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 ...
http://www.ellisparkerbutler.info/
Ellis Parker Butler is best known as the author of “Pigs is Pigs.” Born in Muscatine Iowa in 1869, Butler wrote and published 2,200 stories, books, essays and poems during a career that spanned more than forty years.
http://www.ellisparkerbutler.info/epb/reading.asp?id=1999
“An Experiment in Gyro-Hats” from Hampton’s Magazine
by Ellis Parker Butler
* Hampton’s Magazine (June, 1910) A story. Illustrations by Albert Levering. Published as a booklet later the same year. p 799-808. [HARPER]
[A delightful bit of nonsense, that I am glad that I took the time to read......granny]
http://www.thriftyfun.com/tf546277.tip.html
[As many ideas as there are people]
Keeping Chickens Out of Flower Beds
Does anyone know how to keep chickens out of flower beds? They are destroying the mulch?
Rolayne from Beasley, TX
Feedback Forum:
RE: Keeping Chickens Out of Flower Beds
Sherry Hogan (Guest Post) 2008-03-29
I have chickens and have tried the water hose and it does help but chickens are not very smart, it doesn’t take long for them to forget and you can’t be there evey time one wanders in. I have also tried the chicken wire with mulch. It helped alot but they still dug atound and scattered the mulch and dug up small holes through the opening. Obviously my bulbs were saved but the beds still lookes awful. I love having my chickens but chickens are stupid and scolding or spraying only works short term, very short term!I am still looking for a solution.
RE: Keeping Chickens Out of Flower Beds
Post by honey two 2008-03-27
thanks for all the hints.
RE: Keeping Chickens Out of Flower Beds
mama grizzly bear (Guest Post) 2008-03-26
I have chickens and they keep scratching in my new flower bed. I want to eat them for dinner. I talked with an old farmer friend and he suggested sprinkling chili powder around in the bark, chickens hate it. I’m going to give that a try this weekend. I will let you know how it goes. By the way, the spraying them with a hose does work too, but you have to be out there the same time they are,I usually dont know they have been in the flower beds until it is too late.
RE: Keeping Chickens Out of Flower Beds
Post by Beth - MA 2008-02-05
That’s too bad about the lions and tigers- Now THERE’S a solution to your chicken problem right there. On a smaller scale, however... Have you thought about getting a cat? Chickens can put up a fight, but could it be worth a shot?
Another idea is to wind fishing line through your flower beds. I’ll bet that would freak them out. I also like the idea of camping out in the yard with the hose.
RE: Keeping Chickens Out of Flower Beds
Post by deebomb 2008-02-05
Years ago my dad put chicken wire around the foundation of his house to keep his chickens from scratching the dirt away from the foundation. The chickens couldn’t scratch there any more.
Request: Keeping Chickens Out of Flower Beds
Post by Laurel_admin 2008-02-05
My next door neighbor has a problem with another neighbor’s chickens crossing the street and visiting her newly laid, expensive flower beds. They are digging up the plants, etc. This isn’t a rural area, but there are no laws on the books about poultry in people’s yards. Any suggestions that won’t harm the chickens, yet keep them out of the flower beds? Thanks, Holly Editor’s Note: I guess this explains why the chicken crossed the road! To eat some flowers. Sorry...
Answers:
RE: Keeping Chickens Out of Flower Beds
I used to have chickens and my dad would use chicken wire along the ground, and let the plants grow up through it; and if the base of the plants get too big you can always cut out a little section of it to make it bigger. Then there is the possibility of asking whoever owns the chickens to keep them in a pen. Oh and by the way your won’t even know the wire is there if you cover it with bark, mulch, or pine straw. (04/29/2005)
By jtg90
RE: Keeping Chickens Out of Flower Beds
Letting your chickens roam and destroy others’ property is just as bad as having a dog that does that! I would suggest asking the neighbor to fence in the chickens or you will call the police. Also, take photos of the chickens in the act. Maybe have a lawyer write a letter to the neighbors about the chickens destroying her property. After a fair amount of warnings I would be making some chicken soup!-from a former owner of a small chicken flock (04/30/2005)
By Peach
RE: Keeping Chickens Out of Flower Beds
Huh? I don’t understand how chicken wire covered with mulch will keep my chickens out of the flowers. Do you mean that they will eventually scratch the mulch away and get caught in the wire and then I will end up having to rescue mad, panicked hens from the wire? (05/27/2005)
By KS Sherry
RE: Keeping Chickens Out of Flower Beds
The idea is that chickens don’t like walking on chicken wire. Probably any similar type of fencing would work. I doubt they would get caught in it if you laid it flat on the ground. It does surprise me that it would be effective with mulch on it but maybe it would be with a thin layer, that’s assuming that chickens don’t like walking on wire in the first place. I don’t have chickens so I personally couldn’t test it. Pretty cheap and easy solution to try out in a small area. (05/27/2005)
By ThriftyFun
RE: Keeping Chickens Out of Flower Beds
I have chickens and my mother simply puts vinegar around her flower bed. It seems to help (08/12/2005)
By Chickenboy14
RE: Keeping Chickens Out of Flower Beds
I just read on another web site that using mothballs is both toxic to the chickens and to humans. So please don’t try this method. (04/13/2006)
By taterbug
RE: Keeping Chickens Out of Flower Beds
My grandfather put an electric fence around his yard. There are two wires running parallel to the ground, one about 6” off the ground, and one 1’ off the ground. It only took the chickens a couple of times to learn their lesson. Now they stay away from his gardens and bird feeders. (04/16/2006)
By
RE: Keeping Chickens Out of Flower Beds
Are you sure there are no laws about chickens roaming in a residential area. You should call your town Code Enforcement Office. I had that problem. They destroyed my flowers, messed on my new concrete driveway constantly, etc., etc.. I had no complaint with the chickens, but with their owner. I nicely explained to him what his chickens were doing to my property. He still let them run loose. I then had to let him know I didn’t want anymore chickens in my yard or he would be paying code enforcement a big fine and surrendering his chickens. They were only 3 chickens, but they did enough damage for 20. (06/14/2007)
By Stngray
RE: Keeping Chickens Out of Flower Beds
I have called Zoning and there is no anti-chicken rule in my residential neighborhood. However, they have rules about lions and tigers. So helpful. (06/15/2007)
By cookwie
RE: Keeping Chickens Out of Flower Beds
Just use a garden hose with a jet attachment, chickens hate getting wet and they’ll soon associate the flower beds with getting wet! (11/05/2007)
By Brian Kenneth
http://www.thriftyfun.com/tf546277.tip.html - Copyright © 1997-2008ThriftyFun.com
BTTT
Thank you, good to know that you are ok.
Good morning, Granny, and everybody...
I can’t tell you how great it is to be seeing y’all, this morning, instead of “PAGE CAN NOT BE DISPLAYED”... ;~)
Granny, you’ve been busy, and I’ve got a LOT of catching up to do.... ;~)
The noose (or, if you prefer, ‘belt’) tightens....
Rush to restrict trade in basic foods
The Financial Times ^ | 4/1/2008 | Alan Beattie
Posted on 04/02/2008 12:17:56 AM PDT by bruinbirdman
Governments across the developing world are scrambling to boost farm imports and restrict exports in an attempt to forestall rising food prices and social unrest.
Saudi Arabia cut import taxes across a range of food products on Tuesday, slashing its wheat tariff from 25 per cent to zero and reducing tariffs on poultry, dairy produce and vegetable oils.
On Monday, India scrapped tariffs on edible oil and maize and banned exports of all rice except the high-value basmati variety, while Vietnam, the world’s third biggest rice exporter, said it would cut rice exports by 11 per cent this year.
The moves mark a rapid shift away from protecting farmers, who are generally the beneficiaries of food import tariffs, towards cushioning consumers from food shortages and rising prices.
But economists warned that such actions risked provoking an upward spiral in global food prices, which have already been pushed higher by rising demand from emerging markets like China and India and pressure on land from the growing production of bio-fuels.
“There are so many speculators in the market that when something happens to affect supply, there is an immediate reaction,” said Paul Braks, commodities analyst at Rabobank, one of the largest agribusiness lenders.
“Markets are very tight, and when you see net exporters imposing these export restrictions to stabilise domestic food prices, it makes the market nervous.”
Mr Braks said volatility in food prices had been exacerbated by problems in financial markets. “The credit crunch has pushed a lot of investors into commodities as a safe haven,” he said. “If they get their fingers burned, they are likely to withdraw.”
Kamal Nath, Indian trade minister, said food shortages were becoming one of the most pressing trade issues. “It is ... probably our number one problem,” he said. “World food stocks have never been lower.”
India, which became self-sufficient in food in the 1970s, has imported substantial quantities of wheat and other staple foods over two years in response to shortages and higher prices.
Mr Braks said that even highly productive exporters such as Ukraine were imposing export restrictions on wheat, though a good harvest in the autumn should see more grain being released on to the world market.
In the medium term, high prices should encourage more land to come into production, particularly in Ukraine and Russia. “World grain prices are likely to be high and volatile over the next two crop years, and then from 2010 the supply response should start to bring prices slowly down,” he said.
Disputes over sharing the costs and benefits of higher food prices have shot up the political agenda in many developing countries as sharp reductions in purchasingpower, particularly for the urban poor, have put increasing pressure on governments.
Global rice prices have risen by a third since the turn of the year, and higher soyabean costs have sparked protests in countries such as Indonesia.
In Argentina, farmers have protested against attempts by the government of Cristina Fernández to redistribute the benefits of rising commodity prices by increasing export taxes on soyabeans and other crops. In the Philippines, government investigators have raided warehouses suspected of hoarding rice.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1995349/posts
I am as old or older than you and used to garden but found store bought was less expensive than a garden and canning enough to last all winter. I think it was Jimmuh Cartuh who told us to plant a garden to feed ourselves back in the 70’s.
Of course I will plant tomatoes. Can’t get good tomatoes in the store.
Tomatoes and corn that’s all we plant.
I love fresh corn, put the water on to boil when send the kids out to pick the corn. By the time the water is at the proper temp the kids are back, the corn is cleaned and ready to dropp in. A few minuteas in the water then serve wi8th butter and salt. Yum!
Love the name Freedom Farm!
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Disputes over sharing the costs and benefits of higher food prices have shot up the political agenda in many developing countries as sharp reductions in purchasingpower, particularly for the urban poor, have put increasing pressure on governments.
Global rice prices have risen by a third since the turn of the year, and higher soyabean costs have sparked protests in countries such as Indonesia.
In Argentina, farmers have protested against attempts by the government of Cristina Fernández to redistribute the benefits of rising commodity prices by increasing export taxes on soyabeans and other crops. In the Philippines, government investigators have raided warehouses suspected of hoarding rice.<<<<<
The face of the future.
Yes, there is trouble ahead of the world, all of it.
I missed you yesterday, did not allow for F.R. having been down and your job.
Do dig into the links I posted, some fit you line of thought.
Be careful.
Fresh tomatoes would be a wonderful taste.
The last store bought ones here, were tough and tasteless.
I am glad you can still grow them.
And wishing that I could also.
Fresh corn and tomatoes sounds wonderful.
Glad that you found us, this is not just a garden thread, so join us any time.
Thinking about the upside down garden in pots this year. No weeds.
Wish I could send you some tomatoes this summer. I’ll probably have plenty. I hate “store-bought” tomatoes, too. They are totally tasteless.
I haven’t even been able to get my garden broken up yet, because of all the rain. I was hoping for next week, but now we are due for more rain.
Changing the subject, but I thought you might get a kick out of this: I like to make blackberry jam cakes, but had to make my own jam from frozen blackberries because I could not find any in the stores that had seeds and pulp. In fact, Smucker’s bb jam is more like jelly. I had gone online looking for some, but even the Amish jam was seedless.
Well, a friend went to North Carolina last week and came back with a jar of bb jam for me with seeds and all. Guess where it came from. Switzerland, of all places.
I posted earlier on this thread. I gave my grandmother’s tomato pie recipe.
I also plant a couple large pots of salad greens that I try to keep replenished throughout the season.
And I forgot to mention that I posted earlier on this thread about the earth pots. No one responded so I guess no one has tried them. My husband and I are going to this year for tomatoes. I’ll let you know how it goes.
I may have missed your post, kalee. When you say “earth pots,” are you talking about earth boxes? If so, I have used them for several years, and they are great!
I do, too!
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