#SanfordME, #SpringvaleME - #LandTrust Receives Donation for #AccessibleGarden

March 20, 2023

"The Sanford Community Garden will further expand this year with new wheelchair-accessible garden beds, thanks to a generous donation from Kennebunk Savings Bank.

According to Bud Johnston, President of MWLT, the gift will enable the Land Trust to build six beds for the benefit of those unable to use the existing beds at the garden. Each bed will have two sections – a 3 x 8-foot elevated growing table and a 3 x 4-foot raised bed, 20-inches high. This combination will allow for different gardening activities. The beds will sit on a concrete slab for ease of movement and convenience. Gardeners also will park on a paved surface.

Kennebunk Savings has been the official sponsor of the community garden since its inception in the spring of 2019. In 2022, funding was provided to double the garden’s size in response to demand, and to provide each gardener with everything needed to have a successful harvest without cost. Altogether Kennebunk Savings has provided $30,000 in support of the garden. Dr. Johnston said “I am certain I speak for all those involved with the Garden in saying that we are truly grateful for the generous support of Kennebunk Savings.”

'A community garden grows more than just nutritious food. It benefits the public by building connections – we engage with the earth and we engage with each other,' said Bradford C. Paige, President and CEO of Kennebunk Savings. 'We are pleased to present the #MousamWayLandTrust with a $7,500 donation in support of the creation of an #ADAAccessible garden beds so people of all abilities – everyone in this growing community – can enjoy this space. At Kennebunk Savings, we believe being a good neighbor means investing in our community.'

The Sanford Community Garden is located at the David and Linda Pence Community Ecology Center and the McKeon Environmental Reserve off Blanchard Rd. in #SpringvaleME. It is managed by Patty and Kevin McKeon, University of Maine Extension York County Master Gardener Volunteers."

FMI:
https://mousamwaylandtrust.org/2023/03/20/land-trust-receives-donation-for-accessible-garden/

#SolarPunkSunday #CommunityGardens #GrowYourOwn #GrowYourOwnFood #FoodSecurity #BuildingCommunity

#GardeningForWildlife Habitat

#PrinceMemorialLibrary
Mar 29, 2023

"Explore #gardening and #landscaping with an eye toward creating and maintaining habitat for local #wildlife. Speaker: #AaronParker, Edgewood Nursery in Falmouth, Maine.

A #LawnsGoneWild series event. This presentation was recorded at Prince Memorial Library and was offered in partnership with the Town of Cumberland's Sustainability Committee and Chebeague and Cumberland #LandTrust."

https://youtu.be/cJnmS3fPPlA?si=MXlkTMdPOXL4frIg

#SolarPunkSunday #Gardening
#MaineGardens
#WildlifeCorridors #ChebagueLandTrust #CumberlandLandTrust #LibrariesRule #GardeningForWildlife #WildlifeCorridors #WildlifeHabitats #RewildYourGarden

#FoodForest design

LAWNS GONE WILD is a sustainable backyard education series and is offered in collaboration with #PrinceMemorialLibrary, Town of Cumberland's LCC Sustainability Committee , and Chebeague and #CumberlandME #LandTrust.

"A food forest is a way of laying out a landscape to mimic a natural forest, providing food and other human needs with a minimum amount of external inputs and maximum benefits to #wildlife and the greater #environment. Guest speaker #AaronParker introduces the concepts of ecological niches, analogs, and resource partitioning so you can design your own home-scale food forest. He also covers best practices for starting a food forest and recommended species to plant."

Watch:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c9DVifxdQqU&t=2s

Source:
https://www.cumberlandorchard.org/learn/lawns-gone-wild-food-forest-design

#SolarPunkSunday #Gardening #MaineGardens #WildlifeCorridors

❓ Wie sind die Eigentumsverhältnisse geregelt? Wer ist zur Nutzung befugt?

❕Eigentumsrechte betreffen immer auch unsere Beziehungen zu Mitmenschen, Lebensgrundlagen und künftigen Generationen. Sie sind so festzulegen, dass diese Beziehungen nicht zerstört werden. Ein Sache tatsächlich zu gebrauchen (Besitz) und zu pflegen wird wichtiger, als sie ausschließlich für sich zu haben (Eigentum). Dies steht der Idee 'absoluter Verfügung' entgegen und verhindert Machtmissbrauch durch Eigentum. Rechtsformen beziehungshaften Habens werden von den Beteiligten selbst entwickelt und kontrolliert. Sie erlauben vielfältige Nutzungsformen und heben bestenfalls den vermeintlichen Gegensatz von 'Individual- oder Kollektiveigentum' auf.

👉 In vielen Gemeinschaftsgärten gilt für die Nutzung von Beeten die Regel: Use it or loose it.
👉 Mitglieder des selbstorganisierten Supermarktes Park Slope Food Coop sind sogenannte Mitglied-Eigentümer. Die Mitgliedschaft ist an einen monatlichen Arbeitseinsatz von 2:47 Stunden gebunden. Dadurch werden die Beziehungen zu den Menschen und dem Ort gepflegt.
👉 Das Verbundwiki (Federated Wiki ) erleichtert es, individuelle und gemeinsame Wissensproduktion zusammenzubringen, ohne dass individuelle Leistungen dabei unsichtbar werden.

🗨 Was sind deine Gedanken dazu?

#commons #commoning #fediverse #sharedownership #landtrust #eigentum

This photo was sent to me via text.
It's from my friend, Jeff, whom I originally met off of Mastodon, back in 2022. We met in person in 2023 & exchanged plants🪴We've stayed friends over the years. We are working towards similar community building goals, in separate areas of the island. Ideally, would love to have a full food security, localized food systems 'spine', running West-East/South-North, across #VancouverIsland.
Jeff lives up island with his wife & kids. He also works in #nonprofit #FoodSecurity & #environmental #stewardship. He works for #Greenways #LandTrust in #CampbellRiver :
https://www.greenwaystrust.ca/projects/food-security

This shows some of the work they've done at Maple Park Community Garden in partnership with #Strathcona Regional District. They acquired that land to steward/grow, earlier this year 💚👩‍🌾👨‍🌾👏

#GrowFood #CommunityBuilding #CommunityGarden #CommunityPark #CommunitySpaces #Greenspaces #VanIsle #GrowFoodNotLawns #FoodEquity #Gardens #Nonprofits #ClimateAction #CommunityWork #BritishColumbia #Canada #GrowPlants #Grassroots

#ScarboroughLandTrust acquires 130 acres to expand #conservation area

The 130-acre addition to #SilverBrookPreserve expands contiguous conserved lands.

Dana Richie, July 30, 2025

"The Scarborough Land Trust is expanding its green footprint in Western Scarborough with the addition of a 130-acre parcel to the Silver Brook Preserve at 65 Hanson Road.

"This is a sizable boost to the preserve that was previously made up of a 19-acre parcel purchased in 2001 and an 18-acre parcel purchased in 2024. And it expands the contiguous block of conserved land in the area to 943 acres, 600 of which are within the SLT’s stewardship.

" 'It really rounds out 25 years of conservation efforts,' said Christine Labaree, president of the land trust’s board of directors.

"The Silver Brook Preserve is home to a variety of wildlife including wild brook trout, spotted turtles, deer, bobcats, bats and maybe even a black bear or two.
And the land directly abuts #BroadturnFarm, a 434-acre parcel under the SLT’s stewardship complete with a working farm and wooded trails — the spot where Andrew Mackie, executive director of the land trust, and Labaree met on a hot and sticky afternoon.

"While walking along the #MapleSugarTrail by the edge of an open field full of tall grasses speckled with trees, Mackie said that the Silver Brook Preserve is across the tree line in the distance. Plunging deeper in the woods, past a still brook surrounded by a canopy of green, he pointed to a tree that bore a sign for the Stonewall Loop, a 1-mile trail in the Western corner of the property.

"Mackie explained that the land trust plans to extend that loop into the Silver Lake Preserve property, adding about 2 miles of trails and parking onto the new parcel within the next two years.

"Right now, the Silver Brook Preserve is open to the public for activities like hiking, skiing, snowshoeing, wildlife observation, hunting and fishing, and Mackie said that the land trust is still figuring out a lot of the policies for the preserve, like whether dogs will be required to be leashed.

"Western Scarborough isn’t the only area in town where the land trust is working to 'seed and grow' its conserved areas. There are 500 acres of contiguous conserved land in Pleasant Hill, made up of the 187-acre #PleasantHillPreserve and 300-acre #RachelCarsonNationalWildlifeRefuge. And #WarrenWoods, which was originally 162 acres in 2012, is now 313 acres, with plans in the works to connect trails to The Downs.

" 'The goal is that every neighborhood in Scarborough has opportunities to have access to open land,' Labaree said. The land trust is working with the town to achieve its goal of '30 by 30' — to preserve 30% of its land by 2030. According to Labaree, the town is currently at 23%.

"And Mackie said that these larger land parcels are more attractive in the long term because they are more ecologically sustainable, provide varying habitats for #wildlife and are easier to maintain."

Source:
https://www.pressherald.com/2025/07/30/scarborough-land-trust-acquires-130-acres-to-expand-conservation-area/

Archived version:
https://archive.md/qaDNC

#SolarPunkSunday #WildlifeCorridor #WaterIsLife #SaveTheMarshes #SaveTheFarms #Maine #SouthernMaine #LandTrust #BlueCarbon #SaveTheWetlands #SaltMarshes #ScarboroughMarsh #WebOfLife #Wetlands #SaveTheForests
#PreserveNature #LandConservation #LandForMainesFuture #SpendTimeInNature #RachelCarson

Opponents buy #Maine blueberry barren where housing plan was rejected

by Elizabeth Walztoni, 8/5/2025

"The group has plenty more work to do; it will have to repay a purchase loan within 18 months so it can donate the land to the Blue Hill Heritage Trust. Then, the trust will need time to prepare the site before opening it for public recreation, according to the group. "

Read more:
https://www.bangordailynews.com/2025/08/05/hancock/hancock-environment/blue-hill-blueberry-barren-purchased-donate-land-trust-n6hjn1me0n/

Archived version:
https://archive.ph/QoOza

#LandTrust #Nature #SolarPunkSunday #PreservingNature #BlueberryBarrens #SpendTimeInNature

#Maine - #Agricultural #ConservationEasements

"The primary purpose of an Agricultural Conservation Easement is to protect the agricultural soils, agricultural viability, and agricultural productivity of a property in perpetuity by limiting non-agricultural uses of the property.

What is it?

"It is a voluntary, legally recorded permanent deed restriction place on the property. The easement or 'development right' may be donated or sold (or a combination of the two) usually to a land trust which then holds (and manages) the easement. Land protected from development with an easement remains in private ownership.

Agricultural easements help farmers balance goals of:

- generating revenue for farming or retirement;
- making their land more affordable to future farmers;
- keeping their farmland in farming;
- maintaining a treasured legacy of #SustainableFarm #stewardship.

"Agricultural conservation easements are private transactions, entered into for perpetuity, and thus harder to undo compared to other land protection land use strategies.

"The process can take some time to negotiate and carry out. The cost of buying easements on a significant scale can be prohibitive. It is also important that the 'holder' of the easements has the capacity to ensure that the agricultural land is managed as intended.

"You can contact your local #LandTrust or the statewide #MaineFarmlandTrust when considering easements as a farm viability and farmland protection tool."

Read more (via #GrowSmartMaine):
https://growsmartmaine.org/agricultural-conservation-easements/

Learn more about Maine Farmland Trust:
https://www.mainefarmlandtrust.org/farmland/protect-farmland

#FarmsForMainesFuture #SaveTheFarms #Sprawl #LandPreservation #SolarPunkSunday #Farmland #FoodSecurity #MaineFarms #GrowLocal #EatLocal

Learn to Clam at #ReidStatePark

Date: August 1, 2025
Time: 10:00 AM - 12:00 PM
Location: 375 Seguinland Road, #GeorgetownME 04548
State Park: Reid
Event Type: #NatureExploration

"Learn about Maine's clams and try your hand at clam digging with Shellfish Warden John Hentz and the Kennebec Estuary Land Trust. Meet at Todd's Point parking lot near the Clam Trail. Bring mud boots and gloves.

"Program may be canceled due to continuous precipitation or lightning in the area."

Contact Name: The Park
Contact Phone: 207-371-2303

Cost: Programs are free with park admission. Day use: $1.00 ages 5-11, $6.00 Maine residents age 12-64, $8.00 non residents age 12-64, $2.00 non residents 65+; persons under 5 & Maine residents 65+ free

Co-Sponsor: #KennebecEstuary #LandTrust

#MaineEvents #NatureEvents
#CitizenScience #NatureObservation
#Maine #SolarPunkSunday #NatureBasedLearning