Seed Gifting

On 30th October 1909, Suffragette Rose Lamartine Yates planted a Monterey Pine sapling in the Suffragette Arboretum in Batheaston to commemorate those involved in the hard-fought campaigns for women’s equality. This Monterey Pine is the only tree that remains standing today, and has become a touchstone for inspiration through Walking Forest, and we have been gifting its seeds of courage, survival and hope to todays Earth protectors.

In December 2018, COP24 Climate Talks in Katowice provided the inspiration for Walking Forest to ‘gift’ a seed of Rose’s tree to change-makers there.

The idea gained momentum during our early encounters with climate lawyer Farhana Yamin, now a close Walking Forest collaborator. She suggested the seed needed ‘protecting’, and soon after the launch of Extinction Rebellion in October 2018, we met at her house to sew small bags in which the seed could travel. Tucking single seeds inside small boxes on miniature beds of wool, with a story folded inside that told the seed’s story and how to plant and germinate it, each box then had a beautiful ‘gift’ bag to be initialed with each giftee’s name.

We went to COP24 at the instigation of Marda Kirn of U.S. based EcoArts Connections as artist observers, and with Julie’s Bicycle where we met faith leaders, ministers and activists. Travelling by train, we devised a short ceremony acknowledging the connections the seed could make through time and place to the courage being demonstrated by change makers the world over.

Once there Farhana made introductions for us to delegates, officiants, lawyers and negotiators inside the talks. She’d attended all 30 years of ‘COPs’, and took on the role of gifting a seed to Executive Secretary of UNFCCC Patricia Espinosa. Our collaboration with Farhana continued through the COP26 in Glasgow 2021, around the Climate Change Conference in Bonn June 2023, and is ongoing.

In both scheduled encounters that took weeks of planning and others improvised on the spot, we created a 6 minute ritual to enact with each ‘giftee’. We told the story of Rose and her last standing Suffragette tree, and asked people if they’d like a gift of a seed. The seed catalysed an intimate act of exchange which made space for the non-human, amidst the dizzying scale of talks hosting 30,000 people from all over the world – albeit in windowless buildings under strip lighting.

When people accept the gift of the seed, we ask them to close their eyes, breathe and be quiet for a while, then to hold their hands out, when we place the seed box in their hands. After a moment of silence, we ask them to reflect on the intention with which the seed was planted by Rose, a Suffragette imprisoned 100 years ago. To reflect on how the seed connected back to the campaign for the struggle for Votes for Women, to today, the work our giftees are doing themselves, forward to the future, and to the strongly held intentions to bring about change. We hope the seed’s tininess potential gives them courage and fortitude for the work they are doing.

These close human exchanges with strangers are humbling and remain so, for gifting continues. In a few still minutes it’s possible to make space for something rich and encouraging, as though handing back to people their own emotional strength, courage and trust in nature’s potential for restoration and renewal.

Whether or not these seeds are planted as our own have been, they keep a line of sight on the potential to plant new forests and new dreams that can seed and bring change in the world, even if it takes 100 years.

Seed Giftees

December 2018:

***COP24 at Krakow, Poland,* *7th Dec:***

Laura Pando Martinez
Head of Programmes and Operations, Julie’s Bicycle.
Chiara Badiali
Krakow Market Square, Project Manager, Julie’s Bicycle
Saleemul Huq – Rest in Power
Director of International Centre for Climate Change and Development in the Grab and Go coffee shop in Section E of COP24 venue
Dr Kelihiano Kalolo
Minister for both Economic Development; and Natural Resources and Environment, Tokelau
Paula Faive
Potted plant, Zone E
Niyanta Spelman
Rainforest Partnership in the Polish Pavilion in a ‘forest’
Lindsey Fielder Cook
Quaker Representative for Climate Change
Isabel Cavelier Adarve
Independent Association of Latin America and The Caribbean

Quaker United Nations Office in the lobby near Information Zone, 8th Dec:

Dr. Achala C. Abeysinghe
Legal and Strategic Advisor, LDC, Quaker United Nations Office near Information Zone B
Isabel Cavelier Adarve
The Independent Association of Latin America and the Caribbean, AILAC by Information desk Zone B with baby daughter Gabriella from Colombia
Jennifer Morgan
Executive Director Greenpeace International in Information Lobby, by potted plant, based in Holland
Michael Northrop
Program Director Sustainable Development, middle of lobby
Ruha Matin
Executive Assistant to the CEO and Special Representative of the UN Secretary General, Sustainable Energy for All

Dec 9th:

Cecylia Malik
in her Sister Rivers exhibition at Dobry Klimat in Market Square
Rachel Kyte
CEO and Special Representative of the UN Secretary General, Sustainable Energy for All

Dec 10th:

Tamsin Omond
Author, activist and communications & campaigns strategist
Outside the Park Inn Radisson Hotel Katowice
Farhana Yamin
Lawyer, IPCC report author and activist
Farhana Yamin Delegation of the Marshall Islands

Climate Vulnerable Forum Expert Advisory Group by Christmas tree in the lobby of the Park Inn Hotel, Radisson Katowice:

Patricia Espinosa
UNFCCC Executive Secretary COP 24. Given by Farhana Yamin
Gebru Jember Endalew
Meteorologist
Given by Farhana Yamin at COP, Chair of Least Developed Countries Group

Walking Forest Vigil, Batheaston, UK, Dec 21st

Eileen Paddock
Retired midwife, Eagle Park

February, 2019:

Jay Jordan
Artist, author, activist
St James Church Clerkenwell at the Edge 30th celebrations. Feb 4th 9pm

Jasmine Salter
in XR office Feb 27th 2019 by window
Gail Bradbrook
Extinction Rebellion Co-Founder
In XR office Feb 27th 2019 in sunny corner by window filmed by elder April

July, 2019:

John & Anne Newling
public artist – under a tree in a Nottingham garden, 2 July 2019
Margaret Ben-Tovim
Women’s Movement and CND Activist, Liverpool

November, 2019:

Dorothy Naitore
TIST Kenya, in Exmouth Celebrating Trees

March, 2020:

Skeena Rathor
XR Stroud, March 10 2020
Jojo Mehta,
Stop Ecocide, Stroud March 10 2020

October, 2021:

Anne Langford
Member of the Walking Forest team Coventry October 17th 2021
Under a Yew tree in St John’s Churchyard. The day after Performance Action in Coventry (Oct 15/16th)
Amanda Roberts
Green Futures, Coventry City of Culture October 17th 2021
Under a Yew tree in St John’s Churchyard. The day after Performance Action in Coventry (Oct 15/16th)

November, 2021:

COP26 in Glasgow, Scotland

Little Amal
10 year old girl puppet refugee walked from Syria to Glasgow; Good chance Theatre
The Bowling Green Pollockshields, Glasgow
Sarra Wassu
Volunteer for the John Muir Trust Glasgow – Climate activist
Dorothy Graham
In Galagel office, 15 Fairley Street, Glasgow

Climate Justice and Trust Transition Donor Collaborative (CJJT) High Level Event, Weds Nov 3rd, in Scottish Power Headquaters

Heather McCray
Director, Climate Justice Resilience Fund, supporting climate action by women, youth, and Indigenous Peoples.
Dulma Clark
Head of Livebarefoot Fund – Vivobarefoot
Asad Rehman
COP26 Coalition, Global Director, War on Want.
Tasneem Essop
Director of Climate Action Network International
Maria Francisca Cortes Solanis
Chile Fundacion Meri
Manuela Benini
Artist activist
Carol Excell
Bezos Earth Fund
Masego Madzwamusa
Oak Foundation

During Walking Forest, Performance Action, Friday Nov 5th, in public, in George Square, Glasgow.

Gehan Macleod
Co-Founder Galgael, and Pollok Free State

Under The Canopy of a Felled Tree and following Declaration of Govan Free State, Glasgow.

Cindy Queuedo Dulro
Seed saver, seed protector, from Chile
At the Briggait Friday 5th November
Jean Cameron
Creative Producer and Taproot friend of WF
Saturday 6th Nov, after Climate Justice March, outside The Tron Theatre

At Kelburn Castle – 7th Nov, during COP26 and on a day of ‘Yew Immersion’ and celebration of COP26 Connectors, initiated by Farhana Yamin and held by many:

Kay Michael
Letters to the Earth, Walking Forest Associate, and Culture Declares co-launcher
Isabella Noero
CJJT & UNA Festival and supporting The Minga Alliance
Belen Paez
Community Leader, Pachamama Alliance

Decmber 2021:

***After Tree Planting Ceremony on Floyd’s Field,* *Sunday Dec 12th 2021***

Walking Forest Anchor Women – Coventry

Jane Clark, Becky Taylor, Lorraine Masiya Mponela, Amanda Haran, Alice Khimasia, Mel Smith, Gemma Musgreaves, Sabz Qazi, Sanaa Cheruvallil, Martina Irwin, Sherrie Edgar, Heather Parker, Lisa Franklin, Birgit Kehrer