Growing season approaches... slowly.....

It is January.  The ground is frozen solid.  We have to trick our chickens into laying eggs by setting up a light on a timer to bring "dawn" to them early in the morning.  I leave for work before dawn, and by the time I come home I have maybe an hour or two of fading sunlight.  It's a horrible time of year.

To get through, I am spending lots of time planning (and daydreaming) about my garden.  We have a plot in full sun, already fenced in and currently being fertilized by our chickens.  When the ground thaws enough to drive stakes into it, I'll build a new chicken run and begin working the soil to turn the current one into our new garden.  I cannot WAIT.  It's about 20x4ft with a high chainlink fence along two sides (perfect for climbers)... it's going to be awesome.

We are choosing to buy our seeds this year from the Seed Savers Exchange http://www.seedsavers.org/ .  While browsing through seed catalogs, I had a hell of a time trying to find heirloom varieties... and it seems silly to harvest all of this wonderful food and not be able to save the seeds and plant again the following season.  So, we're going to try some unfamiliar varieties and hope for the very best.

So far, our crop list looks like this:

Tomato, Nebraska Wedding


Tomato, Black Sea Man

Pepper, Napoleon Sweet
Pepper, Sweet Chocolate 

Soybean, Fiskeby

Squash, Black Beauty Zucchini

Potato, All Blue

Potato, French Fingerling

Peas, Thomas Laxton

Green beans, Jade

Carrots, Scarlet Nantes

Carrots, Rainbow Heirloom mix

Swiss Chard, rainbow

Various greens, lettuces, spinach

Obviously, we're not going to have room to plant ALL of that.  But we'll thin the list as we go, plant some stuff in containers... the seeds we don't use, we'll store. 

We've also joined the Lancaster Farm Fresh CSA through http://www.farmtocity.org/.  As far as I can tell, CSAs are the most responsible and economical way to get fresh, organic, local produce (aside from growing it yourself!).  CSAs provide small farmers with cash flow at the start of the season (when they need it most).  They minimize the amount of fossil fuels required to bring food to your table.  And it gives you a very real sense of connection to the land, and the people, who supply you with your food. 

On top of all of THAT, we're splitting a full vegetable share and a fruit share with our neighbors... and this builds community.  Together, the four of us will share not only the cost and the bounty.  There are other more subtle advantages as well.  The way the CSA works is that the farms pack up a selection of fresh items for us on a weekly basis.  It varies depending on what is in season and available, which helps you develop a connection with the seasons in terms of plant cycles. 

With this particular CSA you don't have the option of picking and choosing what items you get.  I personally like this idea, because it will foster creativity and diversity in our diets... and splitting the share with our neighbors removes many of the problems that might arise with this kind of system.  If we get a vegetable that one of us dislikes, like a bunch of artichokes (which I LOATHE), our neighbors will be able to use them and they won't go to waste.  If we get a vegetable with which one of us is unfamiliar (mikuza?  say what?), one of us is likely to know a way to prepare it... and if not, we can have fun experimenting and learning together. 

The farmer's market on the way home from work carries Merrymead milk, we have our eggs covered (AND I buy their feed from said farmer's market)... we buy our honey in bulk from Lancaster, and make our wine from it... the last piece of the locavore puzzle is going to be local organic grain, and I believe I've found a small Lancaster mill that will sell me wheat flours in bulk. 

If we plan well and stick to our guns (with a few exceptions for avocados, hemp and chia seeds), we should be able to feed ourselves on food grown within 70 miles of our house.

If we get the dehydrator up and running on a regular basis, borrow some room in our neighbor's chest freezer, and can fruits and tomatoes like crazy... we might be able to do this through next winter. 

It's an exciting concept.  My lifestyle right now doesn't allow for a true hobby farm, or for the massive garden of my dreams.  But we are blessed to live on a very fertile area of the world... and an hour's drive from an entire community of farmers committed to sustainable food production.  This makes a goal like ours really possible, even while working fulltime and doing things OTHER than gardening occasionally :)