Posted on 03/23/2008 11:36:40 PM PDT by nw_arizona_granny
Americans finding soaring food prices hard to stomach can battle back by growing their own food. [Click image for a larger version] Dean Fosdick Dean Fosdick
Home vegetable gardens appear to be booming as a result of the twin movements to eat local and pinch pennies.
At the Southeastern Flower Show in Atlanta this winter, D. Landreth Seed Co. of New Freedom, Pa., sold three to four times more seed packets than last year, says Barb Melera, president. "This is the first time I've ever heard people say, 'I can grow this more cheaply than I can buy it in the supermarket.' That's a 180-degree turn from the norm."
Roger Doiron, a gardener and fresh-food advocate from Scarborough, Maine, said he turned $85 worth of seeds into more than six months of vegetables for his family of five.
A year later, he says, the family still had "several quarts of tomato sauce, bags of mixed vegetables and ice-cube trays of pesto in the freezer; 20 heads of garlic, a five-gallon crock of sauerkraut, more homegrown hot-pepper sauce than one family could comfortably eat in a year and three sorts of squash, which we make into soups, stews and bread."
[snipped]
She compares the current period of market uncertainty with that of the early- to mid-20th century when the concept of victory gardens became popular.
"A lot of companies during the world wars and the Great Depression era encouraged vegetable gardening as a way of addressing layoffs, reduced wages and such," she says. "Some companies, like U.S. Steel, made gardens available at the workplace. Railroads provided easements they'd rent to employees and others for gardening."
(Excerpt) Read more at dallasnews.com ...
What is pastry flour? I just got a bread machine and it uses bread flour, but I don’t know where to find the pastry flour you mention. Also, I noticed in store “tradition” whole wheat then another kind of whole wheat - I think one is bleached and one is not bleached. Would you know the difference?
Thanks AZ Granny
” I tend to be a heavy poster, so don’t ping to all I post, unless it is something that I am sure you want to know.
We will go to 5,000 posts, before we start a new thread “
Here’s a trick that someone came up with on the other long-time ongoing thread I inhabit (”News From The Long War”) — come up with a unique and memorable keyword, (maybe greengiant?) and add it to the “keywords” section of the first post — and that way, if one of us gets lost, we can do a keyword search and find our way home...
The key that I’ve learned over the years to minimize interruption and inconvenience is to diversify, i.e. don’t rely on just one energy source (i.e. all electric - we use butane for cooking and wood for most of our heat), keep a well stocked pantry, be prepared for extended outages, have a sufficient stock of ammunition, and keep a few gallons of gasoline or diesel in stock in case of emergency (but you will need to rotate and use it periodically to prevent it from ruining).<<<
Excellent advice, very wise.
I am glad you will have a large garden, and am praying that folks all have a bumper crop.
During WW2, we had many Victory gardens, people planted food and not grass.
I do not do lawns, not when the same amount of effort will give me either food or beautiful flowers.
You are correct, I may have more flour and beans in my freezer, than anything else, as frozen food will be the first to spoil.
Good, that you are able to save your own seeds, so few even have an idea of how to do it.
I’m no green thumb, but I am not paying $4 per cantaloupe... planted a small crop. Now that 1 supermarket has an effective monopoly where I live, they have jacked up prices nearly 100% on average... and several hundred percent on certain things.
I’m buying from farmers directly when I can, and the low maintenance stuff that’s grotesquely overpriced growing myself.
Please add me to your ping list too.
By the bye, please add me to your ping-list, also... ;~)
Granny, I’m going to add you to the weekly gardening list and then we can cross reference threads when needed.
If anyonewould like to be on the gardening ping list please let me know!!!
~ “...do drop in and check for new posts.” ~
Will do. Thanks. : )
I bet not many people thought of buying and storing low maintenance fishing gear. Give us fishing line, sinker, bobber and a stick and we're all set. Most of my family like rods and reels, me, I'm a cane pole fisher. We all know how to run a trout line.
I’d like to be added to your gardening ping list!
Excellent idea.
Hello and welcome, your ideas are all good and some that I had forgotten that I knew how to do.
I did not know there was a gardening thread, so can’t ping them for you, I would if I could.
This was not aimed at only gardens, it is everything, that we might want to know or should know about survival and cutting the corners, that we are all looking at, as the prices rise.
People like you, have a lot to teach us, the cooking on the grill I can do, but not the running from a hurricane or the many other disasters that are lurking out there.
Yes, being a farm girl is a plus, we learn things not taught in the book.
Do join in and help make this a good thread..........
Just did a keyword search on greengiant — it’s been used on other threads.....
taking suggestions on something unique....
You’ve got it!!!!
I generally post the thread on Thursday or Friday and will ping the list to threads like this at other times.
At least 2 of our regulars operate/manage garden centers and are a wealth of knowlege.
You are on my...smile list.
Now if I don’t loose the paper, keep checking back, after I get some sleep, I will put up some new posts. and daily, if all goes as planned.
Thank you for being here.
Don’t forget the Berkley Power Bait.
The stinkier, the better.
Errands to run and chores to do...
Leaving a ****trail of breadcrumbs**** to find my way back...
;~)
That’s it...
“Stinkbait” is our unique find-your-way-home keyword... (I’m adding it now...)
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