#sunflowers — Public Fediverse posts
Live and recent posts from across the Fediverse tagged #sunflowers, aggregated by home.social.
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"For Good Luck"
Teableau for 09/02/26I created this scene for a loved one who needed a dose of good luck and good cheer. Sunflowers are lucky for me.
#Tea #Sunflowers #Teableau #TeaCozy #TeaCosy #Handmade #Handpainted #Painting #GlassArt #HenOnBasket #Rooibos #VanillaTea #AdagioTeas
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"For Good Luck"
Teableau for 09/02/26I created this scene for a loved one who needed a dose of good luck and good cheer. Sunflowers are lucky for me.
#Tea #Sunflowers #Teableau #TeaCozy #TeaCosy #Handmade #Handpainted #Painting #GlassArt #HenOnBasket #Rooibos #VanillaTea #AdagioTeas
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"For Good Luck"
Teableau for 09/02/26I created this scene for a loved one who needed a dose of good luck and good cheer. Sunflowers are lucky for me.
#Tea #Sunflowers #Teableau #TeaCozy #TeaCosy #Handmade #Handpainted #Painting #GlassArt #HenOnBasket #Rooibos #VanillaTea #AdagioTeas
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"For Good Luck"
Teableau for 09/02/26I created this scene for a loved one who needed a dose of good luck and good cheer. Sunflowers are lucky for me.
#Tea #Sunflowers #Teableau #TeaCozy #TeaCosy #Handmade #Handpainted #Painting #GlassArt #HenOnBasket #Rooibos #VanillaTea #AdagioTeas
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"For Good Luck"
Teableau for 09/02/26I created this scene for a loved one who needed a dose of good luck and good cheer. Sunflowers are lucky for me.
#Tea #Sunflowers #Teableau #TeaCozy #TeaCosy #Handmade #Handpainted #Painting #GlassArt #HenOnBasket #Rooibos #VanillaTea #AdagioTeas
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Today’s haul.
Some sunflower branches were bent and broken (by squirrels?), so I took them home.
We also got a bag of green beans which were already cooked. -
I saw this sunflower while going to church today, and then I realized it's going to be a sunny Sunday! It rains almost every day during the rainy season, and most Sundays it rains too, but this flower just told me it's going to be as usual. 🌻☀️
#SundayService #SunnySunday #RainySeason #Blessed #Nature #Sunflowers
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10 #IndigenousGardening Techniques Still Used Today
By: Robin Sweetser, May 3, 2026
"As gardeners, we are connected to all people who have come before us, caring for the earth and learning how to best grow crops. Ready for the best gardening techniques? Let’s have a look at some age-old gardening wisdom that’s still relevant today.
A Long History of #Gardening
#Gourds, #beans, and #peppers were being cultivated in #Mexico by 5500 BC, and by 5000 BC, #maize was being grown in #Mesoamerica, and #potatoes in #SouthAmerica. The success or failure of these crops had a major impact on people’s survival. It was critical not only that the land provided sustenance but that it sustained them year after year, which required knowledge of #sustainable growing techniques to preserve the land for future generations.
We hear buzzwords like 'sustainable' or 'permaculture' and 'organic' today. But these techniques were here long before we started talking about 'going green.' Perhaps your grandparents also knew some of the older, gentler ways. Many are simply intuitive and based on fostering a closer relationship with nature and the land. If you don’t already, you might want to think about integrating some of these techniques into your own landscape.
Many of the following practices are often viewed as 'new' to the gardening world, but they’ve been around for a long, long time. They have all been traditionally used by #NativeAmerican peoples, but that is not to say that all of these techniques were used by all Native American cultures. Just like separate countries, #Indigenous cultures vary widely in their gardening philosophies and techniques. Below are just a few #sustainable, Earth-conscious ways to grow a better garden.
These practices originate from diverse Indigenous nations across North and South America, including the #Haudenosaunee (#Iroquois), #Hopi, #Wampanoag, and many others. Agricultural traditions varied widely by climate, geography, and culture.
Companion Planting (the #ThreeSisters Method)
Time-honored gardening wisdom says that certain plants, when grown together, improve each other’s health and yields. For instance, some plants attract beneficial insects that help to protect a companion, while other plants (particularly herbs) act as repellents.
A commonly cited example is the Three Sisters Garden, which has been traditionally practiced by the Wampanoag people of what is now the northeastern United States. A prime demonstration of companion planting at its best, corn provides support for pole beans to climb, the beans add nitrogen to the soil for future crops to use, and squash leaves shade the soil around the taller plants, like a living mulch. Squash’s prickly leaves also deter marauding animal pests. Some would add a fourth sister—a flowering plant such as #sunflowers—to draw in #pollinators.
#Intercropping or #polyculture of plants that have mutual benefits (aka companion planting) mimics the way different species grow together in nature. #Monoculture, on the other hand, leads to the exhaustion of soil nutrients. Indigenous people also discovered that plant diversity meant diet diversity. If one crop should fail, the others could fill that void.
Try 'intercropping' in your vegetable garden. Sneak small crops in between bigger ones; the small crops will be ready before the big ones need the space.
#Terracing for #SoilConservation
Terracing creates flat planting beds in hilly terrain. Taming the steep slopes slows runoff, allowing water to seep into the beds and curb erosion.
Creating terraces in which to garden is an especially good way to garden where rain is seasonal, sporadic, and often comes in heavy downpours. In the southwestern U.S., for example, terracing was key to the agricultural success of the Anasazi and their descendants, the #Hopi, who still use terraced gardens today. This can be seen in the village of #HotevillaBacavi, in northern Arizona, where traditional #TerracedGardens were restored in the 1990s.
If you wish to garden sustainably on sloped land for years to come, the use of terracing is essential in avoiding soil erosion that carries your precious topsoil away.
There are different types of #terracing. If you have a slope, consider using some rocks or retaining walls to create a series of flattened areas, mitigating runoff. Ancient terraces are seen all over the steep terrain in #Greece, too.
Traditional Irrigation Methods
Thousands of years ago, the Anasazi people inhabited what is now the Four Corners region of the U.S., an area known for its low annual rainfall. They traditionally built catchments, check dams (dams made of rock that held onto soil but allowed water to pass through), and reservoirs to collect the infrequent stormwater. The Hopi people of northern Arizona also use these age-old techniques to irrigate their gardens in this arid landscape, although modern technology has allowed for expanded #WaterConservation efforts.
If you live in a dry area, storing water in ponds, cisterns, or even a #RainBarrel is a wise idea, as the reserved water can be used for irrigation as needed.
Conversely, in areas with floods, people learned how to use what could be destructive as a way to boost productivity. For example, one technique was to create shallow depressions so that when the floodwaters rose, the water could be stored. Another technique was to use #canals near rivers to divert water to nearby farmland."
Read more:
https://www.almanac.com/10-indigenous-gardening-techniques-still-used-today#SolarPunkSunday #GrowYourOwnFood #NativeAmericans #TraditionalTechnology #ClimateChangeGardening #TraditionalEcologicalKnowledge #TEK #TerracedGardens #RainGardens
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North: SUNFLOWER
plot of #sunflowers
bold and bright against green fields
they bask in the lightSouth: GLIMMER
gradual sunset
a #glimmer of light remains
before it grows dark -
Sunflower (1849) by J. J. Grandville, from The Flowers Personified.
Source: The Getty / Internet Archive
https://pdimagearchive.org/images/c4e34079-77b9-42cd-bde7-8791275fd349
#anthropomorphism #caricatures #cartoons #gesture #floral #personification #sunflowers #flora #flowers #art #publicdomain
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We've been country folk our whole lives, so it's no surprise how often our outings centered around picnics. 1982. #picnic #picnics #picnicking #outdoors #outdoorfun #outdooractivity #country #liveinthecountry #countrylife #sunflowers #garden #pennsylvania #centralpennsylvania
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Could This #Arizona Ranch Be a Model for #Southwest Farmers?
Oatman Flats has undergone a dramatic transformation, becoming the Southwest’s first #Regenerative #Organic Certified farm and a potential source of ideas for weathering #ClimateChange.
" 'We embraced the abundance of #heirloom and native crops in the #SonoranDesert,' Hansen said. 'We are looking at the land and asking it what we should grow, rather than asking the land to grow what we want.' " - Dax Hansen, owner of Oatman Flats Ranch.
By Samuel Gilbert
May 12, 2025Excerpt: "Regeneration Rooted in #Indigenous Practices
"Southern Arizona’s rich agricultural history stretches back more than 5,000 years. By 600 CE, the Hohokam people were constructing North America’s largest and most elaborate irrigation systems along the Salt and Gila Rivers. The descendants of the Hohokam—the Pima and Tohono O’odham—continued to farm the land up to and after the arrival of the Spanish, who began to colonize southern Arizona in the 1600s. They continue to farm in Arizona today.
"At the Tohono O’odham Indian Reservation, about two hours southeast of Oatman Flats, the San Xavier Co-op Farm uses historic land management practices and grows traditional crops that reflect their respect for the land, plants, animals, elders, and the sacredness of water.
"San Xavier Farm Manager Duran Andrews and his team plant #CoverCrops, rotate fields, and collect #rainwater.
" '[Regenerative agriculture] is nothing new to us,' Andrews said. 'We have been doing this for decades. Harmony between nature and people has been our approach all the time.' Rotating fields and cultivating multiple mutually beneficial species in the same fields improves water and soil quality and biodiversity in this harsh landscape.
" 'You’ve seen what the land looks like in five years; imagine it in 10. If we can do it here, we can do it anywhere.'
"The co-op grows a variety of native crops that were developed in the region and cultivated for centuries or, in some cases, millennia, such as grains and beans, which they sell online. 'We irrigate them till they sprout, then cut them off till the monsoon shows up,' Andrews said. 'We try to keep crops in that hardy state through all the years and decades they have been here. We try not to get away from how things were done in the past.'
"They also grow White Sonora wheat, introduced to Arizona by Spanish Jesuit missionaries in the 1600s. 'It was a gift from Father Kino that we have taken as our own,' Andrews said. 'The [San Xavier] community was one of the first to grow this wheat.'
"Following the Mexican-American War in the mid-1800s, the United States claimed parts of modern-day Arizona, New Mexico, California, Nevada, and Utah. The Anglo ranchers who moved into the area dug canals to irrigate agricultural fields, transforming the landscape. An 1852 watercolor by surveyor Jon Russell Bartlett depicts a verdant valley with cottonwoods and mesquite trees lining a flowing Gila River as it passes through Oatman Flats Ranch.
"That landscape is unrecognizable today. The lower Gila has gone bone dry after years of upstream diversions, dams, water overuse, and climate change. In 2019, the Gila River earned the title of Most Endangered River by the nonprofit advocacy group American Rivers.
"Standing on the sandy Gila riverbed, which divides the north and south farms of Oatman Flats Ranch, Wang pointed to the nearby invasive salt cedars. Healing the land involves rebuilding the water, nutrient, and carbon cycles from the ground up, 'at the micro level,' he said. 'On the macro level, it’s broken.'
"The ranch team has poured resources into rebuilding soil health by planting #hedgerows and 30-plus species of cover crops, at a cost of approximately $100,000. The hedgerows, mostly native trees, were planted along the edges of the fields to reduce erosion and provide habitat for beneficial species, including #pollinators such as #bees and #hummingbirds.
"The cover crops — #millet, #chickpeas, #sunflowers, #sorghum, sudan grass, broadleaves, and #NativeGrasses among them—are planted immediately after harvesting wheat, to provide 'soil armor,' help conserve water, fix nitrogen in the soil, suppress weeds, attract beneficial insects, and sequester carbon. The once-barren land now supports life for more than 120 species of flora and fauna."
Read more:
https://civileats.com/2025/05/12/could-this-arizona-ranch-be-a-model-for-southwest-farmers/#SolarPunkSunday #RegenerativeAgriculture #RegenerativeFarming #RestorativeAgriculture #ClimateChangeFarming
