“The cure for anything is salt water: sweat, tears or the sea.” — Karen Blixen It’s hard not to get discouraged and frustrated. Quite frankly, I don’t even know where to begin. Understandably social media is a moist sinkhole of horror, although its murmurs have begun seeping through into mainstream media where some knowledge is becoming common knowledge, finally. Whether its purpose is to nudge the hypnotized masses and normalize escalating levels of absurdity, honestly I’ll never really know, but some change is afoot.
You would be surprised at the influence you and our movement are having. I live in the hot plains of North Texas but am improving our small farm day by day in a fashion very similar to yours. Some people seem envious of our little place and wish they too could escape the big city but most are oblivious to the changing world and think we have lost our minds. I don't think too much about their reaction anymore.
Yeah there's not much value is worrying about the naysayers. Even in the farming cities around here there seems to be a lot of complacency, despite everything that's happened in the last four years. I like the boonies because everyone, while a little eccentric, mostly agrees on the same things and are well prepared for bad weather and "issues."
Have you seen Charles Dowding on YouTube? He's famous for no dig gardening and soil improvements, but you may find a good intro to companion planting on his channel.
Charles Dowding is my favourite gardener on Youtube, and I wish I had the same climate and access to that volume of compost. I'm stuck with a till and "Back to Eden" approach because we have a lot wood chips on the property, and it'll take time to make my own compost with chicken and green manure. But yes, I absolutely love watching him. I can sit down for 30 minutes and listen to him go on and on about beans and lettuce.
That's great. Aye, he's ace. It's a lot of work. But the first time I made my own compost, it was like a miracle. I couldn't believe how happy it made me feel! I wouldn't have even tried if it weren't for Charles and his amazingly hypnotic channel. 😁
I was able to do it no problem on a small scale in my last garden. And his seed starting and transplant methods are magical, nothing else works quite the same. I'm just trying to figure out how to scale it up with the resources we have now. I might end up doing a few highly composted / well managed beds like what he does and let the others go more wild, at least until I can get a decent large scale composing system working. Also once we get our greenhouse together I can take better care of the seedlings like he does.
Very enjoyable read. I live in the north east of England. Our clime is very temperate (although strong winds do shake the darling buds, not only in May, but June, too. I have a large-ish garden, not that much bothered by insects, not even slugs or snails, as a great many blackbirds live here, along with pigeons, blue-tits, finches, robins and wrens. (Many rooks (crows?) visit my ornamental pond for water, also wild ducks in March and April, if the village pond has a surplus of young adults. I grow potatoes and sprouts in raised beds, zucchini (we call them courgettes), strawberries and broad beans. I have plum, apple, peach and pear trees and a greenhouse that leans against the original 1763 garden wall and so I grow tomatoes and cucumbers, too. The weather in England has been very cold and wet this year, so far, and although the roses love the rain, many of the seeds I planted in the greenhouse, especially the cauliflower seeds, failed to germinate, although last year the crop was good. No basil, no spring onions…do all gardeners blames themselves or do most blame the weather? I am a novice gardener, a dilettante, truth be told, and I love flowers (the foxgloves are doing splendidly). On the whole, fruit and vegetables are cheap here in England but of course, our criminal government (an even worse one almost certainly coming after the U.K. general election next month) cannot be trusted to do right by the taxpayer.
My house (built around 1763 by a seafaring contemporary of Captain James Cook) is lovely, and the garden lovelier. The village is an odd mix of very poor housing and £1 million plus Georgian mansions, with lots of independent shops, cafes and restaurants. The only trouble is…our local council, my neighbours and some of the shopkeepers went all out for the utterly evil nonsense that was ‘Covid’. And so, I have a lot, a very great deal, in fact, of hatred for all those around me who wore masks, who tacked silly ‘don’t kill granny’ posters in their windows, who believed (and still do, I’m sure) that the government ‘should have done more’. My garden, truly, is beautiful, I would hate to leave it as my plants are almost like pets, but oh my goodness, the morons surrounding me! The contempt I have for the is like a worm in my soul.
Thank you for your writing - many writers I follow here on substack remind me that I’m not alone. My idiot, mask-wearing, nhs cheering neighbour has a Vote Labour poster in her window. I imagine putting a brick through it every time I walk past. I pray to god for patience.
Thank you for sharing so much about your garden. Your description reminds me of Charles Dowding and I'm a huge fan of his. Have you had a chance to watch him on Youtube? I'd love to grow the same way he does but my climate is very "specific," at least for the time being until I learn the ins and outs of the seasons.
I must say I do a lot of praying for patience, temperance and concord these days. Agitprop definitely has a way of getting underneath your skin, quite literally for some people.
From Carol Deppe's books I've come around to think in terms of growing:
* greens (easy, little space)
* fruits (pretty easy, a little more space, right varieties and few pests)
* carbs (more space, difficulty varies--potatoes and squash mostly easy)
* protein (most demanding)
I've shifted to focusing on the hard stuff and the easy stuff takes care of itself without too much effort. It looks like, from your plants list, you will overproduce fruit by a good margin. It is not that hard to grow enough fruit (freeze whole fruit on cookie sheets, then bag).
Note 2: I also have a 5th category: growing fuel; and a 6th: miscellaneous category for supporting pollinators, improving soil, and growing poles (e.g. bean poles)
I want to grow beans but the problem are the damn deer (there's a lot). I know they'll chew on them because either them or the ground rats have been eating my kale. We're putting up fencing but it won't be done for awhile, hence the heavy focus on simple crops. I want to overproduce first and see what the yields are like relative to the critters and climate, and then do my fancier plants that need babying. It'll take a few years before I get there though...
Hahaha. Stay strong my friend. When you start getting first fruits, people change. I have some of the same issue around my place - I’m investing in a walk in that I’ll rent out space for for hanging meat. Another person is doing a cold smoker. These things take time.
You would be surprised at the influence you and our movement are having. I live in the hot plains of North Texas but am improving our small farm day by day in a fashion very similar to yours. Some people seem envious of our little place and wish they too could escape the big city but most are oblivious to the changing world and think we have lost our minds. I don't think too much about their reaction anymore.
Yeah there's not much value is worrying about the naysayers. Even in the farming cities around here there seems to be a lot of complacency, despite everything that's happened in the last four years. I like the boonies because everyone, while a little eccentric, mostly agrees on the same things and are well prepared for bad weather and "issues."
Very nice, Theodore. I probably skipped some of the vegetarian parts.
Have you seen Charles Dowding on YouTube? He's famous for no dig gardening and soil improvements, but you may find a good intro to companion planting on his channel.
Charles Dowding is my favourite gardener on Youtube, and I wish I had the same climate and access to that volume of compost. I'm stuck with a till and "Back to Eden" approach because we have a lot wood chips on the property, and it'll take time to make my own compost with chicken and green manure. But yes, I absolutely love watching him. I can sit down for 30 minutes and listen to him go on and on about beans and lettuce.
That's great. Aye, he's ace. It's a lot of work. But the first time I made my own compost, it was like a miracle. I couldn't believe how happy it made me feel! I wouldn't have even tried if it weren't for Charles and his amazingly hypnotic channel. 😁
I was able to do it no problem on a small scale in my last garden. And his seed starting and transplant methods are magical, nothing else works quite the same. I'm just trying to figure out how to scale it up with the resources we have now. I might end up doing a few highly composted / well managed beds like what he does and let the others go more wild, at least until I can get a decent large scale composing system working. Also once we get our greenhouse together I can take better care of the seedlings like he does.
It's an addictive hobby.
Very enjoyable read. I live in the north east of England. Our clime is very temperate (although strong winds do shake the darling buds, not only in May, but June, too. I have a large-ish garden, not that much bothered by insects, not even slugs or snails, as a great many blackbirds live here, along with pigeons, blue-tits, finches, robins and wrens. (Many rooks (crows?) visit my ornamental pond for water, also wild ducks in March and April, if the village pond has a surplus of young adults. I grow potatoes and sprouts in raised beds, zucchini (we call them courgettes), strawberries and broad beans. I have plum, apple, peach and pear trees and a greenhouse that leans against the original 1763 garden wall and so I grow tomatoes and cucumbers, too. The weather in England has been very cold and wet this year, so far, and although the roses love the rain, many of the seeds I planted in the greenhouse, especially the cauliflower seeds, failed to germinate, although last year the crop was good. No basil, no spring onions…do all gardeners blames themselves or do most blame the weather? I am a novice gardener, a dilettante, truth be told, and I love flowers (the foxgloves are doing splendidly). On the whole, fruit and vegetables are cheap here in England but of course, our criminal government (an even worse one almost certainly coming after the U.K. general election next month) cannot be trusted to do right by the taxpayer.
My house (built around 1763 by a seafaring contemporary of Captain James Cook) is lovely, and the garden lovelier. The village is an odd mix of very poor housing and £1 million plus Georgian mansions, with lots of independent shops, cafes and restaurants. The only trouble is…our local council, my neighbours and some of the shopkeepers went all out for the utterly evil nonsense that was ‘Covid’. And so, I have a lot, a very great deal, in fact, of hatred for all those around me who wore masks, who tacked silly ‘don’t kill granny’ posters in their windows, who believed (and still do, I’m sure) that the government ‘should have done more’. My garden, truly, is beautiful, I would hate to leave it as my plants are almost like pets, but oh my goodness, the morons surrounding me! The contempt I have for the is like a worm in my soul.
Thank you for your writing - many writers I follow here on substack remind me that I’m not alone. My idiot, mask-wearing, nhs cheering neighbour has a Vote Labour poster in her window. I imagine putting a brick through it every time I walk past. I pray to god for patience.
Thank you for sharing so much about your garden. Your description reminds me of Charles Dowding and I'm a huge fan of his. Have you had a chance to watch him on Youtube? I'd love to grow the same way he does but my climate is very "specific," at least for the time being until I learn the ins and outs of the seasons.
I must say I do a lot of praying for patience, temperance and concord these days. Agitprop definitely has a way of getting underneath your skin, quite literally for some people.
Whoa, a Blixen quote opener! I love it. Many, many moons ago I started one of my poems with a great line from her too!
https://poempathy.wordpress.com/2022/08/12/sonnet-concerning-love/
I dare say you are the only other person I've ever seen reference her since.
I don't discriminate against quotes. People yes, I'll discriminate against people, but not good quotes.
From Carol Deppe's books I've come around to think in terms of growing:
* greens (easy, little space)
* fruits (pretty easy, a little more space, right varieties and few pests)
* carbs (more space, difficulty varies--potatoes and squash mostly easy)
* protein (most demanding)
I've shifted to focusing on the hard stuff and the easy stuff takes care of itself without too much effort. It looks like, from your plants list, you will overproduce fruit by a good margin. It is not that hard to grow enough fruit (freeze whole fruit on cookie sheets, then bag).
Good luck!
Note 1: In terms of protein, pole beans are easy.
Note 2: I also have a 5th category: growing fuel; and a 6th: miscellaneous category for supporting pollinators, improving soil, and growing poles (e.g. bean poles)
I want to grow beans but the problem are the damn deer (there's a lot). I know they'll chew on them because either them or the ground rats have been eating my kale. We're putting up fencing but it won't be done for awhile, hence the heavy focus on simple crops. I want to overproduce first and see what the yields are like relative to the critters and climate, and then do my fancier plants that need babying. It'll take a few years before I get there though...
Happy planting!
Awesome. Way to be the change you want to see.
No one's gonna change but me, apparently.
Hahaha. Stay strong my friend. When you start getting first fruits, people change. I have some of the same issue around my place - I’m investing in a walk in that I’ll rent out space for for hanging meat. Another person is doing a cold smoker. These things take time.
Great read, love the food self sufficiency
I'm really hopeful for the squash tbh. I love making zucchini stir fry and pumpkin pies, plus I'll be able to say I'm rich in potatoes.