Webinar: Soil Safari!

Join NM Healthy Soil Working Group for a live microscopy session as we take a deep dive into the wild world of creatures inhabiting the soil beneath our feet. Too small to see with the naked eye, soil organisms nonetheless have a massive impact on our lives: the food we eat, the atmosphere we breathe, and the land we care for are all shaped by a diverse array of critters living underground.

In this webinar, you will get to know some of these micro beasties by looking at their morphology and learning about their role in the soil food web. We will examine soil samples collected in typical New Mexican ecosystems as well as microbially-rich Johnson-Su compost and a brew of potentially disease-causing organisms. Your guides on this journey will be certified Soil Food Web Lab Tech Lina Alegre and ecologist Navona Gallegos. 

Lina Alegre is a South American native who has been living in northern New Mexico for almost a decade after falling in love with the region; she dove right into off-grid living which got her an internship for permaculture design thinking. Her work as a Soil Health Champion has been recognized by the NACD at her land in northern New Mexico. As a Soil Food Web School’s Certified Lab Tech, she has enhanced her appreciation and understanding of nature at the micro-scale, assessing soil and compost samples. In 2022, she co-founded the NM Soil Enthusiasts group. Her work on the macro-scale is through building human community, helping facilitate programs like “Women in Ag” in Spanish through the Santa Fe Farmers Market Institute and currently her work at Northern NM Community College is serving as a Community Liaison to embrace the Social component of Permaculture by enhancing classes that look at natural environments to model co-existence and co-creation.

Navona Gallegos is a soil ecologist and permaculture designer, focused on the beneficial relationships between both soil and human communities. At the NM Healthy Soil Working Group, she works to provide soil health education through teaching, networking, and communications. With deep roots in New Mexico as a multi-generational Mestiza farmer, Navona’s passion for land-care began at a young age. Observing the dramatic changes in the ecosystem around her due to land-use practices, she was inspired to delve into ecology and community organizing and to take up management of her family’s Quay Ranch in Tucumcari, NM. Navona earned a BA in Environmental Science from the University of Virginia and is a graduate of Dr. Elaine Ingham’s Soil Food Web Training. She also draws on informal learning from a diverse group of land stewards and community organizers from across the United States, Caribbean, and Central Africa. She is a member of the permaculture consulting group, Reverdecer (reverdecer.org) and serves on the City of Santa Fe Water Conservation Committee.

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