frugal food

**forestdale** · 03-08-2005, 09:04 PM

Okay gardeners, let's get serious. Apart from our mortages and credit cards, what do we spend the most money on. Food, right? So let's get serious and start to grow some food.

If my DH would give up meat, we could live from what we produce in our backayrd. Emphasis there is on the word "could". We don't, but this year we're going to try to become as self-sufficient in eggs, vegetables and herbs as we can be. I expect this to cut down on my vegetable bill considerably and I know we'll be healthier because we'll grow organically.

My situation now is this: we have six small vegetable plots that are behind a fence so the dogs and chickens can't get in there. We do put the chickens in there sometimes to clean up the bugs and to scratch around for insect eggs. Four of the plots are in full sun, two are in partial shade. The soil has been built up in the seven years we've lived here with compost and vegetable matter. The soil is quite good now but still needs annual mulching and fertilising (organic). I have pumpkins, strawberries and herbs growing there now, soon the pumpkins and herbs will be pulled out to make way for the 2005 food crop. I hope to get enough pumpkins to last 6 months.

Out in my greenhouse I have the following potted in seedling trays, they will be planted in the main garden when they're big anough.

Tomatoes - grosse lisse and Roma, sugarloaf cabbage, spinach, zuchinnis, red and white onions, celery, peppers, lettuce, lebanese cucumbers, basil, parsley - italian and curly, swiss chard.

I have these seeds to plant directly into the beds: climbing green beans, dwarf beans, sugar snap peas, carrots, corn and brown onions.

I'll be buying seed potatoes - Nikola (a yellow skinned creamy variety) in the next week or so. When I get the potatoes I'll cut them so each piece has two eyes, then leave then in the dappled shade so they sprout. Then I'll plant them. Potatoes are one of the best crops for a backyard food producer. When you buy store bought potatoes they usually have herbicide residue on them. To facilitate picking, potato growers spray the green tops of the potatoes with herbicide. It kills the green tops off and makes them easy to pick. Almost all growers to that, except the organic growers. When you grow your own potatoes, you just wait for the tops to die down before you pick them. No herbicides, no poison, no problems.

I think I can cut $30 per week from my food bill by producing most of my own vegetables. If I can do that for 45 weeks of this year, I'll save $1350. I estimate that I'll spend around $35 on seed and seed potatoes leaving me $1315 better off.

How serious are you about saving money in your own backyard? Do you want to be eating delicious organic produce this year? If so, add to this thread and tell me your plans.

**Mamawolf** · 03-08-2005, 10:04 PM

I only have room for a very small plot, and have clay soil. I grew cherry tomatoes and sugar snap peas with great luck, but not much else, my carrots did not fully develop at all. Any ideas on what else I can plant in my soil? I live in Ky and it was snowing here today, so I won't be able to start for a few weeks.

**kestrel91316** · 03-08-2005, 10:30 PM

I have 7 raised beds in the back yard, but the weather here won't cooperate anymore. Too cold to grow anything from Nov to Mar, and too rainy anyway (except when it's too hot a winter). Too blasted hot (over 100) too much of the time from Apr thru Oct (July/Aug/Sep can get over 110). I have become very frustrated...........Heavy clay soil is also not helpful in spite of YEARS of amending. I would love to grow most my veggies but I am afraid it's just not possible here.

**forestdale** · 03-08-2005, 10:53 PM

brinda, your most important focus should be on adding organic matter to that clay soil. You might be surprised to know that clay soil is full of nutrients, it's just that they are so tightly packed in and sticky, they can't be used easily by your plants. What you need to do it to add organic matter to loosen and aerate the soil. The nutrients are already there, you just have to be able to access them.

If it were my garden, I'd build the soil up so that each year you'll be able to grow more things. When I first came here we had heavy clay soil, I worked out my garden space and then the local council came, parked their machinery in my backyard and proceeded to install a sewerage system in our tiny town. Ours as the first house, so we got the machinery and most of the pumps installed deep under our yard. It was bedlam as it compacted the soil too. But it made me even more determined to grow vegetables.

The first year I added as much manure as I could get and dumped it with lawn clippings and the small amount of compost I'd made into the garden. That year I grew tomatoes, lettuces, cucumbers and herbs. I mulched everything and let the straw mulch rot down over summer. Before I planted the following year I added some sand, more manure and more organic mulch. I made compost during the year and used that as a mulch. Any piece of bare ground was not safe. I covered everything with grass clippings, shredded paper, anything I could lay my hands on. Each year I added something new and now I have fine soil.

Carrots must have perfect drainage. They send their root down and if they can't get past the clay soil, they give up. Don't try carrots for a few years. But you should easily be able to grow any of the leafy green vegetables - lettuces, cabbage etc plus tomatoes, pumpkins or squash, herbs and even potatoes in a container. If you're interested in container potatoes let me know and I'll write it for you.

So, specific instructions are: remove all weeds and stones from your vegie patch. Buy or trade some cow or stable horse manure, save your grass clippings, shred some newspaper (not the coloured bits) and dump them all on your vegie patch. Dig it all in and leave it for a couple of weeks. You can do that now while it's still cold but it won't decompose properly until it warms up a bit. Start a small compost bin or heap and over the coming months add the compost to the soil around the base of the plants. Compost instructions are in the sticky on beginners gardening.

All the vegetables I've listed don't have really deep roots and you should be okay growing them if you add all that to your soil and dig it in thoroughly. The manure is the most important thing, followed by the shredded paper and compost. You're trying to break up the soil, so really mix it up well. I know it sounds like a lot of work but if you do it you'll be on your way to a fabulous garden that will produce vegetables and save you money.

Please let me know if you need more information.

**forestdale** · 03-08-2005, 10:59 PM

awww gayle, don't give up.

Have you tried growing vegetables in containers? You'd be able to move them to the best spot and you'd have perfect drainage.

I never grow anything here except for pumpkins, strawberries and herbs over summer. It's way too hot and humid. Every bug on the plantet comes to my place for a feed. But from now until november I have free reign, I could grow all year round if I was persistent and wanted to grow in containers. I might do that in coming years if I really get the self-sufficiency bug.

I hope you get some tips for your clay soil in the post to brinda.

**mom2matty** · 03-08-2005, 11:20 PM

I am excited for gardening season this year, last year we didn't get a garden in and boy did I miss it!!

I live in So. Cal so I don't have a really big backyard but I have convinced dh to let me have several different raised bed areas in the yard (3 different ones so far) and I am going to use the big planter around the back of my house for herbs......plus grow them in my greenhouse window inside.

This year we are going totally organic, I have the seeds and will continue to look for more. Dh is setting up my compost bin and I am anxious to get that going!

I hope and pray we have a huge sucess with the garden and I will be learning to can this year so I can save as much of the garden as possible!!

**forestdale** · 03-09-2005, 12:38 AM

Welcome blanche, we'll be with you every step of the way.

You sound like you're quite organised. I'd love you to share with us your list of vegetable that you're growing. Let me know if you need any information to help you along with your project.

I think that we are doing a great thing for our families with gardening. Not only are we providing the freshest, organic vegetables and saving money doing it but we're getting exercise and providing an excellent example for our kids.

Gardeners, if you can post photos of your gardens as you proceed through your growing season.

**QuilterMom** · 03-09-2005, 07:50 AM

I'm very serious about our garden producing to cut down on our grocery bill!

I currently have growing lettuce - buttercrunch and black seeded simpson, carrots, parsley, broccoli, sugar snap peas, coriander, burbank tomatoes, basil, and zucchini. We also have a lemon tree and orange tree with fruit growing currently. Still to do - roma tomatoes, green beans, squash, zucchini, okra, sunflowers, and I can't think of what other seeds I bought!

We have 9 raised beds that are 4x10 each. 4 of them flooded last year from the last hurricane (so much rain and the land behind us is wetland/marshy so the water had nowhere to go and accumulated in those particular beds) and 3 will be relocated to a different spot. I've been working on prepping those spots and creating a separate area just for herbs.

This is all new for me so I'm still very much in the "try it and see what happens" stage.

**Mamawolf** · 03-09-2005, 07:53 AM

I would like to do some container gardening as well. I tried to do some tomatoes in it last year when I had knee surgery but they did NOT turn out well. I even added the fertilizer like I was supposed to. *sigh* I will see what I can do for a garden plot this year, dh built a shed on my plot last year.

**daddys3chicks** · 03-09-2005, 08:37 AM

Brinda - where are you in KY? I am from Louisville and my family is from Wayne County.

**daddys3chicks** · 03-09-2005, 08:40 AM

I only have a small plot because our back yard opens to the common area in out neighborhood and I don't like to put our plot to far from the house. I am getting ready to order seeds and starter from Burpee and get the girls involved in starting them. I want to do tomatoes, beans, squash, peas, carrots, peppers, maybe melon.

I want to do flowers too. I just ordered some lilac and rose of sharon bushes from the free for shipping plant site. I am going to put those down the side of the house. I want to do some hardy hibiscus and peony bushes too. Maybe I can get my little flower garden plot finished this year. I am trying to convince DH to use his table saw and make me a nice swing for that area. I jsut wish we had a fence around out back yard.

**Mamawolf** · 03-09-2005, 09:46 AM

Originally posted by daddys3chicks
Brinda - where are you in KY? I am from Louisville and my family is from Wayne County.

I'm pretty close to you. I live in Campbellsburg, Henry County. Used to live in Douglass Hills.

**daddys3chicks** · 03-09-2005, 09:50 AM

Douglass Hills is a lovely place. I live in NC now and I miss KY!!!!

**daddys3chicks** · 03-09-2005, 09:51 AM

Okay - I just ordered my seeds and starter sets! I am excited! I also ordered some peony bushes, a gardenia for inside and a climbing rose for my chimney.

**DaisyLady** · 03-09-2005, 10:49 AM

We have a very short growing season here...from May to end of September. I can extend that by about two or three weeks each end using cold frames.

This year we are starting our gardens all over from scratch. We have very rocky soil and even though we grow organically and have tried to build up the soil we have come to the conclusion that to get any kind of quantity we need to go with raised beds and start with fresh soil. So we are going to try square foot gardening this year. I am going to probably go with a couple of beds this year and then gradually add a couple each year. Since we also have apple trees on our property we are also going to focus some attention on bringing them back to full production this year.

I plan on growing potatoes this year too, but I am going to grow mine in "containers" I have done this before with good success.

Hard to visualize gardening right now as we are buried under a couple of feet of snow.