Today, I have added a new major, and strategic, feature, so useful for all citizen gardeners : the publishing and sharing of events related to horticulture and urban agriculture. Instead of showing them as a usual calendar, a new tab appears along the map, displaying with blue icons the events that occur in your area. As a result, you get what could become the first citizen and community events worldwide listing in the fields mentioned earlier.

The originality of this feature lies in the fact that this is you and me, anonymous citizens, who will publish these events, simply to serve our gardening neighbors and the collectivity. Additionally to the activities you organize and you wish to publicize (for example, an Incredible Edible meetup for the construction of new containers), if tomorrow you hear about the distribution of compost by your city, you will be able to right away add it on PlantCatching, without wondering if the city or someone else will publish it or not. The trick is to search and to mention the email address of the contact in the organizing entity. By doing so, he will receive an email from PlantCatching informing him that his event has just be published and that, in the future, he should himself add them.

At this point, you certainly understood the strategic aspect I was mentioning above. By handling ourselves the publication of horticultural and urban agricultural events, we also encourage the various organizations of these domains to join PlantCatching. Since they are composed of and work for gardeners, the mass of PlantCatching users should continue to increase.

I have to add that only entirely free events are allowed on the site. No way to add those with a commercial purpose, even if it’s only a part of the event (for example, seed sales or non-free courses). By developing this feature and by creating content useful to everyone, I will one day enable professionals to publish their paying events, while asking them to support the PlantCatching initiative with a modest fee. This is the first idea I have to make PlantCatching a durable project.

I let you add the first events you are aware of in your area. Together, let’s not only share plants and Incredible Edible initiatives, but also the great activities that occur around you.

Happy spring! happy gardening!

Note: this is seedlings time. Do you have too many? Of course, you have, it's always the case! It's time to share...

Today is the first day of spring and I take this opportunity to launch a new PlantCatching update. Counting the adjustments made a few days ago, you get a 2013 platform that will continue to attract new gardeners and to start a true revolution in the way we all access plants and food. Let’s recap all these news:

• Starting today, the homepage gets a new presentation. The vertically displayed steps #1, 2, 3 and 4, better help new visitors understand succinctly what the service proposes and encourage them to share their plants and vegetables, as well as the information, on their networks and in their city. Note also the new checkbox that allows to save a default address when using the same browser on a given computer.

• The donation form has a new field to let you add a picture through its web link from your preferred photo hosing site. The picture will of course appear when a visitor clicks on a search result.

• The flyers on the Seed your city web page are now downloadable in different paper sizes: 4x6", A4 and Letter. Their graphics are also enhanced and the text has been reformulated.

• At different places on the web site, other texts have been changed in order to adapt the content to the growing food sharing aspect and to highlight the use of the site by the Incredible Edible movement members. I remind you that it makes a few weeks that gardeners can promote their shared edible containers.

• Google is sometimes flawed when returning geocoded results corresponding to the addresses you are using on the web site. Fortunately, it makes a few days that it’s now possible to manually set a marker on the map. The page Your requests had not this fix yet; it has been added today. Therefore, there are no excluded people anymore and everyone can share, request and find.

• At last, in private donation mode, it’s now possible to hide your own address.

I hope these enhancements and modifications will please you and I invite you to continue sharing the information about PlantCatching in your area the more you can to invite new gardeners. As for you, Incredible Edible members, it’s time to promote your initiatives by adding your containers and their content to the map. All together, we will build a great plant and food resource, free and accessible.

NB: as usual, a new release comes with its series of bugs. Thanks in advance to report them if you experience some issues.

If you follow PlantCatching from the beginning, you know me a little and especially my vision of this project: a citizen tool for gardeners where there is no place for pseudos and non transparency. The goal here is to connect gardeners and not to hide oneself. The three donation modes have been thought out under this vision, including the private mode whose private label is only here to indicate that a donation is not left on a public place.

Several users, most of them in France, contacted me to let me know their surprise to see their address in the search results. Their point of view is completely respectable and is based on the insecurity all over the net. Seeing their address + a contact info like their phone number or email address makes them feel uncomfortable in front of a possible fraudulent use of these informations.

Since I always listen to user comments and feature requests, I decided to offer a new option to hide an address in private mode:

Since the world is also what we want it to be, I don't specially encourage you to jump on this new checkbox to systematically hide your address. Personally, I don't do it. But the option is there if you feel the need to use it. This does not change the fact that a little green marker will appear on the map on the correct coordinates.

At last, don't forget the public donation mode (as soon as days are warmer in your area) ! It's here to increase the visibility of the service and to let you share spontaneously and quickly.

Last Friday, Pamela Warhurst, the founder of Incredible Edible in England, was among us in Montreal to give a talk to the UQAM students and to whom wanted to come from outside. You can imagine why I booked my day to be sure I could listen to her.

What an extraordinary person, full of energy, passion and enthusiasm. I respect so much what she and the Todmorden citizens have accomplished. I already knew her speech since I'm following the Incredible Edible adventures for a long time, but listening to her in person inevitably gives more sensations than by watching a TEDx conference on youtube.

What happened next, I will remember for a long time: I was able to talk with just the two of us in front of a tea at the cafeteria of the university during 30 long minutes, between a radio interview and another meeting. Ok, my english is not the best one out there, but I think this was not a problem. We had already been in contact by the past when I wanted to make her aware of the existence of PlantCatching, but it was short and just gave Todmorden's team the opportunity of a blog post. But now... 30 minutes of pure joy, discussing about my project and seeing her realize how Todmorden and the movement could benefit from it. I think I spotted in Pam a true interest and the wish to setup something. She left with a folder I had prepared for her as well as a set of flyers to distribute to her friends and colleagues. More importantly, she embraced and kissed me (although I was about to shake her hands), proving without a word that my project was touching her and that the future would certainly concretize PlantCatching in Todmorden. I will of course keep you informed.

(see some english mistakes in this translation? Please contact me)