above: This year’s first snow, about 8” in January, was poetically beautiful and rather quickly gone.

 Monday it gets warm, up into the 70s, and by Wednesday it freezes after midnight. Again. Cold wind slices through the sun’s bright warmth and we lean out of its way; next, it’s gone and we’re pulling off sweatshirts. If snow doesn’t come again, which it might, we’ll be wading in the creeks by the end of the month!

This exquisite weather is nonetheless worrisome because of how the disrupted patterns may cause even more disruption—and also because the huge climate mutations going on all around us ask us to direct our attention to what we can do to support ourselves and others in environmentally and socially useful ways. So far, our lifestyle choices strongly support renewables and movements that resist the continuation and expansion of fossil fuel extraction.

left: Quince bloomed early at the Earthaven neighborhood called Dancing Shiva.*

We wish all our readers a healthy and encouraging Spring. We hope many of you will come visit, take a tour, enroll in a workshop, get your Permaculture Design Certificate and definitely drop us a line to share news from your neighborhood.

Here at Earthaven, residential neighborhoods are reinventing themselves as “pods,” slightly more independent units of interwoven legal entities that have most of the same ecological and unitary guidelines as before, but are taking more individual responsibility for designing their purposes as embracers of the Earthaven vision.

Amidst so many changes within and beyond the community, we continue to treasure our opportunity to learn and practice conscious connection to life, land and each other!

*Dancing Shiva is dedicated to teaching Tantra—an inclusive spiritual practice—to all folks and, in particular, the queer community, through workshops and individual retreats in the U.S., Mexico and Costa Rica, and through satsangs and written material. For more information, email dancingshivatantra at gmail.com

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NikiAnne was out touring when Mana’s mom Dorien came strolling by and they posed for the camera. Happy Spring, y’all!

Gardeners have begun their outdoor planting—some by the moon and some not! Most seeds and starts can go right in, but others will remain safe inside until around the 10th of May.

Plant starts are now available on Tuesday mornings.  Coffee & Trade is about to move outdoors again; these might be the last pictures of the winter location inside Council Hall.

Outside in the fields, another lambing season has proceeded under Caroline’s care.

Below, she leads the flock in Gateway field.

Up in Bellavia, mushroom logs have been inoculated and lay about waiting for stacking. Life is pulsing through every farmer and gardener’s fingers. Birdwatchers (and listeners) are delighted once again.

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Hepatica

Trillium

On a recent walk through the burgeoning Springtime woods, Suchi took these pictures to refresh those of us who are desk-bound, and to charm you who’ve not visited in a while.

“A deliciously long spring began with Bloodroot blossoming, continued with Trillium coming on, Trout Lily, Hepatica and Violet, and rounded off my ecstatic adventure with Lady Slipper and Showy Orchids. Oh, Nature!” ~Suchi

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Spring of 2009 blessed us with many rain showers and a few wet snow flurries. These rain showers have been sorely missed the past few years by numerous beings, including the plants. After a few years of below normal precipitation, the woods at Earthaven came alive with an abundance of woodland flowering plants.

The last few years I located numerous rare and endangered plants. This year many of the usual places where they live have expanded with the emergence of numerous smaller plants. The rain helped spread their wealth, and hence, ours too.

First out, in March the Bloodroot pops up her lovely white flower. No leaf, this she curls around her stalk. You may find her with the flower open for only a few days, and then her leaf unfurls and becomes a wonderful wide hand of green waving at you in the brown duff.

Once the Bloodroot shows, the search begins for others, for the emergence of the Bloodroot is truly a rite of spring in these Appalachian woods.

Next come the Trilliums. They, for some reason, always find their way to the middle of a trail each spring. I spent a few years marking them with rocks or sticks, but have succumbed to moving them to another off-trail place nearby. Of course, not all end up in the trail and there are numerous gatherings of these beauties. The red flowered ones are called Wake-robin. Beth root or Birthroot are other names for the white and pink flowered varieties. They tend not to mix but rather to find their own separate patches. Many have increased the size of their patch.

Then the Trout Lilly’s leaves appear, with a low-growing variegated leaf that shimmers in the sun. Its speckled greens pop up in large patches that actually do look like a school of little brook trout swimming on the banks of the creek. Not all the leaves or patches bloom. This year the yellow orange blossom appeared in many more of the patches. A delicate little Lilly that is best appreciated lying on the ground and looking up into the bell of her flower – exquisite. Once these three announce that spring has arrived, Dogwoods and Carolina silver bell trees dot the woods with white while the Poplar trees peek green and the Maples show red.

In a the heat of the summer, many of these woodland flowers will disappear into the earth, and with them, our wishes for a long rest with dreams of Spring showers.

Rae Jean is a full member at Earthaven, and is developing a homestead in the Hawk Hollar neighborhood.

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Another sign of Spring at Earthaven is the expansion of Chuck Marsh’s Useful Plants Nursery from his homesite in Benchmark neighborhood. The nursery grows permaculture and edible landscaping plants that are well adapted to our mountains and the surrounding bioregions, with a specialty in phyto-nutritionals.

Kicking off the season at the annual Organic Growers’ School, March 11, Chuck offered workshops in growing useful plants and displayed his exclusive variety of potted herbs, berries, nuts, fruits and medicinals for sale. He’ll present day-long versions of the workshop at Earthaven on April 29 and July 8. You’re invited to stop by and see what he’s got in the nursery to share, including both plant science and folklore.

Chuck’s plan for the Spring and following seasons is to expand the nursery downhill onto a leased agriculture site occupying the bottom flats of the current main campground. The upper camping sites will probably remain in place for at least another year, while the permanent campground at Hidden Valley Road is gradually developed.

Wolfberries, Jaogulan (Chinese herb), Jujube, and Goumi are some of the more exotic plants Chuck features, alongside Elderberries, Blueberries, Raspberries, thornless Blackberries, Fig trees, Apple trees, Pecans and Walnuts, and various kinds of Cherries. If you give him a holler, you can set up a time to come pick out your own pots. He’ll give you the lowdown on the health values of delicious foods you never suspected would be so conducive to your well-being! You’ll also meet Chuck at his Useful Plants stall at the Greenlife tailgate market on Wednesday and Friday afternoons in Asheville and at most local herb and gardening festivals all year long.

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In Oriental metaphoric tradition, Spring’s direction is East, its color yellow (or green-yellow), its quality innocence. The time of day is sunrise, and it corresponds to the Wood element. Its animal image is an eagle, flying high over the landscape. Spring is a time of many possibilities, and springtime energy brings openness.

Spring begins with the Equinox, a few days’ relative balance of Sun and Moon power, the days once again as long as the nights. Here in Western North Carolina, there is the likelihood of warm temperatures and the potential for snow (of which we’ve had very little this year).

By this year’s Spring Equinox, Lenten Rose, Crocus and Daffodil had already flowered. When I knelt down to smell the Hyacinths (swooning), I saw the Irises already fanning out their broad, flat green leaves. Robins were everywhere, nests and birdsong appearing literally out of the blue.

On days like these, the heart leaps up to see the trees and bushes budding, while the mind sends a flash of fear for them and the weather they may yet have to survive. However, at press time, we can say that Spring temperatures stuck around and all the buds were saved.

In general, the last frost date for the Asheville area is May 10th, but Earthaven is tucked into the edge of a iso-thermal belt that runs through Rutherford County, so we often have frost-free nights several weeks ahead of Asheville and Black Mountain.

This Spring at Earthaven is definitely a time of new beginnings! Just come up to the end of Camp Elliott Road and see the cleared, graded, soon-to-be-seeded “big sky” reality at Gateway Ag Field. Major food production planned here for years to come, with several of our young men earning “sweat equity” during the establishment of the farm. (See “Sweat and Ye Shall Receive” in this issue. Gateway Farm will be featured in the Summer newsletter.)

Continuing along Another Way to Rosy Branch Creek (second crossing), you’ll soon be driving over our second bridge. On the far side, turn right to Imani Farm and meet new residents Carla and Hijo, a ewe and her lamb. (Don’t forget to say hello to Bridgit the cow, now almost a year old.)

More surprises: arrive in the Hut Hamlet and discover that ag field in its new incarnation as “Finally Farming CSA.”

And those are just the obvious things. Interiorly, Earthaven members are creating and recreating our community with every conversation, meeting, decision, and with a revitalized Strategic Planning Committee that has begun actualizing visions that have been nurtured for more than a decade.

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