Wait. I didn’t mention it. I planted a garden. One if the first things that I asked our landlady when we moved to this place is if it would be alright for me to plant a garden. She said it was okay and that I could put it anywhere that I wanted.
I took her to heart on that one and chose what I thought was the best spot. I got a fellow to come and till up the lawn behind the house near the back, so that we would still have a continuous place to play games with the kids. I’ve not grown a garden by myself before, so this is new to me. Our last one was a single row along the fence, which produced a few munchables for the kids for a week or so, but nothing big.
So, this year, I have a 16 foot square which I have raked into 8 rows. Our neighbor was gracious enough to let me use a big barrel that he had to catch rain from our downspout. This way, we won’t be relying as much on the well water to keep the garden hydrated (as long as it rains enough, that is).
Corn and potatoes take up a fairly large space for what you get, so I didn’t plant any of those. I also opted for this, as they’re usually pretty reasonable to buy, as far as price goes. There are many local farmers that grow these crops, especially potatoes. One of the continent’s largest frozen food companies, McCains, draws on this province for many of its french fry potatoes.
What I did plant were carrots, spinach, leaf lettuce, beets, turnip, squash, pumpkins, peas, dill, pasrley, wax beans, and chinese broad beans. I will be ading cucumbers, tomatoes and peppers shortly. Its been five days since the lawn was tilled up, so there’s nothing poking from the ground yet, of course.
I’ve opted out of using any chemical fertilizer for my garden, relying on the earth that is already here, supplimented by some black earth that I purchased fairly inexpensively from a local store. I will let nature do its work and just add water to the garden, as the ground seems to be fairly rich as it is (the grass was growing like crazy there).
I hope that this garden flourishes, as it will help us offset our grocery bill with fresh and nutritious food. It will have the added benefit that I know where it came from and how it was grown.
Oh how I love the idea of having a garden of my own too. Good job, Corey. My dad used to grow some plants like chillis, tomatoes, cucumbers, eggplants, ladies fingers, etc (sadly no squash
). It was a small hydroponic garden system, and it was fun watching them grow. Oh well, not exactly watching them grow, but you get the idea. Plucking fresh vegetables is more enjoyable than buying them.
You’ll notice a big savings on your grocery bill as far as vegetable go. Plus nothing beats fresh vegetables straight from the garden either.
Mom and Dad had a garden and we all would go gardening every weekend. They had a plot back when we lived in Chatham. WE had a gigantic garden in back of the air force base along with several other military families.
I can remember Mom and Dad having that garden there every year. WE had corn one year and decided that it took up to much space for such a high maintenance and low yielding veggie. Dad thought the space used by corn was wasted and could plant more potatoes, carrots, beats, and other veggies in their place.
You should get the kids involved. I can remember my folks getting me involved and I actually enjoyed it. Dad allowed me to plant a patch of watermelon and it was my responsibility to keep it growing. I managed to get a few fair sized watermelons and it was awesome to come home with them and share with my best friends.
Wow! That was some flashback. Thanks!
@MacBros – I would have planted more, but I don’t know how to can vegetables and I want to learn on a small scale before I commit to a large crop. I’d freeze a lot, but we only have the freezer in the fridge to work with. Its too bad, because I’d load it up with whatever I could (I’ll have to get one of those vacuum sealers), as I’m always up for the plate having more veggies on it.
The kids are involved. The help water. With working evenings, I have time during the day that I can devote to the garden. School will be out in less than a month. They can help weed then.
@od – Thanks for reminding me. I think that I’ll see if Okra will grow here. Its a key ingredient in one of my favorite soups – Gumbo!
What about onion? Onion is a key ingredient for many dishes.
Great job, Corey.
Whoops. I forgot to mention onion. Thanks. I planted a row of red onions, too (all but 1 meter, which is dill).
Will micro-farming catch up in urban areas? I doubt it. But for people lucky enough with a bit of space for a garden, this is a great idea.
Here in India, at least we have access to fresh vegetables in the marketplace so there is no incentive to start a backyard garden. The culture of canned food hasn’t yet made sufficient inroads and I hope it never will.
@hari – So do I, hari. I keep my fingers crossed in hopes that the “factory farm” is not going to overtake India. I would hate to wake up some day to find out that there’s only one kind of mango.
I’m not into the farming thing, unless you count tropical fruit. I have payaya growing next to my house. Banana and guava growing next to the mother-in-law’s house. We have a huge indian mango (hey, I didn’t name it) tree in the part of our compound that isn’t being used yet. I don’t even like mango (any variety) but everyone else seems to.
Other types of plants are grown for food and the only one I’m sure of is sweet potato (they eat the leaves more than the potato).
Back when I lived on a couple of acres, my first garden was small like that. Then I missed the food in the winter. So the next summer I bought a deep-freezer and also learned how to can. Also the next summer, all my veggies were huge. Neighbors asked why mine were so big and theirs weren’t. I think it was my dogs “fertilizing” the land, lol. One year I tried watermelons and was so proud at how they were doing… then one day I went out with the intention of picking one up to see how heavy it was, and it was suspiciously light. With a hole in both ends. Hollow. Eaten straight through by squirrels or gophers or who knows what. So here’s a tip to keep little ground animals out of your garden: Moth balls. Just drop them around the garden in a line, then step on them to push them into the ground part way.
I can’t wait to hear how your garden works out. I wish I had better light where I live, because I only have a limited space to put a few veggies. I would love to try my hand at canning but don’t have the indoor space for that either. Guess you could say I live on a postage stamp…lol
Good luck!
Some things are coming up, but its a slow process. The leaf lettuce I planted is coming up nicely and the peas are poking out of the ground and the transplants seem to be alive, but I may have been a bit early for the rest. Its been cold at night here and some other stuff hasn’t taken off like it should have, so I’ve reseeded a few things. When my parents were here, my dad took the kids out back and got them to plant some more squash in the grass behind the garden with some seeds he had brought, so I might have an excess. If I have too many in the fall, I’ll donate them to the food bank.
That’s a wonderful idea, Corey. You may want to call them now to see if they take fresh stuff. Some only take non-perishable stuff, because they don’t have refrigeration to store the other.
Gardening is great, even if you don’t produce a lot of edible foods, I’ve found it’s a great hobby too.
A garden was the first thing I thought of when I first moved into my house. Had great output last year so I expanded my one 6×12 garden bed by creating another 6×12 garden bed. I live in Texas so it’s best to use a raised garden bed since you can hit clay and limestone very quickly.
To date, I’ve harvested and eaten Zucchini squash, Jalapeno’s, Bell Peppers, Cilantro, Dill, Carrots, Strawberries, Arugula, Basil, Parsley and 1 watermelon so far. I’ve got about a dozen or so that are about softball size or bigger coming in. The cantelope is starting to flourish and I’ve had some Cherry Red and Roma tomatoes but those are just now kicking into full swing, should have some ripe tomatoes in the next few weeks. All organic of course.
It’s fun nevertheless and a good time waster as well. Good luck and you can never have an excess of food, you’d be surprised what you can do with it without usually going the traditional way of preparing and eating it.
@drew – So true. I’ve thinned out the leaf lettuce and we are currently enjoying the baby greens. Some carrots that survived were still a bit too small to eat as babies, but you never know. I’m having quite a war with slugs, as our land is quite wet. Its complicated by my landlord’s sporadic lawn mowing, as well, as he lets the grass get quite high, due to his frequent away trips and the loads of rain we’ve gotten
Yeah, the only thing I’ve had to battle was catapillars which seemed to love the dill we had, but after the dill season was over a couple weeks ago, we let the catapillars stay, caught them, put them in the kids butterfly pavilion we got and watched them turn from catapillar to butterflies to then let go. The kid thinks that’s really exciting.
And another thing was squash bores. Luckily I got about a dozen or so zuchini squash before they ended up killing the plants. Even using organic BT to kill them, it didn’t get them all. Last year we didn’t get any cause when I realized they were dying due to the squash bores, the BT chemical came too late after ordering it.
Oh and I forgot to mention that I also had a nice round of broccoli as well. You can send some of that wetness my way if you want, it’s hotter than hell now in Austin with no rain, I have to water every day or every other day just to keep the soil moist so the heat doesn’t evaporate the garden.