Lost my garden here in central Arkansas. Thought I had bad seeds, but the local co-op told me all are having this problem. Seems we’ve had a wet spring with unusual highs and lows that have caused the seeds to rot before germination. Am turning the rows again today and replanting.
Best of luck on your efforts, Victory gardens will be needed especially this fall. WWG1WGA!
It has been a crazy year for gardens, just when we need them with looming food shortages. I often think of my grandparents (both sets) that had large gardens every year. Both grannies canned to preserve food to last through the winter. If the garden failed .... well, it was slim pickings during the winter months.
They did have animals they could butcher - both grandfathers butchered more hogs than anything & both were excellent sausage makers. Cows and sheep were rarely butchered for the family because they were too valuable as sale animals - per my dad, maybe 1 cow per year & 1 lamb for a special occasion (Easter in particular).
They both had chickens and those were most often ‘Sunday dinner’. My dad recently told me a story of waking up one morning & seeing a couple of chickens outside the coop. Since the chickens were locked up every night, they knew someone had gotten into the coop and it turned out that between 30-40 chickens were gone .... cleaned out by thieves. Those were hard times (Depression years) and people were desperate and stealing to eat. In our more modern times, when the grocery shelves are empty & the city dwellers can’t grow their own food ... I hate to think what will happen.
Anyway, to end on a more positive note .... saw this article the other day, written by Dr. Malone on “Victory Gardens” - he is encouraging people to grow them.
The Victory Garden.
Don’t just Consume, Produce. Our parents did it, and so can we.
https://rwmalonemd.substack.com/p/the-victory-garden?s=r
The article starts with this quote, but it gets into more than just the politics around food - a good read.
“If people let government decide which food they eat and medicines they take, their bodies will soon be in as sorry a state as are the souls of those who live under tyranny”
Thomas Jefferson