A pod of neighbours, one backyard
A land host opens their backyard, their acreage or their homestead to a small pod of neighbours. Stewards hold the know-how. Volunteers do the work and take home a share of what comes up. Learners turn up knowing nothing and leave knowing something.
The demo is a whole fictional pod with a season behind it. No sign-up, no email, nothing to undo.
What this replaces
One person triaging Instagram messages, a group thread and four texts to find out who can come Tuesday at three — until the whole thing quietly dies.
What it is instead
Land hosts have space and water and can’t do all the work. Apartment dwellers want their hands in the dirt and have nowhere to go. Elder gardeners have forty years of knowledge and no one to hand it to. Usually within a few streets of each other.
A pod stays small on purpose — about ten regulars, twenty on a big day. Small enough that decisions are a conversation. The app writes down what happened; it never decides who was right.
These are people’s homes. Addresses, hours and rosters stay inside the pod. The public sees a hexagon about a mile across saying a backyard farm is near you, and the classes anyone may come to. The address arrives when you’re let in.
How a pod works
Where you stand is set per property. Being initiated at one backyard grants you nothing at the next. Stewards are the one exception, which is what makes them worth paying.
The county firefighter
Run the work days, teach the well and the animals, initiate volunteers, work across properties.
In returnPaid from what the pod pools together — plus shares.
The volunteer firefighter
Come on your own, inside the hours the host set, once you've been initiated on this land.
In returnAn hour of work is a share of the harvest.
The community that shows up when there's a fire
Come to classes, helper half-days and work days, with a steward on hand.
In returnA goodie bag to take home. Nobody counts your hours yet.
A neighbour
Come to a public class. Find a farm near you on the map.
In returnWhatever you learn, and a ticket price where there is one.
The host has the last word on their own land, always. Educator sits sideways across all of it: you can be a learner at one place and teach the class at another.
What goes round
Someone asks to join. The host or a steward says yes, no, or not yet. A training on this land is what makes it real.
A work day goes up with a cap and the skills it needs. People say they're coming. Afterwards the steward signs off the hours, and shares land in the ledger.
A glut goes on the pod's stand: zucchini this month, a dozen eggs. Members spend shares on it, or divide a harvest at the table.
The pod writes down what the season costs, steward pay first, and everyone puts in what they can. The books stay open the whole time.
Lynden House, in Boulder: work days held, hours signed off, shares earned, a zucchini glut and a season goal half funded. Step in as the host, the steward, a volunteer, or someone who has never grown anything.