Sterling Terrain V02 - Flipbook - Page 41
Sterling College | 39
Kristie Kapp ‘80
natural systems). Considering these two ideas together translates
to an ecosystem that is healthy for everything: insects, wildlife, soil
biota, water, and air – earth care, people care, and fair share.
I pursued my Permaculture Design Certification (PDC) and an advanced course. I began creating permaculture designs for homeowners. After a few years doing one backyard at a time, I started to
feel that this wasn’t enough to effect the kind of change I wanted
to see. I wanted to have a bigger impact and reach more people.
And here was born the idea to start a nonprofit - Resilient Roots. We
started with hosting weekend workshops and then added gardens
and education at a number of transitional housing sites in Hyannis
with the hope that the clients could take the knowledge with them
when they transitioned out. We are also working with Habitat for
Humanity on Cape Cod on some projects – they are trying to be
good stewards by not just throwing in lawns and hydrangeas, but
provide for their clients some diversity with natives and edibles.
I am inspired by Doug Tallamy’s Homegrown National Park project
– this idea that if individual lawns were planted with native plants,
we could collectively create 20 million acres of cooperative conservation. This is a concept we try to encourage.
One of the most rewarding and meaningful things we do at Resilient Roots is the permablitz. We start with a family or individual that
is interested in a permaculture design and is also willing to organize
materials and participants with our help. We develop planting plans
together, and then bring everyone together – 20 or so people – on
one day to do the work of installation. People are eager to learn about
how they can live gently on the earth and grow their own food and
protect and enhance wildlife habitat. Each time we do a permablitz
there is a multiplier effect that elicits another few projects and folds
more people into the process. This is how I participate in activism.
It is changemaking in action. At the end of a permablitz everyone
is exhausted and exhilarated. The joy lasts from year to year as we
watch these plantings thrive and produce. Hard work is good stuff.
Kristie Kapp ‘80 is the Founder and President of Resilient Roots. She is a regenerative
landscape designer that focuses on edible
and native plantings. She has many years of
farming experience and has taught farming
and gardening to every age group through
several different organizations. She merged
her professions of ecology and agriculture and
completed a permaculture landscape design
program in 2012 and has been creating designs
for clients since. Kristie strives to encourage
people to look at their environments holistically
while incorporating elements of time-honored
design and reinforcing our revered relationship
with the natural environment. She lives in West
Barnstable, Massachusetts.
Kristie’s Reading Recommendations:
A Sand County Almanac by Aldo Leopold
Silent Spring by Rachel Carson
The Quiet Crisis by Stewart Udall
The Outermost House by Henry Beston
Small Is Beautiful: Economics as if People Mattered
by E.F. Schumacher
The Unsettling of America: Culture & Agriculture
by Wendell Berry
One Straw Revolution: An Introduction to Natural
Farming by Masanobu Fukuoka
Gaia’s Garden: A Guide to Home-Scale
Permaculture by Toby Hemenway
Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer
Nature’s Best Hope: A New Approach to
Conservation That Starts in Your Yard
by Douglas W. Tallamy
Photos: Compliments of Kristie Kapp