About
Restoration Nation aims to encourage all Americans to restore whatever they can, so that nothing is trash(ed).
How should they do that? By choosing something they love, and investigating how they can increase its sustainability.
For example, if you love cars, you could look into buying used parts to fix them. Or you could drive your car uber-efficiently. Or you could stop driving it so much. Or you could switch it to biodiesel.
My goal, in 2012, is to fill this site with similar examples in order to inspire Americans to restore. Whatever they can. Whenever they can. No matter how small.
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My name is Beth Partin, and for the moment I live in the Denver area while I am recovering from breast cancer. I hope to be back on the road (12 Cities, 1 Year) by the end of the year. I make my living as an editor, write Beth at Home and Abroad, take pictures that I want to sell, watch birds, and recycle obsessively. I used to garden, when I had a garden, and I installed a somewhat successful buffalograss meadow in my yard in Broomfield.
To my sorrow, all the organic food I ate and the nontoxic cleaners I used and the composting I piled in the backyard didn’t preserve me from cancer. To be honest, I never expected organic produce to keep me healthy, but still, it’s a sore spot. At least for my pride.
Everything I do that is sustainable, I do for one reason:
REDUCE POLLUTION.
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Hi Beth,
I found your site while searching for land restoration companies and work. Terrific site and ideas. I share them all with you. Restoration of our biodiversity and overall land health ought to be a top human objective. On my own former 40 acres in WI this was my primary goal. Not to extract but to give back and bring back to full health. I put hundreds of hours of labor and thousands of $ into the effort. It was fun and rewarding work restoring eden. Now I’m in the PNW seeking to partner with a landowner to do the same thing out here, and I think I’ve just found one.
So I’m curious as to who you are, your background, what part of the country you live, how you came to be so passionate about land restoration, etc.
Wiliam, thanks for commenting. It is indeed a long-term project to restore anything, especially 40 acres.
I grew up in the Midwest and didn’t really get concerned about the environment until I was in my thirties. Then I started volunteering, first doing administrative work for the Nature Conservancy and then a few restoration projects. All the TNC properties were more than an hour away, however, so I tried signing up for local projects. Then Wildlands Restoration Volunteers formed around 2001, and I’ve been doing restoration with them for 9 years.
I also learned some things about native plants from trying to create a buffalograss meadow in my backyard, with which I’ve had mixed success. It’s right next to a weedy park, so my first piece of advice to anyone restoring a yard is to observe the surroundings. I don’t think my little buffalograss patch will ever be viable because of all the competition next door.
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