No water, no life. No blue, no green. - Sylvia Earle
I believe the loss of aquatic ecosystems is our single greatest threat to life on this planet. Inversely the construction and regeneration of aquatic ecosystems is the single greatest compensatory act that industrialized humans can do to mitigate our destructiveness. This notion underlies the bulk of my creative inertia.
I believe the loss of aquatic ecosystems is our single greatest threat to life on this planet. Inversely the construction and regeneration of aquatic ecosystems is the single greatest compensatory act that industrialized humans can do to mitigate our destructiveness. This notion underlies the bulk of my creative inertia.
In the watershed of the Klickitat River, our family built a retreat on 5 acres of former horse pasture. One of our first efforts was designing and building this pond. To avoid the use of a plastic liner we ordered a load of bentonite clay from central Oregon. This clay expands many times its original size when wet, and by this virtue makes an excellent natural pond liner. It is amazing to watch how quickly life colonized this pond. Most of the dozens of species of plants and invertebrates arrived via the legs of passing birds who ducked in for a swim. We also stocked the pond with blue gill, perch and bass.
The architecture of resurrection, the calculus of runoff and the cooperative of labor have buttered my bread for more than a decade. I am no stranger to the business of design and construction. As the unsustainable ceases to sustain itself, the economics of the regenerative takes root in the heart of people.
I am drawn to the derelict. In the dusts of misuse and neglect I see a green phoenix rise.
Oppenheimer's deadly legacy is embedded in the psyche of these lands. In this public art work entitled, Monsoon Arsenal, we re-articulate the notion of homeland security.
Bio-swales with target shaped infiltration basins and warhead shaped seedbombs awaited the monsoon rains. The rains melted the clay, compost and native seeds; the swales captured the hillside runoff and allowed the water to saturate the root-zone of the compost amended mounds. Four winged saltbush, lemonade berry and soaproot seeds sprouted and took root. A dusty weedscape becomes a lush native refugium.
Oppenheimer's deadly legacy is embedded in the psyche of these lands. In this public art work entitled, Monsoon Arsenal, we re-articulate the notion of homeland security.
Bio-swales with target shaped infiltration basins and warhead shaped seedbombs awaited the monsoon rains. The rains melted the clay, compost and native seeds; the swales captured the hillside runoff and allowed the water to saturate the root-zone of the compost amended mounds. Four winged saltbush, lemonade berry and soaproot seeds sprouted and took root. A dusty weedscape becomes a lush native refugium.
At the edge of metropolis and aquatic system grows the spirit of repentance. Our clumsy infrastructure begins to un-trample our heavy bootprints and explore the renaissance of watershed abundance. In my home(s) I seek to liberate latent ecosystem function, construct riparian areas to biologically purify our drainage and nurse disabled environments.
Our homes can rob the earth beneath of life but the thoughtful and hygienic connection of our drainage to the landscape can double its vitality. I design and build greywater, rainwater, yellowwater and blackwater recycling systems. I reclaim these nutrient rich waters to irrigate plants that support not only food and flowers for human delight but that the winged and the finned may once again thrive and inspire our kindredness with mystery. Human cleverness, like Shiva, destroys and creates. If God's wrath be holy then let her sanctify our progress with the restoration of abundant food webs.