Homegrown Diversity
By Krishna Ramanujan MA'01

David, Daisy, and Yasmine Shiffert

In 1997, the Shifferts couldn't tell a vegetable from a weed.

"We pulled out all the eggplants because we thought they were weeds," David laughs, remembering his first season as a gardener.

In four years, the family has evolved from novices to people committed to the cause of sustainable agriculture. David became chair of the garden committee in 1999, and he has grown passionate about passing on his own transforming experience with gardening.

"We became completely addicted to being out there, being outside in the sunshine, being out in nature, and just working out there," Daisy says.

The Shifferts see social significance in what happens at the Eagle Heights gardens. They worry about the rapid loss of small farms and biodiversity, and they believe that urban gardens such as the one at Eagle Heights can teach future generations how to grow some of their own food in city environments. David has put a lot of effort into making the gardens educational and promoting a variety of gardening programs.

"We have an agro-ecology field station right here — it's just undeveloped," he says. "Our hope is that some of these academic departments will take the lead in developing some of these programs in conjunction with the gardens."

David has been trying to help launch an urban cooperative in Madison, a living space that would combine city-style housing with green areas for growing food.

"We're at a point now where we know we're not going to live anywhere where we can't garden," he says.

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