DIG IN
The latest articles from Chelsea Green and our authors: offering tips and techniques about how you can bring our books to life in your kitchen, backyard, or community.
The Five Keys to Photosynthesis: Caring For Your Plants
There is more to growing than just the basics of sunlight and water. In fact, there are five important factors in determining how well your plants or crops will do: sunlight, carbon dioxide, water, soil organisms, and nutrients. Luckily it is easy to maintain healthy plants, healthy food, and healthy living soil. The following is…
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Three Ways to Improve Your Mindset
We don’t realize how much our mindset affects our day-to-day activities until we become in tune with our bodies. Through practices like self-talk, mindfulness, and optimism, we can vastly improve our mental and physical health. The following is an except from Peak 40 by Marc Bubbs. It has been adapted for the web. If your personality traits…
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Reestablishing Balance: Nature’s Cure
In No-Till Intensive Vegetable Culture, renowned organic grower Bryan O’Hara describes the methods he developed during a multi-year transition of his Connecticut vegetable farm to a no-till system. His resilient crops are testaments to the value of letting the inherent biological functions in soil do their work. The following excerpt discusses reestablishing balance among microbes,…
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On Swarms and Stings
To a beekeeper, thousands of bees concentrated in one area isn’t a nightmare–it’s an opportunity to help the bees find a new home safely when necessary. It does not always come naturally though; some of the most seasoned beekeepers were scared of being stung at first. It takes a lot of time and patience to…
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The Right Way to Hydrate
Everyone knows water is important, but advice on how much to drink is wildly different. “Drink your weight in ounces of water each day”, “drink before you’re thirsty”, “drink eight 8oz glasses”, and the list goes on. Unfortunately, you can drink too much water, and it can be detrimental to your health. Read on to…
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Adding Some Pizazz to Your Greens
It’s difficult to come up with new and interesting recipes to spice up your greens, whether they’re store bought or foraged. In Alan Bergo’s new book The Forager Chef’s Book of Flora, he gives recipes like Greens with Garlic and Chili as well as Dotty’s Wild Green Salad to add some flair to what might…
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Are You Getting Enough Sleep?
If you’ve been feeling drained and running ragged from lack of sleep, you are not alone. The average adult gets around 6.5 hours of sleep every night while the recommended amount is 7-8 hours of sleep. To upgrade your performance at work and home, sleep makes all the difference in your ability to keep up…
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How to Grow Okra Microgreens
Microgreens can be used as a garnish or addition to provide great nutrients to your meals. Recently, okra joined the list of delicious microgreens. You can grow your own at home! Okra can be grown using an aquaponics system; find a use for any gallon-drums you have left in your garage or shed. The following…
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Fantastic Frozen Fruit Smoothies
Nothing says summer like fruit smoothies. But what’s better than a fruit smoothie? A frozen fruit smoothie. When it’s too hot to cook a meal, and sandwiches or salads aren’t appealing, try one of these delicious recipes. Not only will they cool you down, but you’ll get plenty of nutrients, too! The following is an excerpt…
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Say Cheese! Four Cheese Recipes to Keep You Smiling
Attention all cheese lovers! If you’re looking for recipes to satisfy all your cheesy needs, then look no further. Try out some of these fun and easy recipes next time you’re craving homemade cheese. How To Make Your Own Chèvre Using Natural Ingredients Making cheese at home may seem like a time and labor-intensive process,…
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Moths: Nighttime’s Kaleidoscope
While butterflies may take all of the attention during the day time, moths are the celebrities of night. There are over 2,500 species of moths in Britain alone, yet they are often ignored. Author Chris Salisbury is trying to change that. The following is an excerpt from Wild Nights Out by Chris Salisbury. It has…
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Should you skip breakfast?
When it comes to whether or not you should skip breakfast, there is a lot of conflicting information out there. Some research claims that skipping breakfast is the key to loosing weight. Others, on the other hand, have proven that skipping breakfast could cause your metabolism to slow down and make you gain weight. So, what’s…
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Interplanting and Beyond
Permaculture is more than just a way to garden, it applies systems-thinking to every facet of our relationship to the earth and each other. The three main ethics of permaculture are care for the planet, care for people, and only keeping a fair share of the yields of your productive work (gardening and otherwise). Expanding…
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10 Cooking Projects to Keep You Extremely Well-Fed
Are you looking to add new recipes to your repertoire? Look no further! We’ve compiled some of our favorite cooking projects and recipes that will nourish you all year long. Making Amazing Amazake Rye Bread Ready to take your rye bread to the next level? This new twist on an age-old recipe is perfect for…
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A Taoist Approach to Gardening
In her book The Tao of Vegetable Gardening, Carol Deppe introduces her innovative “Eat-All Greens Garden” which could be the easiest, most space-saving, and labor-efficient way of growing greens. With this method, a family can raise all their summer greens as well as freeze and dry enough for the winter months with even a tiny garden—a perfect…
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Redeeming the Dark
Are you afraid of the dark? If you said yes, don’t worry, you aren’t alone. But have you ever wondered why the dark gets your blood racing? In his book Wild Nights Out, author Chris Salisbury explains where that fear comes from and then encourages us to face that fear and go out and explore the night (and…
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From the Homemade Hooch Files: How to Make Dandelion Wine
Heads up: you definitely don’t want to be spraying weed killer on your dandelions. If your lawn is a total dandelion breeding ground, you are so close to having some delicious wine! Get out there and pick some so you can get started on fermenting a batch of flower wine. This drink is not only…
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Pinching Flowers to Prolong Bloom: When and How
This time of year, flowers are in full bloom! To get the most out of them, try pinching flowers to prolong the bloom. This may sound simple enough, but there’s more to this trick than you might think. The following gardening tip is from The Flower Farmer by Lynn Byczynski. Pinching Flowers to Prolong Bloom…
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Keeping the Smoke Hole Open
It’s no secret that social media has changed us, but is it necessarily for the better? Author Martin Shaw puts social media on the spot as he reflects on how today we face more “societal flatness” than ever before. The tonic? The old stories. The following is an excerpt from Smoke Hole by Martin Shaw. It…
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Learning from Our Arboreal Allies
Akiva Silver owns and operates Twisted Tree Farm, a homestead, nut orchard, and nursery located in Spencer, New York, where he grows around 20,000 trees per year using practices that go beyond organic. His background is in foraging, wilderness survival, and primitive skills. He has been observing nature intensively for the last 20 years, cultivating…
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Kickstart Your Day with Homemade Granola and Yoghurt
If you’re looking for a flavor-packed granola recipe with many delicious ingredients, then look no further! This granola recipe is a go-to for famous London restaurant Towpath’s breakfast regulars. As a bonus, they included their simple yoghurt recipe, which completes the meal. The following is an excerpt from Towpath by Lori De Mori and Laura…
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Inheriting the Earth
Farmland covers 38 percent of the land area of the Earth and is a major contributor to climate change. But it doesn’t have to be this way. Soil and plants have the capacity to store huge amounts of carbon in the ground, thus how we grow food can be one of the key solutions to…
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Dealing With Crossroads: Something to Hang Your Heart On
At a time when we are all confronted by not one, but many crossroads in our modern lives—identity, technology, trust, politics, and a global pandemic—celebrated mythologist and wilderness guide Martin Shaw delivers Smoke Hole. Here, he invites us to put down our phones and lower our gaze to the prayer mat. In Martin’s own words “In…
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The Three Pillars of Immune Health
Staying healthy is at the top of everyone’s to-do lists. But what is the best way to do it? The key is keeping your immune health in check. While that sounds daunting, there are a lot of small tweaks we can make in our everyday lives to keep our immune system in tip-top shape. If…
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Pros and Cons of Tillage
When it comes to tilling your soil, less equals more. “Why?” you may ask? Traditional tilling is exceptionally damaging to the soil in the long run. Occasional tillage may be necessary, such as before you start growing vegetables, or when you need to add supplements to depleted areas. In these cases, use a hand tool…
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