Gwen Roland,
Modern Homesteading & Sustainable Farming Expert
Occupation:
Writer. Even though she has written on topics as far flung as scuba diving and Chitimacha Indian basketry, Gwen’s favorite beat is farming and rural living. Since 1993 she has been the communications specialist for the Southern Region Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education Program, translating sustainable agriculture research results into stories farmers can actually use.
Location:
Pike County, Georgia, a rolling rural landscape in the foothills of the Pine Mountain range.
Farming & Rural Living Background:
Gwen grew up in rural Louisiana where self-sufficiency was a given, so the back-to-earth movement of the early 70s was just a short jaunt for her. She and then-partner Calvin Voisin built a houseboat and returned to the Atchafalaya Swamp of their ancestors. There was so little information about the things they were doing that she began writing as a way to help others who were also pursuing a self-sufficient lifestyle.
Gwen’s first article for Mother Earth News was published in 1982. Barge on a Bayou described the details of building a monstrous floating house without power tools. (For more about building boats, see the Boat Page.) Thanks to those details, which even included some financial specs, measurements and dates, Gwen was able to use the old article as framework for a chapter in her book Atchafalaya Houseboat (2006, LSU Press). Most of the book consists of similar stories Gwen wrote during that period. A documentary based on Gwen’s book and life will air nationwide on PBS stations the evening of August 31, 2008.
Personal History:
Gwen’s sense of curiosity has always outweighed her fear of failure. This imbalance has led her into many jobs for which she was not remotely qualified.
Current Projects and Other Fun Facts:
Gwen and her husband Preston raise most of their own food with the help of horse manure, chickens, goats and earthworms. They also buy from Pike County’s Market on the Square, which they helped organize. The market, along with an old-time dance group Gwen started, make up the core of their social life. The best of times happens when the two groups overlap. As she puts it, “How can you top an evening spent dancing with the farmer who grows your food?”
A big step for Gwen this year was raising a flock of pastured broilers. It was the first time she had raised animals for the purpose of killing them to eat. She reports that the nine birds, now 36 frozen packages in her freezer, are contributing to the most thoughtful meals she has ever eaten.
See What Gwen's Been Writing About Lately:
* Training and Grants for Value-Added Food Product Marketers
* Chicken Harvest: Conscientious Consumption
* Bats in the Corn Field
* Catering to Stink Bugs: A Trap Crop Experiment Success
Ask Gwen a Question!
Have questions about farming, food preservation, houseboat life, rural living or anything else up Gwen's alley? Submit them through our free Ask Our Experts service today.
Gwen harvests fresh produce for canning.
Whether buying or selling, or just looking for good conversation,
Market on the Square is the place to be on Saturday mornings
in Pike County, Georgia.
Now that she lives in Georgia instead of the Louisiana swamp,
Gwen appreciates not having to haul manure for her garden
by boat.
Photos courtesy Brenda Fayard