Growing Food

Growing food is fundamental to sustainable living and good health.  Fresh food is simply better; flavors, vitamins and enzymes decrease rapidly as food ages.

The majority of people who live to a ripe old age, and who seem to enjoy good health right up to the end, seem spend a disproportionately large amount of time puttering around in their gardens, and comparatively little time out driving around in traffic or managing the hostile takeover of corporations.

There is a lot to know about growing food, and information varies depending on geography, climate, etc.  It takes years to become an accomplished farmer.  This site will simply guide you to the resources that you need in order to do it.  But first, a few basic principles:

• Pick a sunny location.  Most food does not grow well in the shade.  You need at least six hours of direct sun a day to be very successful.
• Establish buffer zones.  Your garden may need protection against wind, automobile traffic, deer and other pests.  Hedgerows, fences and perimeter beds can help.  Surrounding a garden with perennial herbs confuses pests with its strong scents.  Fencing a garden with pollen-bearing perennials provides critical habitat for for the predatory insects which keep pests in check.  Establishing the perimeter first can help ensure success when actual crops are planted.
• Establish permanent pathways and garden beds.   Arrange beds running north - south.  A good-sized bed is 3-4 feet wide and as long as you want it.  (If it is much wider than four feet, you will not be able to reach the center without stepping or kneeling in the bed.)  Cultivate your beds year after year, adding compost and organic fertilizers as needed, and rotating crops.  Do not walk on your garden beds; it compacts the soil. 
• Build your soil:  This is the cornerstone of organic farming and gardening.  Healthy soil supports good plants.  The best way to build healthy soil is to add lots and lots of compost.  You cannot add too much compost to your soil, but if you add too little, it will get hard and your plants will be puny and weak, and thus susceptible to disease.  If you cannot make enough compost (most homeowners fall into this category), then buy it from your city, a local farmer, or your neighborhood landscape supply house.  A few sustainable businesses have developed products out of recycled plastic which help urban and suburban residents compost.
• Buy a good spading fork:  The digging fork is by far the most useful cultivation tool.  You will use it every day for digging new beds, re-digging old ones, cultivating around crops and trees, even weeding and pulling out nasty unwanted trees and cactus.  The best forks have big, fat forged steel heads; short, stout, unbreakable handles and a  D-grip. 
• Cultivate diversity:  Monoculture attracts pests; so grow a little of everything.  Learn which plants grow together, and which do not (the science of companion planting).  Harvest your own seeds and purchase heirloom variety plants.   Keep a steady stream of flowers available to feed predatory insects (which need to eat even when there are no pests in your yard); multitudes of small flowers feed more predators than big, showy flowers.
• Water carefully:  Plants show many of the same signs when over-watered as when under-watered.   Established plants typically prefer deep, infrequent watering; that is,  soak, let the soil dry out completely, then soak again.  Check the soil to be sure.  Dig down six inches.  If the soil will hold in a ball, then it does not need to be watered.  Daily, shallow watering causes or exacerbates many plant diseases, including blossom-end rot.
• Learn about Integrated Pest Management.  Avoid using chemical pesticides and fertilizers, which already plague the commercial food supply. Most homeowners wind up misusing chemicals far more egregiously than farmers.
• Learn how to tell when fruits and vegetables are perfectly ripe.

Gardening Resources: 

• Check our page on how to build a simple compost pile!
• Don't miss our forks, spades and composting helpers.