During WWII, Americans were encouraged
to grow “victory gardens” of fresh food in their yards as a
patriotic effort, and millions did, in back yards and on rooftops.
After the war, the number declined, but in recent years, home-grown
foods are enjoying a resurgence of interest among people who have
never previously grown anything but mold in the refrigerator. (Including me!) For
those whose source of food tends to be a delivery van or a drive up
window, the idea of growing food in the back yard (or window sill)
may seem daunting. It doesn't have to be. In the future I will
offer step by step articles for super easy seed starts to encourage
the beginning gardener, since my successes and failures are still fresh in my mind. But with this article, I hope to inspire
readers with the successes of an erstwhile terrible gardener.
|
Wild raspberries galore all summer! |
I definitely did not grow up gardening
and I gave up every summer in Texas. Here, though, over the past
three years, I have increased my production to 65 animal and herbal
foods this summer. And guess what: most survive my care! Except
for planting and harvesting at the beginning and end of the growing
season, the time expenditure for all that is less than 1.5 hours per
day. So a modest effort by someone else might require only 20 minutes, every other
day.
Since a packet of (hundreds of) seeds
costs about $2, a strawberry plant costs $1, a raspberry cane about
$5, and a fruit tree sapling $10 – 50, depending on age/size/type
(all these fruits are perennial – they last many years), the cost
and quality of home grown fruit and vegetables is much more
attractive than at a store. The cost of producing eggs and meat is
higher than at a big box store, but we can justify that for a number
of reasons I won't belabor here. My hope is that if I, a relative
newbie, can grow so much food, perhaps this article will inspire you
to start or expand your food raising efforts. (For more information
about raising chickens, ducks, rabbits, and honeybees, see other articles on
this blog).
Each section below lists the foods we
raise/make, some notes about successes and failures, and comment about what foods in
this category we still need to buy because we cannot raise/make them
ourselves. I hope you will feel encouraged to grow something you
can put in your next pizza or scrambled eggs.
Sweets: We tap birch trees for
sap in April/May (used in cooking and making beer) and harvest honey
in August/September (four hives).
Notes: Birch sap is less than
2% sugar, so it is a subtle replacement for water in oatmeal, coffee,
and beer. It is also chock full of vitamins, including calcium. We
collected 15 gallons last year from four trees in three days. Maple
syrup is MUCH more efficient than birch syrup. But since maples don't grow this far north, we are preparing to
collect 100 gallons from 14 trees over ten days in order to process a
single gallon of delectable birch syrup! We will also collect
additional gallons of sap for cooking and drinking. The sap needs to
be chilled, but the honey is shelf stable, forever.
|
Honey about to be extracted from the comb |
Our bees in Alaska do not overwinter so
we have to buy new queens and “starter colonies” each spring.
The first year, the bees spent more time building comb than making
honey, so we netted only two gallons from a hive. The second year
(with the existing comb), our honey harvest doubled. We do buy sugar
for baking, but with next year's sweet harvests, I will endeavor to
tweak recipes to use the sap and honey instead. I have learned that I can use honey instead of pharmaceutical products to cover a cut.
Shopping: We buy flavorings that do
not grow in a cold climate, like chocolate, vanilla, and coffee.