Sitemap“It is my belief that well being is intimately tied to the soil,” Sophia Buggs tells her audience.
With a grin and an air of confidence, Buggs is holding a watering can on a stage, presenting her knowledge of plant life and urban agriculture to a Massillon, Ohio, gathering. “It was always my grandmother who has always reminded me to stay true to who I am, stay true to my roots and do the thing that you know,” she said “In fact, ancestral wisdom saved me.”
Roots
Buggs of Lady Buggs Pharm, on the southside of Youngstown, Ohio, sees herself not only as an urban farmer but as a food educator, herbalist, spiritualist and evangelist. About 14 years ago, Buggs was living in Florida far from her ancestral roots and her grandmother in northeast Ohio. She felt sick, tired and unhealthy. Her grandmother would tell her to stay connected to nature.“My grandmother would treat The Weather Channel like a sitcom. She would watch it all the time and then want to talk about how the weather was affecting her garden,” Buggs said.
Buggs followed her grandmother’s wisdom, but it wasn’t until after her grandmother died and she was laid off in Florida that Buggs returned to Youngstown with the idea of getting healthy by growing her own food. She also knew her community did not have access to high quality foods. “I would hear conversations around food and security and how there are communities that are without high quality foods,” she said. She honored her grandmother the only way she knew how. “I wanted to make my grandmother’s famous zucchini bread, and I had my grandmother’s garden where she grew zucchini, tomatoes and cucumbers. ”Buggs began to grow and eat the fresh vegetables, the homemade zucchini bread and delved into medicinal plants. “I found that in growing all of those plants, I found clarity,” she said. “My depression and health issues went away.”
Education
She continued farming on her urban acre and began an in-depth plant education. Buggs has earned a number of accreditations, including a market garden certificate with Youngstown Neighborhood Development Corporation and a certificate of intuitive plant medicine with One Willow Apothecaries.
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