Susannah Shmurak

Freelance health and environmental writer

Northfield, Minnesota · USDA zone 4b

Susannah Shmurak writes about growing food, foraging and low-impact living from a fifth of an acre in Northfield, Minnesota. She is the author of Everything Elderberry (Skyhorse, 2020) and holds a PhD from the University of Illinois.

Where: Northfield, Minnesota
Grows: An edible landscape, since 2002
Articles: 83
Book: Everything Elderberry Skyhorse, 2020

Biography

In 2002, Susannah Shmurak and her husband became homeowners by rescuing a hundred-year-old house scheduled for demolition and moving it to an empty lot in a small Minnesota town. She has been turning that lot into an edible landscape ever since.

She came to this work by an unusual route. She holds a PhD in English from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, taught as a Visiting Assistant Professor of Interdisciplinary Studies at St. Olaf College — including a course called Eco-logic: Consumption and Its Consequences — and left academic teaching in 2015 to write full time about health and the environment.

Since then she has founded and run HealthyGreenSavvy.com, published Everything Elderberry with Skyhorse in 2020, and written for Sierra, Ensia, Northern Gardener, Mother Earth Living, and The Upside. She writes a weekly Substack, Garden & Forage, read by more than five thousand subscribers. She served on the City of Northfield's Environmental Quality Commission, a mayor-appointed municipal body.

Her subjects are foraging, growing food, medicinal plants, permaculture, and eco-friendly yard practice — and she is open about preferring whichever version of it takes the least effort.

Where they garden

A fifth of an acre, worked since 2002

The corner lot in Northfield, Minnesota — zone 4b — is planted with six kinds of berries as well as plums, grapes, apples, and rhubarb, plus raised beds of greens, squash, tomatoes, and ground cherries.

She is, by her own description, obsessive about energy conservation. Everything she grows has to survive a Minnesota winter.

Background

Credentials and education

PhD in English, 2006 University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign — dissertation: Constructing Urban Experience: American Realism, the Periodical Press, and the Late-Nineteenth-Century Cityscape
Visiting Assistant Professor of Interdisciplinary Studies St. Olaf College, Northfield, Minnesota
Former member, Environmental Quality Commission City of Northfield, Minnesota

Elsewhere

Books, journalism and speaking

Everything Elderberry: How to Forage, Cultivate, and Cook with This Amazing Natural Remedy Skyhorse Publishing, 8 September 2020 · ISBN 9781510754003
“How to Put Your Yard to Work for the Climate” Sierra, Sierra Club · August 2016
“Most Americans drink fluoridated water. Is that a good thing?” Ensia, University of Minnesota Institute on the Environment · November 2017
“Paris is building the eco-community of the future” Ensia, 2018 — syndicated by Trellis and Resilience.org
“Street Food: Is It Safe to Grow Food on the Boulevard?” Northern Gardener, Minnesota State Horticultural Society · Jan/Feb 2017
Regular contributor to The Upside by Vitacost 2018 to present
“The City's ‘War with Nature’: Urban Parks in The House of Mirth and Sister Carrie” Nineteenth Century Studies, vol. 24, no. 1 (2010), pp. 123–140
Minnesota State Horticultural Society speaker roster Eco-friendly yard practices · permaculture · growing natural remedies · foraging · edible landscaping

Profiles

HealthyGreenSavvy.com Garden & Forage — Substack LinkedIn Pinterest Goodreads

Articles by Susannah Shmurak

The 9 most recent.

Susannah Shmurak

A fifth of an acre, worked since 2002

Credentials and education

Books, journalism and speaking

Articles by Susannah Shmurak

5 Ways to Eat Local Foods After Harvest Season

Back to School with Sustainability in Mind

How to Pack a No-Waste School Lunch

Making the Most of a Small Space Garden

Green Spring Cleaning Tips to Refresh Your Home

6 Green Gift Strategies for the Children On Your List

The Amazing Elderberry: Health Benefits and Uses

How to Host a Toy Swap

How to Take a Forest Bath

How to Start a Neighborhood Tool Share

How to Campaign for a Less Plastic Planet

Ocean Plastic Pollution: Here’s How You Can Help

Can Household Disinfectants Make Your Child Fat?

How to Choose a Simple Water Filter for Your Home

Scientists Reveal Why BPA Plastic Still Isn’t Safe

How to Reduce Plastic Pollution in 15 Easy Swaps

Finding a Non Toxic Mattress: Best Eco Friendly Options

Here’s Why Washing Your Hair Could be Bad for You

This Dermatologist Reveals Truth About What You’re Doing to Your Skin

10 Myths That Stop Us From Saving More Water

Are There Microplastics in Your Drinking Water?

The Environmental Cost of Legalizing Marijuana

5 Amazing Inventions For a Thirsty Planet

Do We Still Need Fluoride in Our Drinking Water?

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A fifth of an acre, worked since 2002

Credentials and education

Books, journalism and speaking

Articles by Susannah Shmurak

5 Ways to Eat Local Foods After Harvest Season

Back to School with Sustainability in Mind

How to Pack a No-Waste School Lunch

Making the Most of a Small Space Garden

Green Spring Cleaning Tips to Refresh Your Home

6 Green Gift Strategies for the Children On Your List

The Amazing Elderberry: Health Benefits and Uses

How to Host a Toy Swap

How to Take a Forest Bath

How to Start a Neighborhood Tool Share

How to Campaign for a Less Plastic Planet

Ocean Plastic Pollution: Here’s How You Can Help

Can Household Disinfectants Make Your Child Fat?

How to Choose a Simple Water Filter for Your Home

Scientists Reveal Why BPA Plastic Still Isn’t Safe

How to Reduce Plastic Pollution in 15 Easy Swaps

Finding a Non Toxic Mattress: Best Eco Friendly Options

Here’s Why Washing Your Hair Could be Bad for You

This Dermatologist Reveals Truth About What You’re Doing to Your Skin

10 Myths That Stop Us From Saving More Water

Are There Microplastics in Your Drinking Water?

The Environmental Cost of Legalizing Marijuana

5 Amazing Inventions For a Thirsty Planet

Do We Still Need Fluoride in Our Drinking Water?

Get $15 Off

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