Letters

There is great news afoot. Or, I might say, there is great news underfoot.

With the film “Kiss The Ground,” which the Southampton Arts Center, along with Drawdown East End, brought to the community last week, along with a panel, “The Great East End Soil and Sea Carbon Sequestration Conversation,” we now know the incredibly powerful impact our soil and seas have on planetary health. Now we know that we personally have dynamic tools at our fingertips, in our own yards and with the choices of the food we buy, to be forces for good.

The minute we switch from our old ways to new ways, we switch from being the problem to being the solution. Eureka!

During the panel, moderated by Drawdown East End’s Mary Morgan, we learned of landscape architect Edwina Von Gal’s “Perfect Earth Project” and her just-launching “2/3 For The Birds.” They give tours to learn best practices as well as have internships in development.

Chris Gobler, Ph.D., of the Stony Book Southampton Marine Sciences Center regaled us with amazing statistics of the power of fast-growing seaweed, which we can eat or use as fertilizer, to sequester carbon better than any land plant.

From Cornell Cooperative Extension Agency, Deborah Aller, Ph.D., shared educational offerings that she presents to farmers, including the new practice of no- or low-tillage farming. And she introduced mind-blowing data on the carbon sequestering benefits of bio-char, which we can use in our own landscapes without the harmful consequences of commercial fertilizers.

And we were roused by the regenerative practices of Mim Edelman, Slow Food East End board member and 2019 winner of the national Snail Blazer Award for biodiversity. She farms in Orient at her I & Me Farm.

As we incorporate these practices, no more festering about what we can do. Between the power of the purse to buy regeneratively produced meats and vegetables, and personal landscape methods, we are the hope for the future. We will move to one planet living together.

You can view “Kiss The Ground” on Netflix. You can find the panel video on the Southampton Arts Center YouTube channel. Or you can join a Rogers Memorial Library watch party with a follow-up live panel on December 2.

Special thanks to the Southampton Arts Center for the pivotal programs they bring to our community.

Dorothy Reilly

Drawdown East End

Southampton