Where are all the victory gardens?

[NickB79]

As I drove around my town yesterday to buy some essentials, I suddenly realized something that was bugging me for weeks that I couldn't put my finger on. At this time of year in the small rural town near where I grew up in, there would be rectangles of bare dirt indicating harvested potatoes, carrots, beets, and onions, along with corn-stalk tee-pee huts indicating harvested sweetcorn, in most of the yards. Pumpkin and squash would be piled up next to patios or cellars, and a few apples still would still be hanging on the now-leafless trees.

Driving through this suburban wasteland that I am now forced to call my home, I see none of that. The best I see is a tilled-up flower bed here or there, or an occassional walnut tree feeding the squirrels instead of the people. I see large areas of land next to department stores that could be used as community gardens, but instead go totally unused, just mowed weekly to look nice. Then, I come home and read this: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=102&topic_id=2617628&mesg_id=2617628

There are 35 MILLION Americans going hungry every year, and we grow endless expanses of grass and dandilions instead of a few vegetable crops. We plant inedible crabapples instead of apple and pear trees. We continue to plow under farmland to build subdivisions of crappy, lookalike townhomes where you actually have to pay the association to cut your grass for you.

Again I ask, where are the victory gardens? In WWII they helped provide millions with additional food, both here and in Europe. My grandmother still talks about what they did to help the war effort, how each farm would compete to see who could win local awards for the most productive farmer, and how each wife would compete to win awards on most productive garden. Today, it seems like it's a mystery to people how to grow something from a pack of seeds. When I told someone that a hobby of mine was to grow trees from seed, they actually asked "you can do that?" like putting an acorn or walnut in the ground is some form of alchemy.

I understand that people are working more and more to get by, but a properly designed vegetable garden is no more difficult to maintain than a flower bed. No, you can't have fresh produce year-round in most areas with a vegetable garden. You can, though, freeze, can and store enough produce to last months into the winter. I grew up in poverty on a small family farm, and if it weren't for the food we produced ourselves, we would have either starved or would have been totally reliant on WIC and food stamps. As it were, we only needed those occassionally. How can people sit down at the dinner table less than a week from now and not feel guilt that they have a feast while there are men, women and children out there with nothing on their tables? I donate yearly to the food shelf and still feel horrible, mainly because I know what it felt like to go without as a child. The food you get from a food shelf is not impressive in the least.

Ok, venting done, rant off :)

[NMDemDist2]

1. you'll see one in my new yard next spring summer and fall

and I found an apple on a sad little bush out in the yard, so that sad little bush just got a dose of water and it'll get fertilizer this spring

i plan to use my precious water here to give life to plants that can sustain me and i'm working on how to divert the summer rain runoff to feed my thirsty veggies

:hi:

that article was something wasn't it?

[WarNoMore]

2. Good rant!

I agree whole heartedly. I too grew up in poverty. My mother had the most wonderful garden, and I helped with the freezing and canning at a young age.

Now I have a few raised beds (bad anthracnose problem with tomatoes this year) and half the neighbors think "there's that crazy lady that weeds by hand and won't use any chemicals. Lol


Here on the Cape, just about everyone has a lawn service that uses those chemicals like there's no tomorrow.

[mitchtv]

3. I still miss my rural land/home

although no a suburban dweller for the first time, my garden still has a Lime and a Guava, and I grow some rosemary ,oregano, etc. No room for much sadly. I miss my Fuji apple and walnuts. and a compact Stella that gave cherries every year without a pollinator

[Ezlivin]

4. Got ours going - on the Winter schedule now

We've already planted and harvested our summer crop; now my wife has tomatoes, cabbage, brussel sprouts and collard greens going. She's already canned a lot of tomatoes and has laid up jalapeno jelly and pickles.

There's nothing better than eating organic produce right out of your own garden. We had a lot of salads this summer with everything but the salad dressing coming right out of our backyard.

However, there's not another garden around for quite a ways; it's all suburbs, driveways and SUVs in the Metroplex (D/FW).

[pinto]

5. Nice post. Not earth shattering, but I manage to have fresh tomatoes,

sweet peppers, chilies, scallions, lettuce, spinach, bok choy, assorted greens, herbs, strawberries and some odd ball stuff (trials) from patio pots/tubs alongside my little place in California. I grow year 'round, but even farther north, I know it's doable, and really rewarding to step out the door to get a salad or some bok choy for stir fry. (I'd have a couple of laying hens if I could get away with it...) :hi:

[Mabus]

6. I've always tried to have one

My grandma had one and she told us how they came about. I learned to can, pickle and dehydrate. It saved me in the early 90's. At one period, most of money was going towards tuition, books and an apartment. I had a large yard for a garden and used it. I canned everything from okra to tomatoes. I made my own pickles. I had enough canned food to last through the winter. It saved us a lot of money and, I believe, healthier for us. Over the years I've cut back but I still put one out every year.

My victory garden got burned out this year. The sun just burnt everything. I got a small crop of strawberries and a couple of tomatoes but then, in a couple of days, it was all gone. I'm going to give a try again next year. I've got the jars and the pressure cooker for canning. In years past I have taken my extra to the homeless and drop-in centers but mostly I let a couple of young families up the block take what they want. It helps them cut down on their bills and the kids are getting good, non-chemically treated food.

[Wiley50]

7. Humbolt county, California, among others

But don't expect to see them from the road.

They have Federal Task forces and Choppers looking for them.

But, what they grow, few eat, most smoke

and they do put groceries on the table

of the fortunate few who get away with it

[havocmom]

8. Gardening is a political act and fosters independence. An old post of mine on the subject

to back up your most excellent rant, NickB79. :hi:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=102&topic_id=2564412&mesg_id=2564451
Re: Carbon Sequestration Project and reply to just plant a tree

Just what I was thinking! Wanna make the world better? Plant trees and veggies. Catch some CO2 and get a little rain making mechanism working in a neighborhood near you!

People ask me how I define gardening as a political act. Oh, so many ways it is political... Start with teaching kids they can change things and create some of what they need themselves, pry them from the TV which is training them to be helpless consumers, show corporations you know the difference between 'need' and 'want'... empower people to make small positive changes in their immediate surroundings and lessen dependence on large corporations... Gee, how far could any of those lessons be expanded?

And make the weather better. Make friends of the birds and they will rid you of many bugs so you aren't as likely to resort to horrible chemical poisoning of your immediate surroundings. Might even find your blood pressure knocked down a few points, lessening your dependence on our very poor system of medical care delivery and the growing power of Big Pharma over your very existence.

Get some fresh air. Kick some ideas around in your head while doing menial, but healthy, physical chores. Clear out the emotional shit and get some perspective on what is really important.

Learn to plan a bit, to research how to make next year better. Give yourself space to experiment and tweak your methods if at first you don't succeed. Learn that great improvements are often done in small, manageable stages.

Gardening is a political act. And a damned good on. Teach some youngsters the values of tending the soil and plants and you have made them stronger participants in their own futures.

Stop waiting for 'somebody' to fix this or that. Realize the 'somebody' you hope for is YOU and start planting a future. Even if it's just a trash bag with potting soil and some lettuce seeds... make something grow. The world has enough pavement for cars to play on. Be the anti-pavement and make habitat for people and other critters ;)

[Warpy]

9. Two income couples don't have the time

to devote to a vegetable garden, even if they can drag the kids away from soccer and crafts and computer games to help out. They're working 50-60 hours a week each in high pressure jobs and have barely enough time on weekends between taxi trips to more kid activities to do the laundry and catch up on vacuuming, wash the cars and trim the lawn.

The poorest are in the same boat, only instead of having the kids do activities, they spend their work time worrying and hoping the kids will stay off the street, out of a gang, off drugs, ALIVE.

In other words, people are working too damned hard to devote time to the simple act of feeding themselves via the land.

[brer cat]

10. Nice rant! Always enjoy hearing from fellow gardeners.

I understand that many people think that veg gardens are too time consuming, but they don't have to be. A raised bed area with plenty of mulch can be easily maintained, and produce high yields per square foot.

My sister and I bought a town house on a corner lot with a decent sized side yard, and the first thing we did was get rid of every blade of grass. We didn't use chemicals, just covered it all with heavy cardboard/newspapers and poured several inches of mulch over it in the fall. By spring we were ready to install our raised beds, add dirt and lots of compost and start growing. We both work, but rarely have a problem staying on top of things. An added bonus is that my 5 and 6-year old grands are now really "into" gardening...such a better way to spend their time than with tv, etc.

There is also the joy of sharing. Our sweet pepper crop this year was amazing. We filled our freezer and still were giving away bags of red and yellow peppers, which are expensive in our area, to elderly friends and neighbors, all of whom told us that they never bought them because they couldn't afford it. It was pure pleasure to be able to share.

We were initially concerned that our "in-town" veg garden might offend our neighbors, but most are very interested in what we are doing and stop by regularly to see what we have up and how it's doing. We don't use chemicals and sometimes the bugs have our beans, etc. looking a bit ragged, but we placed flower beds close to the street so that the area looks attractive.

I highly recommend gardening however small your space. You will eat better tasting, healthier food and it's a great stress reducer.

[pitohui]

11. where do you live

w.out knowing your location, i can't a full answer but the short answer is that the pumpkin and squash crops failed this year, home crops too, there is some virus or disease making the rounds apparently of the curcurbits

my satsuma crop mostly failed because of the drought in the new orleans subsequent to katrina and rita

if you grow fruit or vegetables at home, the first lesson is that mother nature hates you and that some years the crop fails, this is not a very good year really

lots of persimmons tho, unfortunately most folks can't eat them, fortunately for me i can so i've been given a large number

damn raccoons eat all the figs

this growing stuff looks so easy certain years and certain other years you're just screwed

[Shakespeare]

12. Well, you won't see the government pushing the idea like it did in the past, because...

...it gets FAR too much money from big Ag corporations. The last thing they want is for people to realize they can grow much of their own (and healthier!) food.

Anybody who's got so much as a few square feet on a patio could and should grow SOMETHING. It's fun, and it's good for you.

[InvisibleTouch]

13. It's frustrating to me that I don't have the space...

...to plant a decent veggie garden, though I've managed to grow a few paltry tomatoes, radishes, and garlic plants on my patio in recent years. I'm big into self-sufficiency, and my goal is to be as independent of outside sources for my survival as possible. Living in a city that I hate, though, that's all but impossible. I've felt for years that something is very very wrong with not only the way I'm living - forcibly cut off from the earth - but with what our whole society considers "normal."

During my teen years, my family was very strapped for money, living just on the edge of surviving. But we had a big yard. My mother obsessively turned it into a parklike setting with groundcover and evergreens. It boggles my mind to this day that she didn't plant food. Not only would it have provided healthy meals and eased the financial strain a bit, but it would have given us a sense of self-sufficiency and competence, and maybe even, gods forbid, a sort of family cohesiveness. When I mention these days that I want to grow my own fruits and vegetables, she ridicules me. Go figure.

[Syncronaut Seven]

14. Had a HUGE Victory Garden!!! Untill we lost the house

Six 6' x 12' raised beds, double dug. Four units of soil (30 yards) I brought in, hell of a lot of work, but worth it. Two does free ranging out back to keep the milkweed trimmed.

New owners own rottweilers, the garden has lay fallow 4 years now. :cry:

We are so seriously fucked folks, a rototiller might not be a bad investment.