ideas

I was thinking that our garden needs tending. Do you think it's a good idea to make a schedule? I would find this helpful especially for watering. As it starts to get warmer and doesn't rain as often, we should make sure we don't starve our growing plants. I have noticed that the mushroom compost retains moisture for a while, so that's a plus. Let's figure it out in class tomorrow

So Excited! Painting Day soon?

Hey guys,

I can't tell you how excited I was to get some veggie in the ground last week! Our garden will be kicking in no time, I'm sure of it! I have been wanting to do some painting recently and wanted to see who was interested. I think we should paint the garden boxes, as planned, and also make a colorful sign to put at the entrance of the garden. Does anyone know where to get eco-friendly paint? Hopefully for cheap? Let me know if you are interested in decorating our new garden oasis and I will be in touch!

-Thanks!

Starting seeds

Yesterday I was looking up ideas for jumpstarting seed germination and I came across a great idea. I know our garden is pretty full but if anyone hasn't started all their seeds yet; using an old waterbed heater is an inexpensive way to get higher germination rates. Nobody really has a waterbed anymore so its pretty easy to get a cheap one at a garage sale, goodwill, ebay or craigslist. They work great because they're water resistant and a decent size to use for multiple pots or trays at once. Another idea was outdoor rope lights buried in sand in the bottom of a large plastic container. You just drill drainage holes in the bottom, and a larger one in the side for the cord to go through, then you wind the lights all over the bottom of the container, then cover with a few inches of sand. The sand is warmed by the lights which warms the trays above, and by putting the lid on the container you keep the moisture in (just don't put it in direct sun or you will cook your seedlings!). Either option is cheap and easy to set up which is key for gardening ;)

Urban Grazing

Since it is offically spring now but we don't have anything to really eat from our little garden I thought I would share some wild plants to eat. I brought in the chickweed pesto from The Revolution Will Not Be Microwaved by Sandor Ellix Katz with my own little twist. I added some wild chives and used sunflower seeds. Chickweed and wild chives aren't the only things ripe for the pickin' right now! Thanks to a little website called Eattheweeds.com and a little research I found some other things that are growing in my yard and downtown. Dandelions used for salads or in wine, henbit which is super easy to spot is completely edible and is used for salads or cooked, plantain leafs are good fried as chips according to the website, Violets can be used raw dried or cooked and the flowers can be candied. There are probably some more I haven't found out about but if nothing else its pretty fun just seeing what is actually edible, and most people consider "weeds". I've also noticed a fair amount of rosemary planted around campus and I tend to break off a sprig or two to add to some of my pasta dishes. Remember a weed is just a plant somewhere you don't want it, so the term is relative. I also suggest doing a good bit of research before actually eating anything. There are lots of sources out there so you can be really confident before you take the leap! Happy Hunting!!!
(right) chickweed

Plantain:

Sweet violet:

Henbit:

wild onion or garlic (either way it smells like onion and tastes great!)

Chucktown Urban Agriculture

Charleston, SC is a very unique area with lots of potential for urban agriculture. This historical city with an urban center yet small town feel is a host to many small organizations, citizens, and nonprofits that have taken steps to promote local, sustainable agriculture and community gardens. It appears that all of this is occurring independently and naturally - a very beautiful thing. It would be great though if there could be further communication between groups to do even more to facilitate a healthy, more environmentally-friendly Charleston. Here's a list of some of the resources I've found so far pertaining to urban agriculture, and healthy local food:

Lowcountry Local First: Wonderful nonprofit to strengthen community support for local businesses and farmers. Check out their Farm Fresh Food campaign for information on local food and CSA's.
http://www.lowcountrylocalfirst.org/

Charleston Area Children's Garden Project: An excellent nonprofit aimed at providing children with a community-based outdoor learning experience. Focus is placed on undereducated, low income neighborhoods.
http://www.childrensgardenproject.org

CofC Urban Agriculture Club: An active student organization at the College of Charleston that promotes "social justice, environmental justice, public health and supporting the local economy through the growing of fresh, organic and local produce." Sign up on their e-mail list for information on garden work days, film screenings, and more: CofCUrbanAgriculture@gmail.com.
Website: http://www.wix.com/UrbanAgriculture/Urban-Ag
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?v=wall&ref=ts&gid=153495370790

Fields to Families: A local nonprofit that helps bring healthy, nutritious food to the hungry in our area through donations by generous farmers and community gardeners. Click on the link below to find out how you can help.
http://www.fieldstofamilies.org/

Community Gardens:

Lowcountry Community Gardens: A fairly new nonprofit in the area "fostering the growth of healthy communities through the growing of food in small neighborhood plots." They even have a seedbank! Check out their Charleston Urban Gardens Map to view current and potential sites for urban gardens.
Blog: http://hyperlocalfood.blogspot.com/
Website: http://lowcountrycommunitygardens.bbnow.org/index.php

Elliotburg Community Garden: Lovely community garden located at 134 Line St that includes individual plots and a children's play area.
http://acga.localharvest.org/garden/M2356

The Bogarden: A new community garden springing up on the corner of Bogard and Rutledge.
Blog: http://www.thebogarden.blogspot.com/

Note: This is by no means an exhaustive list; just a few I happened to be able to drum up in a short time. There are also many other wonderful things occurring off the Internet grid. :) Please let me know if you have any links I can add.

We have soil!

It is starting to look like spring around here. Thick yellow pine pollen is coating our wind shields, azaleas are starting to bud after a cold winter, and soil has appeared in our garden boxes. That's right! Soil! A huge thank you to All Seasons for the donation. Thanks, too, to the student crew who took charge of pick-up and getting it  into the boxes so quickly. It was exciting to come out of class to find the attractive boxes ready to go.

I have started some seeds (this morning my five-year-old excitedly pointed out that some have sprouted) and others have been promised to us. We should be able to start planting soon, perhaps this week. For inspiration, we are going to visit the "Bogarden" at the corner of Rutledge and Bogard St. during class on Thursday. We can make some decisions about what to plant then.  Please meet at our classroom and wear walking shoes. Matt G. will lead the way. We will have our book discussion at the garden or on Matt's porch.

I have also been in contact with Ambrose Farms and I'm pleased to announce that we are going to take a field trip there in early April. We are coordinating with Ambrose to time it so we can be there when the crews are picking.

See you Thursday!

Paint

So I’ve been looking at natural and non toxic paints and it looks like there’s not much out there in retail stores that completely environmentally safe. Here are two paint brands I found that are available online:

Real Milk Paint: http://www.realmilkpaint.com/products.html non-toxic paint made with milk protein, lime, clay and earth pigments. It’s non toxic, environmentally friendly, and sticks to raw wood. It comes in powder form and mixes with water and advertises that it doesn’t congeal for at least two weeks. It dries in 30 minutes to 4 hours. There’s a bunch of different colors to pick from. We can order it online and it’s $11 for a pint or $16.50 for a quart.

Bio Shield stains: http://www.bioshieldpaint.com/ BioShield Healthy Living Aqua Resin Stain Finish is a solvent-free water-based, Zero VOC, low-drip, resilient wood stain finish for interior and exterior applications. Aqua Resin Stain Finish is based on nontoxic and natural raw materials that are harmless to the environment and waterways. The finish is completely solvent-free. It dries within 30 minutes. It’s around $30 for .75 liter and only available online.

This is it so far but I’m gonna keep looking!

Food Culture

Barbara Kingsolver begins her book Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life, explaining how her family moved from Tuscan, Arizona to southern Appalachia to live on a farm and eat the food they grow. The book is refreshing and unique, a true family feat as both her daughter and husband contribute. She starts with statistics about how much oil is used to carry food, with the disturbing fact that the “average food item on a U.S. grocery shelf has traveled farther than most families go on their annual vacation” (p. 4). Her husband, Steven L. Hopp, adds that if every citizen ate one local, organic meal a week, our oil consumption would decrease by “over 1.1 million barrels of oil every week” (p. 5).

Kingsolver goes on to explain how many of us are grossed out when any dirt or soil is still on our food. The irony is that this is where our food comes from; without dirt, we would have no food. It should be the chemical fertilizers and pesticides that scare people. Yet we have become used to the processed, artificial food fed to us in neat packaging since the end of WWII. Kingsolver addresses how this artificial food is contributing to our nation’s ongoing problem of obesity, with extra calories coming from now-common ingredients from corn, soybeans, and other vegetables like lecithin, xanthan gum and citric acid. Specifically, children are targeted by the food industry, with billions of dollars going into how to advertise sugary, artificial foods to children.

One specific part of her first chapter I found interesting was her take on food culture. Kingsolver argues that European and Asian countries have their own food cultures. Italians eat Italian food, Chinese eat Chinese food, the French eat French food, etc. Their recipes and ways of cooking are handed down from generations. While Americans certainly eat all these kinds of cuisines, or at least the Americanized version of them, we have no food culture of our own. Instead, we have processed foods and an opposing series of fad diets that people use to try to get rid of the weight they’ve gained from the processed foods. Coming from upstate New York, I would have to somewhat agree with Kingsolver. Where I grew up, there was no “upstate New York” cuisine that everyone ate. The one kind of food that everyone ate, and everyone eats throughout the country, is barbeque. Barbequing, or cooking out depending on where you’re from, varies from state to state, but it seems to be a staple of the US. It also usually involves people coming together to eat and socialize, as Kingsolver describes French meals.

I wouldn’t necessarily constitute barbeque as a “food culture”, and certainly not a healthy one, but it may be a start. I don’t see America ever having one “food culture” because we are such geographically large nation compared to most European nations. Also, being the “melting pot” of the world, we have too many people from too many backgrounds to throw out all but one kind of cuisine. Considering the diversity of the US, I would argue it’s not just the food industry that keeps us from having one “food culture”, but also our history as a nation.

Update on getting organized

I've had a number of good conversations and email exchanges with several of you after my weekend email about injecting a bit more structure into the garden project. Several ideas were floated, but they were all variations on a theme: we need to have a weekly "to do" list by the end of each Thursday class with people signed up for each task.

This Thursday, let's start class with the list-making and hold off on the book discussion until we are done. I think this will put the project(s) on firmer footing just in time for Spring Break.

garden boxes

Hello Everyone,

The garden boxes look great! Thank you so much!

I just wanted to put out some ideas about how to finish them in a way that they can be a sort of permanent structure- the wood looks untreated, so it may not withstand outdoor conditions for long. We need to take some time to sand all the edges and then paint it with something for the outdoors- I thought I had some paint for this, but it turns out that it contains an ingredient that is a known carcinogen in the state of California. I am sure that we don't want to plant in a container that has come into contact with a known carcinogen (in any state). So, I will plan on doing some research for outdoor paints that are earth- and health- friendly. If anyone has any paint that they were thinking of using, please check the ingredients and warning labels. I was surprised to see that I own something so toxic.

Thanks for everything. See you on Thursday :)

Tater Towers

Over the winter I've had some potatoes growing and now I have plenty of seed potatoes for us to use in our tater towers! I have blue, purple, red, white, and yellow potatoes to start and I plan on bringing some of each so we will have a wide variety at the end of the season.

In order to build the towers we need to pick a spot out of the way from the best sun. I think we should put them somewhere against the fence so they aren't the first thing people see. We also need to plan out how much room we have so we can figure out how many tires we're going to need.

In order to start the project we need to loosen the soil beneath the tires to promote draining. Next we need to cut away the inner ring of the tire, leaving enough of an edge so they can stack and support the weight of the other tires. The first tire needs to be completely filled with a mulch/ soil mixture then 3-4 eyes or small seed potatoes need to be placed in the center. After the potatoes are place they need to be covered with enough soil to bring it level with the top of the tire. The soil should be throughly soaked to promote growth.

After the plants get to be about 8 inches tall, place another tire on the stack and fill it with soil so that a few inches of the plant are still exposed. By gradually covering the plant with soil you are creating a 24-36 inch tap root without suffocating the plant. This process encourages the potato plants to send off more roots and more potatoes than hilling does. The black rubber absorbs heat and allows planting earlier in the season. This method requires no hoeing and once the plants are dried up the potatoes can be harvested mearly by knocking over the stack!

Other benefits:

In 2001 alone, Americans discarded nearly 281 million tires, weighing some 5.7 million tons! Dumps charge to dispose of old tires, and it is easy to get old tires for free to use in your garden.

Tires can be used to grow other plants as well. Tomatoes, lettuce, and other crops can have their growing season extended by these cheap warm beds. By using multiple sizes of tires strawberry planters can easily be created. If thats not enough you can help the environment by reusing an item that would normally take up space in a landfill.