Leaping Down the Garden Path

It was a synergistic year for me, everything lining up perfectly so that I could get a vegetable garden going. It felt like the universe was begging me to get my hands into the dirt. I was a stay-at-home mom and the youngest of my five kids, the triplets were past the age of putting every found object in their mouths; I was able to take them from the deck to the yard without the worry of needing to watch them like a hawk. We were able to hook up to city sewer and water through our front yard, leaving our backyard free and clear to put a vegetable garden in without worrying about having to rip it up midseason. My husband’s work contract was due to run out and I felt an urgent need to learn how to feed my family directly.

I was planning to put in some raised beds so that the dogs and the kids wouldn’t run through the vegetables. My father-in-law mentioned that raised beds are more accessible for people with poor mobility and I wanted to build so that it would be easy for him to garden if he ever came to live with us. Raised beds are also good so that you don’t need to be constantly bending over and getting a sore back.

As I was planning to put in some raised beds, a couple of people came to visit from Green Calgary’s (then Clean Calgary) Healthy Homes Program. They told me about lasagna gardening and the importance of buying local food because of the degradation of the planet caused by food shipping. I went to the store and bought seeds for my favourite vegetables. My father-in-law came to visit and he and my husband built four large raised beds. My father-in-law also gave me the book Square Foot Gardening so as they built, I planned the layout of my garden. I collected newspaper and leaves from neighbours and layered them with twigs and peat moss and compost with loam mix. It snowed in late May so I waited until June 1st to plant the seeds.

To my amazement, the garden actually worked. Water, soil and sunshine were the simple things it took to get things growing. I was struck that such a small seed could grow into a mature plant. Radishes, lettuce and potato plants popped up quickly. I planted zucchini seedlings and their big elephant ear like leaves quickly covered their bed. Vibrant purple veins sprung up from little balls of beets. My daily routine involved visiting the garden marveling at the speed with which these plants reached for the sunshine. I would stand with the water hose and spray the garden, the sound of water rushing and the warmth of the sun on my back comforted me as deeply as any religious service. The smell of fresh turned dirt felt familiar on a cellular, on a genetic or evolutionary level. With every step into gardening, I felt like I was coming home.

As my garden grew, I realized that other than eating fresh carrots and strawberries from my mother’s garden when I was growing up, oh, and that one time that potato plants grew out of my little compost pile, I had never grown vegetables and had no idea when to harvest. I started doing research as to when to tell when radishes were ripe, when and how to harvest lettuce. I picked the radishes and found to my delight that my kids didn’t like them so I could eat them myself. I did save some for myself and restrained myself to share with my husband. Unfortunately I wasn’t until I started cutting them up that I noticed little worms. I had forgotten about doing bug checks. I hadn’t thought about bugs at all. I needed to look into that and finding natural ways of preventing bugs.

Imagine how elated I was to discover that if you cut lettuce off leaving an inch, the lettuce will produce another head. I thought I would have to replant all summer, but to my delight, my little lettuce plot could produce all summer.

We had fresh salads every single day. I raided my potato plants too early to get new potatoes. I would point out to the kids every time we were eating something from our garden. That summer we only shopped for meat and dairy products. We were making our own bread and growing our own vegetables.

Throughout the summer, I was getting daily email notices from the Canadian Food Inspection Agency about salmonella in spinach, lettuce and pistachios and Listeria in meats and processed food. The food delivery system was failing and we were all vulnerable; our children, sick, and elderly were most at risk for chronic damage to tainted food. I suspected that in the desire to bring costs down, corporations were cutting corners in food safety. I was more determined than ever to learn how to safely grow and handle food to make sure my family was protected.

I thought more and more about local food sources. I started foraging in my yard, finding Nanking cherries and Saskatoon berries. I moved the rhubarb to a better location hoping for big yields in future years. I pruned and fertilized my crabapple tree. I planted more perennial herbs. I looked at sub climates in my yard and looked into planting more fruits and berries; I planned to plant super foods like blueberries near my fir trees. I vowed to no longer buy shrubs or trees unless they were food producing. I started to imagine my whole yard as food producing.

I started thinking about different seeds to get and new that experienced gardeners poured over seed catalogues all winter. I did a search for seed catalogues and found heirloom seeds. Another door into sustainability opened as I saw that certain varieties of plants are important to continue to maintain genetic diversity. I had heard about the Irish potato famine and knew that agribusinesses’ reliance on a select few strains of vegetables and genetically modified foods was not good for the future of food. The trail led to Salt Spring Seeds on Vancouver Island and their Zero Mile Diet kit. The thought of growing my own wheat and grain for my own breads got me thinking of how to even further push my self-reliance.

My next step was to learn how to preserve the harvest that we weren’t using right away. I loved pickled beets so went shopping for canning supplies. My first attempt at finding used canning jars on Kijiji was successful and I got a pantry’s worth of big jars. I was chatting it up about gardening to everyone and then found some friends who canned all the time. They even bought me the quintessential guide to canning filled with facts and recipes. I had read the book Pickled, Potted and Canned: How the Art and Science of Food Preservation Changed the World by Sue Shepard. http://www.amazon.ca/Pickled-Potted-Canned-Science-Preserving/dp/0743255534/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1271101654&sr=8-3The book outlined the sometimes accidental discoveries in food preservation and how the processes worked. I appreciated the scientific discoveries that we took for granted that enabled us to eat in a climate with a short growing season.

My first attempt at canning involved peeling tiny beets and boiling vinegar during a hot summer day with 5 kids home and curious to hang out with me. I was flipping pages in my book while wearing oven mitts, trying desperately not to burn myself, my kids or spill purple juice all over my canning book. I was all for the idea of self-reliance but understood in that sweaty panicked moment that some things are best learned as an apprentice, not just via a book. My half-sister, an experienced gardener and canner, came to visit later that summer and she and I pickled zucchini spears, made strawberry freezer jam, mint jelly, canned Bruschetta and liquor soaked pears. It was an awesome inheritance.

My pantry filled with the fruits of my labour and I felt like I had surpassed what Jane Austin described as an ‘accomplished woman’. That Thanksgiving everything but the wine, turkey and cranberries was either from our garden or homemade; I was truly thankful for the bounty of my garden.

As I noticed my stores dwindling, I thought about how to increase my garden yield. I would analyze what grew well and what my kids liked to eat. I would try to find more recipes for preserving foods that I used year round such as ketchup. My goal was that within 3 years, I wanted all of my vegetables to come from my own yard.

Secretly, I wondered how to enjoy the vibrant culture of the city while being completely self-sufficient by getting fruits, dairy and meat from my yard as well. Enter the backyard chicken…