will be doing includes:

• Mounting 4’ pollinator plywood silhouettes (giant butterflies, hummingbirds, beetles etc.) on posts above the garden.
• Creating planting circles filled with sheet mulch, compost and soil.
• Installing drip irrigation.
• Seeding CA native wildflowers.

The location: Large lot on Harrison between 1st and Essex streets.

Time and Date: Sat April 3rd 10 am-4:30pm

We promise to make this fun.

RSVP if you think you can make it,..even if just for an hour or so.

-Gregory

And feel free to call or email with any questions you may have

Gregorykellett [at] gmail [dot com] 415.260.2428

Aerial view of plan