On Saturday, November 7, 2009, from 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m., the Seacoast Summit on Sustainability: Greening our Communities will be held at the Portsmouth Library, 175 Parrott Avenue, Portsmouth, NH.

The conference is being presented by Creating a Peaceful World by Sustaining our Future, a community group. All concerned citizens are invited to attend, become more informed about environmental issues of sustainability facing the seacoast community, learn how to take action, green our communities, and become prepared to sustain ourselves in the future, given the realities of climate change.

Dr. Tom Kelly, Director of Sustainability Programs at the University of New Hampshire, will be the opening speaker. Nine workshops will follow, in three tracks: Food, school nutrition, and sustainability, Town and state Activities and Planning, and Educating and Promoting Environmental Wisdom in Faith Communities. Panelists will include local sustainability leaders, in the towns of Barnstead, Dover, Durham, Epping, Exeter, Lee, Northwood, Barrington, Portsmouth, and Rochester.

The summit is sponsored by the Peace and Social Concerns Committee of the Dover Friends Meeting. Participating faith communities include: Interfaith Sustainability Team, Durham Community Church, Exeter Congregational Church, Dover Congregational Church, Durham Unitarian Universalist Fellowship, Unitarian Universalist South Church, and the Exeter Unitarian Universalist Church. A vegetarian meal will be served; workshops will be 75 to 90 minutes each, and there will be a short wrap-up session at 4:15 p.m. This Seacoast Summit is free to all.

Dr. Phyllis Killam-Abell, one of the founders and the coordinator of Creating a Peaceful World by Sustaining Our Future says, “Working toward sustainability is essential to preserve and respect the earth’s resources. Climate change, water shortages, poverty and diminishing supplies of oil and other commodities demand sustainable policies on the part of government and the private sector.” She describes “sustainability” as “the use of a resource in such a manner that it is not depleted or permanently damaged.”

Sponsors include the Peace and Social Concerns Committee of the Dover Friends Meeting, The Interfaith Sustainability Team, the Green Sanctuary Committee of the Durham Unitarian Universalist Fellowship, the Seacoast African American Cultural Center (SAACC), Seacoast Peace Response, the Seacoast NAACP.

For additional information, please contact Dr. Killiam-Abell, 603-580-1934, or Ms. Heidi Porter, 207-384-0048. For four years Creating A Peaceful World by Sustaining our Future weekly has offered speakers, films, readings and discussion on sustainability issues on Wednesday evenings, 7:00 p.m., at Friends Meeting House, 141 Central Ave., Dover.

This Saturday, Oct. 3, Apple Annie will be participating in the Green Buildings Open House sponsored by the New Hampshire Sustainable Energy Association. For more information about the open house and other places you might want to visit, see www.nhsea.org.

The Barrington Heritage Commission and the Barrington Farmers, with the sponsorship of the Barrington Recreation Department, are pleased to announce the first annual Natural Heritage and Agricultural Fair to take place Saturday, September 12^th, from 10am-4pm, at the Warren Farm, off of route 4, in Barrington, NH. The fair is a collaborative effort of local farmers and conservationists to celebrate the beauty and agrarian utility of our local natural resources.

Arrive in style on a mule-drawn hay ride, shuttling you to the day’s events.

The farmers’ market is open with many area farms offering vegetables, fruit, corn, potatoes, local meats, and heritage poultry. NH Crafters bring their wares, jewelry and yarns. Come and taste the goodness of local foods, sweet and savory, prepared by our own NH chefs.

The barnyard brims with heritage animals raised by NH farmers, working for NH food security. Cows, hogs, alpacas, rabbits, goats, sheep, and herding dogs, turkeys, ducks, geese, and chickens will all be accompanied by their farmers for your questions, ideas, and curiosity. Discover how to homestead and create your own farm.

Come and learn about the many area initiatives to preserve and protect our natural resources for our health, enjoyment, and local food security. Learn about our water, our soil, our flora and fauna. Learn about bees and honey, worms and organic gardening. Find out what you can do to bring nourishing local food into our schools and how to preserve farm lands for future generations. Meet your NH experts, whose goal it is to partner with the community to transform our state into a sustainable haven.

Dance and take in the folk music of bands and fiddle jams. Learn to contra dance, and watch the spectacle. Listen to old-fashioned story telling and the history of our local farms. Go back in time to the Revolutionary War and see the routines of our earliest Americans and junior militias.

Join the celebration and conversation about what we can do to reclaim the greatness and wonder of our New Hampshire natural heritage and agriculture.

There’s a new fair in town! We’re delighted to note that Warren Farm (site of Slow Food Seacoast’s first-ever Farm Picnic, in 2006) will be thost of the Natural Heritage Agricultural Fair on Saturday, September 12, 2009.

The fair runs 10 AM - 4 PM and includes lots of wonderful offerings:

• Farmer’s Market with lots of great, fresh, local food
• Crafts and Specialty items made by local artisans
• Educational Displays and Information about Agriculture, Land Conservation, Sustainability and Living Local
• Animals accompanied by their owners who can answer questions about the purpose each animal serves on the farm as well as in our healthy local diets.
• Musicians, Country Dancing, yummy local food cooked up fresh, Revolutionary War re-enactors in authentic garb, Jr. Militia, Mule Team Rides, and Old Fashioned Storytelling

Help Out! The festival welcomes you as an attendee….or as a volunteer! Volunteers are needed on the afternoon of September 11 for setup,or on the day of the fair for parking and breakdown. To volunteer, please callCharles Tatham at charles.tatham@aphis.usda.gov

Directions to the Fair:

Two miles west of the Lee traffic circle off route 4.
From Lee Circle (where Rt 4 and Rt 125 intersect) head West on Rt 4 for 2 miles. Warren Road is on the Right hand side. The farm is down Warren Road 1/3 rd mile.

Contact for Questions, or to be a Vendor:  nh.ag.fair@live.com, or call Jessica at 603.335.2605

At Slow Food Seacoast, we love local shrimp. The Northern shrimp are small, sweet, meaty, and succulent and taste amazing in everything - shrimp cocktails, curries, pastas, stir-fries, you name it. And what’s more, the Northern shrimp are a very good fishery for Slow Food folk to support; the shrimp (especially when trap-caught) are a sustainable fishery, with healthy population levels and low environmental impact. And as if that weren’t enough, purchasing these shrimp really helps local fishermen stay ‘afloat’ during a winter season in which not many other fish are available.

So we’re very excited to hear that this year, the Yankee Fisherman’s Cooperative is offering a Shrimp CSF (Community Supported Fishery)! They write:

The Yankee Fisherman’s Cooperative (YFC) will be offering shares for the upcoming Northern Shrimp season. As a participant in the community supported fishery, you will be supporting the NH commercial fishing industry and a sustainably harvested resource. Your shrimp will also carry the NH Fresh and Local brand which ensures that it was landed in NH and is the freshest available.

WHAT YOU WILL GET
- An 8-week subscription to the winter CSF (January - February)
- HALF share of whole shrimp: 5 lbs per week
- FULL share of whole shrimp: 10 lbs per week FULL shares are $128 ($1.60 per pound), HALF shares are $72 ($1.80 per pound)

Please use this link to fill out the interest application and a member of the fisheries cooperative will contact you.

Woody Tasch, author of Slow Money: Investing As If Food, Farms and Fertility Mattered, will be speaking at RiverRun Bookstore on Tuesday, Aug. 11 at 7 p.m., as part of Seacoast Local’s “Making the Connection” speaker series, co-produced with RiverRun Bookstore.

“Think about it: A hundred thousand Americans providing millions of dollars a year for investment in local food systems. Is it typical philanthropy? No. Is it investing as we’ve come to know it? No. Is it achievable? Yes.”

So says Woody Tasch, who works at the intersection of venture capital and slow money. He is chairman emeritus of Investors’ Circle, a nonprofit network of angel investors, venture capitalists, foundations, and family offices that, since 1992, has facilitated the flow of $130 million to 200 early-stage companies and venture funds dedicated to sustainability. Now, he is president of the newly formed NGO Slow Money. As part of the larger Slow Movement sweeping the cultures of food, travel, cities, and schools, Slow Money proponents seek investments and returns at the pace of sustainable business development. Click here for more information about his new book, Slow Money, and plan to join us on Tuesday, Aug. 11 at 7  pm.

Seacoast Local and RiverRun Bookstore present the next author in their “Making the Connection” speaker series, a series that serves as a catalyst for continuing education, community connections, and sustainable change. Lisa M. Hamilton, author of Deeply Rooted: Unconventional Farmers in the Age of Agribusiness, will be at RiverRun Bookstore on Saturday, June 27 . Hamilton will take us beyond local food and into the lives of western farmers who are David to the Goliath of corporate agriculture.

The event is co-sponsored by Slow Food Seacoast, and it starts at 6 pm with the debut of their new game “Who Wants to Be a Locavore?” Local food writer Rachel Forrest will host this trivia challenge, there will be prizes galore and as always, refreshments of the local variety will be served.

Lisa M. Hamilton will present her talk at 7 pm. The journalist and photographer spent two years profiling three families in rural America who represent a change in the way we should think about food and agriculture.

As with The Omnivore’s Dilemma, Deeply Rooted suggests one of the best ways to address the problems with our nation’s food system is to go straight to the source—the farmers themselves.

Over the past forty years, many American farmers and ranchers have been told to “get big or get out.”  Countless people within agriculture have been replaced with machines, and their farms with corporate agribusinesses. The large-scale industrialization that followed has altered the face of American agriculture with dire environmental and economic consequences, and endangered the health and wellbeing of consumers.

Now, across the country, a courageous group of farmers and ranchers have issued a call to arms to end these unhealthy and unsustainable practices. To them, agriculture is not an industry but a way of life, and humans should be at the heart of it all.  Among these farmers are

•    Harry Lewis: an African-American dairyman in Texas who dreams of addressing Congress one day

•    Virgil Trujillo: a tenth-generation New Mexico rancher who believes agriculture could be the salvation of his impoverished hometown

•    David, Dan and Theresa Podoll: North Dakotan organic farmers whose vision for a more sustainable way of farming is derided by their neighbors

Scorned, ridiculed, and dismissed for their unconventional beliefs and faith in people, Harry Lewis, Virgil Trujillo, and the Podoll family prove to be the real mavericks of our time.  By telling their stories, Hamilton has given a human face to agriculture, and serves up an important lesson about bringing farmers back to the table at a time when we need them more than ever.

Lisa M. Hamilton’s work has been published in National Geographic Traveler, Harper’s Magazine, The Nation, Orion, and Gastronomica. She lives in northern California.

RiverRun Bookstore is located at 20 Congress Street in downtown Portsmouth. The event is free and open to the public.

For more details on the event, call 603-431-2100 or visit www.riverrunbookstore.com. For more information on Seacoast Local, including its “Buy Local” program, call 603-766-1775 or visit www.seacoastlocal.org. The Slow Food Seacoast website is at www.slowfoodseacoast.org.

At RiverRun Bookstore on Monday, May 18 at 7 pm: a free workshop on New Ideas for Preserving Nature: Useful Tips for NH Landowners, Gardeners, and Landscapers

With rural areas fast disappearing in the Northeast, it seems the only way to preserve our identity as a place where people, plants, and animals can share the land is to integrate the landscapes around our homes, communities, and work spaces with the natural world. What does that mean and how do you do it?

And what about landscaping’s far-reaching effects on water quality? No matter where you live in New Hampshire, the actions you take make a difference. Why? Because we all live in a watershed, where water drains into a lake, river, wetland, or coastal estuary. How do we protect that natural resource?

Take some time to “sit at the feet” of experts who will share what they’ve learned—and taught—over many years. Mary Tebo, a community forestry educator, and Lauren Chase-Rowell, a landscape design expert, will present information from two books they’ve co-authored with other experts: Landscaping at the Water’s Edge: An Ecological Approach and Integrated Landscaping: Following Nature’s Lead, both published by the UNH Cooperative Extension.

You will learn

• How to establish landscapes that look and feel as if they belong
• To integrate natural principles into beautifu, functional landscapes
• To create landscapes that sustain themselves with minimum cost, energy, and effort.
• To think in terms of plant systems, rather than mere collections of individual plants.
• How to use and apply plant-system models designed for challenging conditions
• Where to find alternatives to invasive species.
• How to create landscapes that benefit wildlife, both above and below ground.

RiverRun Bookstore is located at 20 Congress Street in downtown Portsmouth. For more information on the event, visit www.riverrunbookstore.com or call (603) 431-2100. The event is free and open to the public.

Slow Food Seacoast is very excited to be working with a new partner, Clay Hill Farm in Ogunquit, ME - you may know them for the Green Wedding Giveaway contest that was won by friend and frequent partner of Slow Food Seacoast, Jonathan Blakeslee and Joelle Guerard of White Heron Tea! Clay Hill Farm is taking steps into the sustainability movement and has planned a great Earth Day celebration called Clay Hill Unplugged. Slow Food Seacoast will be there!

Clay Hill Farm is on a 30-acre tree farm originally settled in 1780. It’s the only restaurant ever to be certified and congratulated by the National Wildlife Association as a wildlife habitat and bird sanctuary, and is a Maine Certified Environmental Leader. We’re excited that they’ve reached out to the Slow Food movement.

Hope to see you there! This should be a lovely weeknight out.

The Details:

Lights out! Celebrate sustainability with a candlelit event featuring local music, local food and local resources
Date: Wednesday, April 22nd at Clay Hill Farm
Time: 5:30 pm
Tickets: $15 in advance/ $18 at the door

Hors d’oeuvres ~ acoustic music ~ tastings ~ charity raffle ~ networking and chats with local businesses, growers and earth-conscious folk.

Live Perfomances by:

Jonathan Blakeslee  (the 2009 Green Wedding Giveaway contest groom-to-be WINNER!)

Adam Flaherty of the Sea Captains

Pat Keane Classical Guitar

Presentations by:

Slow Food Seacoast ~ Michelle Moon

Strawbery Banke ~ John Forti

The Green Alliance ~ Sarah Brown

(We think there will be a greens tasting from Andy’s Greens and Smiling Hill farm cheese, too!)

EVENT SPONSORS: Bartram’s Beeswax Candles, Lori D Entertainment, Adam Flaherty Productions, Ovington Produce, Great Works Regional Land Trust, White Heron Tea, Carpe Diem Coffee, Center for Wildlife, Griffin-vites Watercolor Stationary, Haunted Milk Marketing, Purely Organic Lawncare,
Dixon’s Earth-friendly Golf Balls

Candlelight courtesy of Bartram’s Beeswax Candles
Logo by Haunted Milk Marketing & Design