It's time to start growing your own
Every day you delay starting your garden is one less day you can enjoy it
Growing your own flowers, vegetables and herbs is not only a pleasure but it makes good economical sense and assures you and your precious family are consuming healthy food high in nutrient and free from nasty chemical residues (unless you prefer to spray the stuff you eat).
If you have access to a small patch of ground that gets a sensible amount of sun and has water available then you can make a garden.
One of my early gardens was in an old bath on a concrete terrace in Wellington. I recall growing great lettuce.
How to make a garden from scratch
- Start by removing all grasses from the area by forking and weeding or using thick layers of biodegradable materials to mulch and smother out existing vegetation.
- Amend the soil if required (it never hurts) with compost, rotted animal manure, a nitrogen fixing cover crop like broad beans or similar
- Position seeds or young plants directly in the prepared soil or start in small pots or trays of dirt and then plant the young seedlings into position when they are 5 - 10cm. Make sure the spacing is suitable for the size of the mature plant.
- Weed and water as required
- Harvest when you can't bear to wait any longer
- Ask other local gardeners about managing soil types in that area, also when are the best times for sowing seed as every location will vary even over a small distance
Whether you can grow all your fruit and vegetables will depend on how much time and space you have and what you try to grow. Some things are easy and take little space, others are more complex or demanding or require a large area.
An hour a day and 10 square meters of good soil well managed should drastically reduce your grocery bill while you enjoy the taste, smell, sight or knowledge of good healthy produce... Not only that, you will become more self reliant and confident, valuable traits in these changing times.
