(LS) — Whenever the subject of home gardening comes up, I always think of a story my uncle once told me about my father.
With food supply reduced during World War II due to the war effort, the government encouraged families to grow their own gardens to supplement the deficiency of vegetables caused when farmers had to put down their hoes and pick up rifles. My grandmother grew an extensive array of veggies in her backyard garden, but the cucumbers had a bad habit of disappearing before they made it to the table or the pickle barrel. My father, then a small child, was picking and eating them, and his older brother soon ratted him out. Thus, my grandfather ordered my father to stop picking the cucumbers. A week later, when my grandmother went to pick the veggies, there was nothing on the cucumber vines but little nubs of gnawed cucumbers. Furious, my grandfather grabbed my father and screamed at him, “I thought I told you to stop picking the cucumbers!” Confused my father managed to answer through a stream of tears, “I didn’t pick them. I just ate them off the bush.”
While our country is currently embroiled in two wars (and a third soon to be on the way), we have an abundance of vegetables grown by our now industrialized farming industry. The problem is that both industrialized farms and grocery stores employ dangerous pesticides that can be harmful in unseen ways when ingested year-after-year. Moreover, the world is facing a dangerous over-crowding problem. In the next 40 years, the world’s population is supposed to rise to 9 billion people. In order to feed that many people, the world’s farmers are going to need to produce as much food in the next 40 years as they have in the past 8,000 according to the American Association for the Advancement of Science. I love post-apocalyptic movies, but they’re always fighting over water or oil in the those films – not watercress and onions. The world’s food supply is going to have change dramatically in order to meet the rising demand. Coupled with the rising cost of oil, the prices of food are expecting to skyrocket as demand for food zooms right past supply. Thus, the time has come for everyone to do his or her role to save the world and learn how to grow his or her own food.
Fortunately, you likely have everything you need to start your own home garden – whether a small one on an apartment deck or balcony or a larger one that can feed your entire family. Even if you’re living in the city and only have a windowsill flower bed in your apartment, that’s more than enough room to grow a fresh herb garden that can brighten up every meal you cook.
If you have the space, you can turn your backyard into a business. On just ¾ of an acre of land, a single farmer working a 40-hour work week can grow enough food to feed 24 people regularly. Crops can be rotated year-round, growing what’s in season and instead of paying for produce, you can be producing it and money from selling the overage.
However, for most people, that’s simply not practical. On the other hand, putting in just one hour of work a day on 1/10 of an acre of land can permit a family of four to grow enough vegetables to avoid entering the produce section at the grocery store from the spring through the fall. Many vegetables take little effort to grow and seed themselves, coming back year-after-year, and indigenous fruit trees can be planted that will feed your children’s children (Or, whatever tattooed, motorcycle-riding warlord who takes over your backyard in the post apocalyptic nightmare). If your space is even more limited, then you can always grow your favorite vegetables in a small area on your deck or balcony or flower bed. It’s all up to you.
What do you need to get started gardening? Really, just sun, soil, water, and a shovel, although a hoe, a tiller and a rake wouldn’t hurt. So long as you have at least 20 square feet with which to work, you’ve got enough room to supplement your food supply. Here’s a quick, how-to list for getting started. Beginning is the hardest part. After fruits and vegetables begin to grow, many of them take care of themselves.
- Pick a spot that gets the most exposure to sunlight on a year-round basis. Stay away from fences or your house, because the soil could be tainted by paint of chemicals. Ideally, you want something much longer than it is wide. You want a narrow enough garden, so you can reach across from one side to the other without compacting the soil.
- Cease the use of pesticides and weed killers in all areas around the space you intend to use for gardening.
- Begin a compost heap for future use in fertilizing your garden. Don’t buy any trendy kits, but just start piling up organic refuse in a corner of your yard (preferably as far away from the house as possible). Tea bags, fruit rinds and cores, coffee grounds and filters, leaves and grass mixed with dirt all make excellent compost. Mix it up occasionally and keep it moist.
- Remove all garbage, rocks and other unwanted debris from the area you plan to garden. Anything larger than a grape must be moved out of the way.
- Spread organic material over the gardening area, including leaves, dried grass and plants – only be certain the material is free of pesticides.
- Spread a thin layer of compost over your garden, and the bugs, worms and other organisms in the compost will begin breaking down your soil and ready it for planting. You want to use between four and six inches when starting a new garden but then two to four inches once your garden has been established. However, do not use your own compost heap until it has had time to mature. Half-finished compost can deplete the nitrogen levels in the soil and destroy its ability to grow plants.
- Use a pick, shovel, rake, till or hoe to mix up the top three inches of the soil with the layer of compost. Don’t mix up the compost any more than this or you risk killing the helpful critters in it.
- Keep the soil damp like a wet towel that has been rung out, but not wet. The insects in the soil need oxygen to live just like you do.
- Attach an old pillow or cushion to a piece of scrap wood and then use it as a kneeling board when you work in the garden. The purpose is to avoid walking on the soil because it compacts.
- Buy vegetables in four-inch square planters. Pick those veggies that are best suited to your part of the country. Consult with an expert at a local garden center for a list of them. Dig a hole slightly larger than the bulb, then squeeze the side of the planter to loosen the plant, fluff the roots laterally and then plant it. Surround the root ball with soil, but then top it off with more leaves or other organic material to keep the soil damp underneath. Finally, water the plant with a slow drip to allow the soil to aerify.
- Spread compost from your heap onto the growing plants on a regular basis.
- If you have the space, plant fruit trees. A good idea is to plant the fruit trees in your front yard and the vegetable garden in the back. This way the trees don’t sap sunlight from the garden. You need to plant somewhere that the trees have access to six hours of sunlight per day. You will need six feet of space from buildings and three feet from streets and sidewalks. Allot 10 to 15 feet of space between trees. Buy a small tree and then dig a hole wide enough and deep enough sustain roots. Till the soil around the hole, so the roots can gain a foothold. Place some loose soil back down in the bottom of the hole, patting it down. Place the tree in the hole with the bud union (the place where the root stock is grafted to the tree) slightly above the ground level. Fill soil in around the tree, amending it if recommended for your area. Drop a layer of soil, pat it down, and then water slightly. Repeat until the hole is filled around the tree. Use the remainder of soil to build a circle around the tree that will hold in water. Compost can be placed inside the circle to help it grow faster.
As stated, exactly how many fruits and vegetables you are able to grow depends upon the size of the garden. Generally, 1/10 of an acre is enough to feed a whole family. On just ¾ of an acre, a mini-farmer can run a small business, but it will require as much work as a small business, as well. Whether trying to make a few extra bucks, preparing for the end of the world, or just trying to provide safe, organic vegetables for your family – a garden is a great idea for the present and the future.
