More likely an updated version of this:
Posted on 03/15/2009 11:54:44 AM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
With the recession in full swing, many Americans are returning to their roots -- literally -- cultivating vegetables in their backyards to squeeze every penny out of their food budget.
Industry surveys show double-digit growth in the number of home gardeners this year and mail-order companies report such a tremendous demand that some have run out of seeds for basic vegetables such as onions, tomatoes and peppers.
"People's home grocery budget got absolutely shredded and now we've seen just this dramatic increase in the demand for our vegetable seeds.
(Excerpt) Read more at salon.com ...
Sounds like a great place to live.
Real garden ping list needed here. I worked in mine today.
Hopefully the tarring and feathering of traitors and useless politicians.
I hope to get a greenhouse to raise my own crops. Fruits and veggies and other tasty stuff, year round growing.
Does this look like a good deal? I’ve just acquired enough land for a real garden.
http://www.survivalseedbank.com/
Melinda, everyone should be blessed with the kind of community you describe. And yes, when it comes to taste, home grown wins over store bought every time.
More likely an updated version of this:
What would be wrong with growing a garden for money, anyway?
My mother grew a huge garden every year to supplement her husband’s retirement check. That garden paid for itself and all the sheep, goat, duck and chicken feed for the entire year.
With a little work, they had milk, eggs, butter, meat and tons of fresh, frozen and canned veggies. The retirement check went to the mortgage, utilities, provisions they couldn’t grow themselves, gas and vehicle maintenence.
They also rented out their land to hunters in the fall. “Give us one deer and you and your party can hunt freely for two straight weeks.”
They were poor, but they ate *very* well.
I’m putting in a large garden this year. *If* I manage to get a good harvest, I plan on selling some of it to reimburse myself for the cost of the tiller, seeds, water, etc.
I’m not gardening for the fun of it. I’m gardening to save money and to feed my family. If I actually make a little on the side, I will do so.
Heck! I need to sell some if it just to buy more canning jars!
We have a large garden every summer and a flock of chickens year round. Love the fresh food but never figured a way to make money off it. Without a doubt we put much more money into both the garden and the chickens than we get out of them in food.
Sour Dough Bread.
Quick Starter, you only do this once.
2 1/2 cups bread flour, 10 bucks for 25 pounds at Sam's Club.
2 cups warm water.
1/3 cup white vinegar. Bacteria do best at low pH's
4 TBS sugar.
1 packet yeast.
One 3.5 pound Folgers Coffee can.
Dump all the above in the can, mix and let sit for a couple of days.
Bread.
Add two cups of flour to your starter, mix and wait for it to foam and bubble.
Take 2 cups of starter, Barm, and 2TBS of margarine, butter, oil, or bacon grease. two to four tbs of sugar. 1 tsp of salt and mix with 2.5 cups of flour. p>Mix and knead for 15 minutes, dough should be tacky not sticky, add water or flour to correct.
Let rest for 30 Minuit's.
Let it rise until doubled, a couple of hours.
Degas genitally, and divide into two greased loaf pans.
Let rise until doubled, a couple of hours.
Bake in 350 degree oven for an hour or so, internal temps 195 thru 205 degrees, and the bottom sounds hollow.
Cool for 30 minute's. Put starter in fridge for next time. You have to feed the starter abouts once a week 1 cup of flour and one cup of water if you don't use it, keep the bugs alive.
Kitchen Gardeners: http://www.kitchengardeners.org/
National Gardening Assn: http://www.garden.org/home
Burpee Seeds: http://www.burpee.com/
MasterGardening: http://mastergardening.com/
Harris Seeds: http://www.harrisseeds.com/
I like knowing what is in my food so growing my own veggies and canning them is wonderful. I’m seriously thinking about buying a second smaller canner so that when I make soup instead of part of it being thrown out because we can’t eat it fast enough, cannng the extra 2-3 quarts and not wasting as much as we do. The canner I have now cans 14 quarts at a time and is a little too large to drag out for only a few quarts.
It's like living in a time warp at times. I'm in a very rural back hills part of S. Tennessee but close enough to Knoxville and Chattanooga that we aren't that remote. A lot of the rural parts of TN like mine are very people and community oriented. Each time I have to go to Chattanooga or Knoxville it makes me thankful for my community and glad to be home! Just driving through Chattanooga makes me feel like I just survived a near death experience. :-)
I started two kinds of tomatoes, eggplants and cabbage today. And mr sneakers built an onion box this morning and we’ve got our onion sets in. He built a frame for strawberries. We’re doing several raised gardens because we have a few black walnut trees nearby.
I agree with you about needing a garden ping list especially for people like me who don't know that much about the when, how and best way to get the best results out of their gardening.
For several years I've planted tomatoes and peppers in my front yard flower bed because it gets the best sun. This year I'm playing around with seeds and I'm turning all of my front flower beds into beds for herbs and veggies. I'm also turning a larger fenced in area on the side of the house into a veggie garden for the vegetables and fruits which are vines. That area is just big enough to hopefully support cucumbers, cantelope, pole beans as well as beets and yellow squash.
What started my interest was a packet of San Marzano tomato seeds from Italy I received in a magazine solicitation. In watching the Food Network and being on a cooking bbs, these are the tomatoes favored by the Italians. Then I decided if I was going to play around with those seeds, I might as well try some other vegetables. So, the front beds will have eggplant, bush beans, broccoli and maybe brusssel sprouts if I don't run out of room.
There's limited availability of small herb plants here at the local gardening places so I decided I'd also do a few herb seeds such as dill, cilantro and several different types of basil as well as the usual parsley, oregano, tarragon, sage, thyme, chives and rosemary.
I also decided to try out growing garlic after a couple of heads of my garlic started sprouting. I've since found out I should have waited til October to plant the garlic because for some reason it needs to overwinter before it produces bulbs. It will be fun to see what happens to it when I plant it sometime next week.
Nothing wrong with a Franklin stove.
Pitch forks...
Added a "garlic bed" today to my garden. Never know when you might need garlic!! Got silver bullets... & wooden crosses.
Also planted variety of beans, tomatoes and squash. Fertilized the grapes before the rain came. Picked strawberries, & fresh eggs, for breakfast.
Seeing this article was so funny, since I’m starting a garden for the first time this year. Mostly it’s for fun, but also because some fruits/vegetables have become so expensive, the only way we’ll eat them is if they are growing in the backyard.
I’m limiting what I’m starting with, so I haven’t gotten to garlic yet. I love garlic, but figured I’d see if I could grow an onion first.
I’m letting Gabz know that you’re interested in the gardening ping list. Gabz is a wealth of information and the weekly gardening threads contain very useful information. Love to hear from you on the success of your plantings!
My husband was raised in the country, the back woods. When we were in college struggling with two kids... that multiplied to 5... we raised almost everything we ate. I canned, froze and dehydrated what seemed like forever. Once, hubby came home with two huge black garbage bags FULL of turnip greens. I was suppose to wash them, rinse them, wash them, rinse them, repeat-repeat, then blanch them and freeze them. It was taking forever. I stuck them in the washing machine on "gentle cycle"... big mistake. We wore greens for months... got stuck in those little holes in the washer tub.
Hubby has been tranferred a lot over our 30+ year marriage. I always had a "portable garden" in pots or containers. We love fresh vegetables!
You are right about the price of stuff, it's ridiculous! Good luck with your gardening! It's fun, and rewarding!
Garlic has so many health benefits, and I love to cook with it. Onions, chives, shallots, leeks and garlic are easy to grow!
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