Waffle Garden
"“They are the inverse of raised beds, and for an area where it is more arid, they’re actually very efficient at conserving water,” said Enote, who leads the Colorado Plateau Foundation to protect Indigenous land, traditions, and water. Each interior cell of the waffle covers about a square foot of land, just below ground-level, and the raised, mounded earthen walls are designed to help keep moisture in the soil.
Similar sunken beds for growing food with less water have been used globally in arid regions, arising independently by Indigenous farmers, including across distinct Pueblo tribes in the Southwest. “When you have ecological equivalents you often have cultural equivalents,” said Enote. As climate change deepens, he sees this tradition as one of many ways to adapt while building food security and sovereignty."
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"Rather than buying soil to fill the program’s box gardens they use a mix that includes soil hauled from the base of hillside trees. “We’re taking the same concepts Zunis used to prepare their field,” said Bowannie. “They would clear the brush and then allow the rainstorms to run off and capture the tree soil and spread it on their fields.” The nutritious, carbon-rich soil helps absorb water, while replacing the need for fertilizer.
Not everyone opts for Bowannie’s box gardens. Curtis Quam, a Zuni museum technician and cultural educator at the A:shiwi A:wan Museum and Heritage Center, decided to go a more traditional route and planted a waffle garden with clay-soil walls with his family in 2017. This year, he planted onions, tomatoes, cucumbers, zucchini, yellow crookneck squash, basil, jalapeño, and carrots in the garden."
"Gary Nabhan, an agrarian activist and ethnobotanist based in Arizona, has observed waffle gardens in Egypt and the Canary Islands with trees that offer shade to underlying vegetables and vines extending beyond the beds. He sees the broader “very sound ecological principles” of the gardens as widely effective in arid landscapes, though cautions against replicating a specific tradition outside its original climate.
“People have already independently invented this in multiple places, so you really have to localize its size, the water source and type of soil. That’s already happened all over arid lands around the world,” said Nabhan.
That includes the area directly east of the Zuni Pueblo. In the el Valle region of New Mexico, Yvonne Sandoval, who describes herself as “mixed-race Indigenous,” tends to a 20-square-foot square waffle garden. It’s part of the Bueno Para Todos Cooperative, a small farm predominately led by queer farmers of color, as a way to reconnect with Indigenous methods for farming on dry, arid land and feed the surrounding community.
“In this region, we have really high winds and the air can be really dry, so waffle bed gardens are ideal,” said Sandoval. “I want it to be an example that shows pre-colonial farming methods can still be an answer to climate change.”
This summer, the waffle garden brimmed with corn, squash, amaranth, chilies, several varieties of peas, carrots, tomatoes, and herbs, which was fed entirely by rainwater captured in cisterns and the waffle garden’s sunken beds. This catchment system has enabled Sandoval to reduce her dependence on the acequia, the centuries-old irrigation canals that are at risk of running dry."- https://civileats.com/2021/10/26/resurgence-waffle-gardens-helping-indigenous-peoples-thrive-amid-droughts-grow-food-less-water/
Guides
Constructing a Waffle Garden with Jemez Historic Site
4:23 minute video showing how easily a waffle garden can be created.
Organizations
North America
USA
Indigenous Seed Keepers Network "Promoting Indigenous culturally diversity for future generations by collecting, growing, and sharing heirloom seeds and plants."
Native American Food Sovereignty Alliance (NAFSA) "We are an organization dedicated to restoring the food systems that support Indigenous self-determination, wellness, cultures, values, communities, economies, languages, and families while rebuilding relationships with the land, water, plants, and animals that sustain us.
Through our efforts and programs, we bring stakeholders and communities together to advocate and support best practices and policies that enhance dynamic Native food systems, sustainable economic development, education, trade routes, stewardship, and multi-generational empowerment.
We work to put the farmers, wild-crafters, fishers, hunters, ranchers, and eaters at the center of decision-making on policies, strategies and natural resource management."
New Mexico
Bien Para Todos Cooperative "is a matriarchal Indigenous-led farming project of El Valle Women’s Collaborative, a non-profit located in the rural community of Villanueva, NM."
For Teachers
Class Activity Packets
Un jardín de forma de wafle Manteniendo la vida del desierto (PDF)
Waffle Gardens: Sustaining Life in the Desert Lesson kit has visual and written information, plus some data collection sheets that can be printed out for students.
Waffle Garden (PDF) Educational packet from the New Mexico Department of Cultural Affairs for grades 3-5
Maps
International
Butterfly Conservation: Wild Spaces: Put Your Wild Space on the Map "Our interactive map shows the number and types of Wild Space near you. When you sign up in the UK, your Wild Space will also appear on the map so you can show everyone that you're taking action and encourage others to get involved too."
Europe
UK
Butterfly Conservation: Wild Spaces: Put Your Wild Space on the Map "Our interactive map shows the number and types of Wild Space near you. When you sign up in the UK, your Wild Space will also appear on the map so you can show everyone that you're taking action and encourage others to get involved too."
Grants & Funding
North America
Mexico
Community Seed Grants (CSG) "are available once every year for school gardens and community organizations with regional and cultural connection to the NS/S seed collection. They are offered to garden projects working toward collective food security, seed sovereignty, traditional knowledge, education, and other efforts of community wellness. We do not require CSG recipients to save and return seeds, but encourage those who are able to do so, to provide seeds for their community.
Our region of focus is the Southwest, which generally includes: Arizona, New Mexico, southern Utah, southern Colorado, western Oklahoma, western Texas, southern California, southern Nevada, and northwest Mexico. Native communities in arid places outside of this region may also apply.
We strive to support projects in Mexico. Due to mailing restrictions it is best if you have someone in the US who can receive and bring the seeds to Mexico.
USA
Community Seed Grants (CSG) "are available once every year for school gardens and community organizations with regional and cultural connection to the NS/S seed collection. They are offered to garden projects working toward collective food security, seed sovereignty, traditional knowledge, education, and other efforts of community wellness. We do not require CSG recipients to save and return seeds, but encourage those who are able to do so, to provide seeds for their community.
Our region of focus is the Southwest, which generally includes: Arizona, New Mexico, southern Utah, southern Colorado, western Oklahoma, western Texas, southern California, southern Nevada, and northwest Mexico. Native communities in arid places outside of this region may also apply.
We strive to support projects in Mexico. Due to mailing restrictions it is best if you have someone in the US who can receive and bring the seeds to Mexico.
Colorado
Colorado Plateau Foundation offers grants for indigenous projects on the Colorado Plateau.