Vegetable garden

Terry Davis said:

I just purchased a home in the country and I am thinking of starting a
small garden to grow my own veggies. I have a wife and a daughter so
the garden will feed 3 people. Is this idea economically feasible or
would I be better off just buying my veggies at the market?

How many in this group grow your own veggies for cooking?

Terry

you won't save any money, but home grown veggies are generally worth the
effort. (particularly with tomatoes and other fruit bearing vines)

--

saerah

aware of the manifold possibilities of the future

"I think there's a clause in the Shaman's and Jujumen's Local #57 Union
contract that they have to have reciprocity for each other's shop rules."
-König Prüß

Terry Davis said:

I just purchased a home in the country and I am thinking of starting a
small garden to grow my own veggies. I have a wife and a daughter so
the garden will feed 3 people. Is this idea economically feasible or
would I be better off just buying my veggies at the market?

How many in this group grow your own veggies for cooking?

Terry

I'll say that you can...but you probably won't. It pretty much depends
on how much effort you're willing to put into it, what sort of things
you grow, and where you live. My "original" garden plot has saved me a
bundle, but the only outlay I had was $60 worth of mushroom compost when
I first dug it, and seed money...it's never seen any "store-bought"
fertilizer or pests treatment. But....I have a compost pile, a leaf
mold pile, and a burn pit for ash, and readily available manure. I also
tend to raise those items which costs the most....and....I live in an
area where I get 3 growing seasons a year.
On the other hand....last year I bought 600 concrete blocks to build
raised beds in which I'm playing with square-foot gardening. There's no
way that I'm going to save money there.
What you will get, is a superior product and probably a great sense of
satisfaction!
In a nutshell: if you spend $500 on a tiller to plant radishes....you're
not saving money....but you will have some damn tasty radishes!

Bubba

--
You wanna measure, or you wanna cook?

"Terry Davis" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

I just purchased a home in the country and I am thinking of starting a
small garden to grow my own veggies. I have a wife and a daughter so
the garden will feed 3 people. Is this idea economically feasible or
would I be better off just buying my veggies at the market?

How many in this group grow your own veggies for cooking?

Terry

You will gain a great deal in the quality and freshness of your veges, and
thus flavour and nutrition. You might also gain in variety depending on
your local suppliers, your skill and climate. You may save money but only
if you don't count your labour at a very high rate and you can get manure,
mulchable organics, etc cheaply or free. OTOH if you all work the garden
instead of paying for the gym your veges might be free. Your gain in
satisfaction will probably be huge.

Where you will lose is in not having varieties out of season, exotics that
you just cannot grow and in gluts at certain times of the year. With
attention to the cultivars that you grow and successive plantings these
problems can be reduced to some extent.

Yes I grow my own.

David

"Terry Davis" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

I just purchased a home in the country and I am thinking of starting a
small garden to grow my own veggies. I have a wife and a daughter so
the garden will feed 3 people. Is this idea economically feasible or
would I be better off just buying my veggies at the market?

How many in this group grow your own veggies for cooking?

We do, but not all of them - just some/what we can. Save money? *Maybe*, as
others have said (the more you want to save, the more effort you will have
to put in, and it's pretty much an exponential thing up to a point), but
what you will do is have a great time, much better than store bought produce
(if you get it right!), and if you're like me, you'll cry when a whole bunch
of your seedlings suddenly up and die for some reason and there's no time to
plant more for the season, heheheheheh!

I plant a seed etc. - soon as it has sprouted, it's one of my babies - you
won't believe how much they can drag you right in, how much love, care and
attention they inspire you to give them. I love to go round to our plot,
tend to things, then just sit back and chill with a cold one, take in the
vibe of it all - excellent. 'Life', heheheh...

Cheers!

',;~}~

Shaun aRe

Good morning Terry. I pretty much agree with the rest of the posters on
saving money, but the object lessons for your daughter (if she is pretty
young) will be invaluable. Most kids love to plant and watch things grow.

Watch your property for a couple of says and find out where your property
stays sunny all day, where you get 6 to 8 hours of sun, and where you get 4
or less of sun. Then decide what you love to eat that is expensive to buy.

You don't say where you live, so lets assume strawberries, garlic,
artichokes, grapes, raspberries, blackberries, asparagus, and fruit trees
will grow there, and live through the winter. Locate these in full sun (6
to 8 hours a day). If these are what you like to eat, plan on making a
permanent bed for them. Have a pH test run on different areas of your
property. Most gardens require a soil pH of between 5.5 and 7. Blueberries
like 5 or maybe even a little less.

I had a 7 acres in Arkansas once, and found that 17 blackberry plants would
produce more than 15 gallons per year. Forty ever-bearing strawberries fed
two of us all we wanted, and the slugs got the rest. I had an 80 ft long
asparagus bed and had to pick it every other day. We had all we wanted to
eat, and I put it in the freezer. The blueberries, grapes, and fruit trees
were just getting old enough to start producing really well, when we decided
to move.

Get a pressure and a hot water bath canner and jars, a freezer and a space
saver machine that sucks the air out of the bags before you freeze it, and
if you like dried fruit, and dehydrator. Learn how to use them correctly.
People on rec.food.preserving can help you with that. Then you can store
the extra that you grow, or you can give it away or even sell it.

Learn how to pull weeds. Learn how to hoe weeds. Learn how to remove
weeds. Did I put enough emphasis on weed removal?

Have fun.

Dwayne

"Terry Davis" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

I just purchased a home in the country and I am thinking of starting a
small garden to grow my own veggies. I have a wife and a daughter so
the garden will feed 3 people. Is this idea economically feasible or
would I be better off just buying my veggies at the market?

How many in this group grow your own veggies for cooking?

Terry

Shaun aRe said:

....... and if you're like me, you'll cry when a whole bunch
of your seedlings suddenly up and die for some reason and there's no time to
plant more for the season, heheheheheh!

Or the birds get to the seedlings, as was the case with us. We have
enclosed our veggie garden with very fine shade-cloth over a framework
- keeps birds out and lets the sun in. 😉

Quoted message said:

I plant a seed etc. - soon as it has sprouted, it's one of my babies - you
won't believe how much they can drag you right in, how much love, care and
attention they inspire you to give them. I love to go round to our plot,
tend to things, then just sit back and chill with a cold one, take in the
vibe of it all - excellent. 'Life', heheheh...

It is so great to have fresh veggies. We had a whole lot of onions and
sweet potatoes (still eating them) and don't forget the chillies!. I
didn't have to buy onions for about 3 months, so it does save you money
sometimes. But as another person pointed out, you still have to buy the
"out of season" veggies. We have had cabbage, carrots, lettuce, and
leeks too. And green beans. I think it's worth it if you have the time
and people-power to tend to them.

Cheers
Cathy
--
I don't suffer from insanity - I enjoy every minute of it

Fresh garden veggies are a whole lot better than those shipped in to
stores.My wife canned 40 qts.of tomatoes last year.As soon as corn is
picked,the sugar starts turning to starch and by the time it arrives at
the outlet,it has lost taste.Few people know this,because not many have
tasted fresh picked corn.Some SE (sugar enhanced) varieties will hold
their sugar for up to a day after picking,but the seed is expensive and
few commercial growers plant it.Good luck in your efforts

"cathyxyz" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

Shaun aRe said:

....... and if you're like me, you'll cry when a whole bunch
of your seedlings suddenly up and die for some reason and there's no

time to

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

plant more for the season, heheheheheh!

Or the birds get to the seedlings, as was the case with us. We have
enclosed our veggie garden with very fine shade-cloth over a framework
- keeps birds out and lets the sun in. 😉

Not with ours usually - we grow them in greenhouses until large enough to be
fairly if not totally safe from birds. We've just erected a 12 x 22 foot
polytunnel as well now, fo things like my chiles, the tomatoes and whatever
else we dream up to put in there ',;~}~

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

I plant a seed etc. - soon as it has sprouted, it's one of my babies -

you

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

won't believe how much they can drag you right in, how much love, care

and

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

attention they inspire you to give them. I love to go round to our plot,
tend to things, then just sit back and chill with a cold one, take in

the

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

vibe of it all - excellent. 'Life', heheheh...

It is so great to have fresh veggies. We had a whole lot of onions and
sweet potatoes (still eating them) and don't forget the chillies!.

Forget chiles? - NEVER! That's what I'm a bit sad about this year - very
poor germination with mine, then over half of the seedlings died. The rest
aren't looking great either - they've not grown at all so you'd notice, in
over 2 weeks. I hope they survive and have a good growth spurt!

A while ago we managed to over-winter 2 chile plants in the house and they
did superbly in their second season (last year) with such a head start, and
produced heavily from very early to very late, but they got too big to bring
into the house, and try though I did, no way to keep them warm enough to
survive in a greenhouse here over winter - we had a parafin greenhouse
heater going non-stop and a calor gas heater too for a while, as an
experiment (expensive one too!), but they died regardless.

For next season I plan on getting a much larger heated propagator and
planting many, many more seeds than I did this year - if we have to many
seedlings to plant out in the polytunnel in the end, we can sell some on
easily enough.

Quoted message said:

I
didn't have to buy onions for about 3 months, so it does save you money
sometimes.

Yup! Innitial layout for tools, greenhouses, manure, all sorts of things
eats into it though, and people often forget about that money when working
out how much they've saved. - Will our polytunnel ever pay for itself?
Maybe, but not by savings alone - we intend to sell some fresh produce
(already have takers for a lot of excess), as well as make finished products
to sell on too - Kath is a multiple first prize winning preserve maker -
she's taken 1st in every event she's entered (bloody show of LOL!) - so
she's been making some already and selling it from a table set out at the
edge of the plot, money into a tin to pay for things like new seeds and
plants etc. I will be making chile sauces too - I make excellent ones by all
accounts. We also plan on making tomato/oinion and herb sauces to sell on.
That's the only way we'll ever have a chance to see the plot pay for
itself - to have fun turning this into a little business.

We grow onions each year too, usually corn as well (like this year),
rhubarb, strawberries (we did have current bushes and raspberries too, but
they became diseased so we dug them out - we'll have more again, in a
different part of the plot we are preparing) squash types of some sort (last
year we grew courgette/marrows though - had heaps of lovely little
courgettes, left some that I tended carefully to grow to marrow size -
biggest one was about 10lb in weight, and totally unblemished! It never made
it into food though in the end, because we had so much, even after making
gallons of marrow wine, ginger marrow jam, giving all takers some - all
sorts, we still had loads left. We have some pumpkin to go in this year,
might do some melon in one of the greenhouses too.

Quoted message said:

But as another person pointed out, you still have to buy the
"out of season" veggies. We have had cabbage, carrots, lettuce, and
leeks too. And green beans. I think it's worth it if you have the time
and people-power to tend to them.

Yup! We both work full time and have busy lives generally, but have help all
the time from Kath's dad - he's retired, and the plot is one of his
pass-times (I just wish he didn't love concrete so much! He's not a
'gardener's gardener', IYKWIM...)

I have to go round tonight to check on things actually - see if my chiles
are doing any better, poor things...

Shaun aRe

"T" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

Fresh garden veggies are a whole lot better than those shipped in to
stores.My wife canned 40 qts.of tomatoes last year.As soon as corn is
picked,the sugar starts turning to starch and by the time it arrives at
the outlet,it has lost taste.Few people know this,because not many have
tasted fresh picked corn.

Heheh, so true! We have a corn BBQ on the plot itself at least once a year
around corn harvest time, just to taste it at its very best - delicious! A
real eye opener for me the first time that was...

Shaun aRe

In article <[email hidden]>,

(Terry Davis) said:

I just purchased a home in the country and I am thinking of starting a
small garden to grow my own veggies. I have a wife and a daughter so
the garden will feed 3 people. Is this idea economically feasible or
would I be better off just buying my veggies at the market?

How many in this group grow your own veggies for cooking?

Terry

I think rec.gardens.edible is a better place for your question - lots of
helpful folks there.
--
-Barb, <http://www.jamlady.eboard.com> 5/8/05.
"Are we going to measure, or are we going to cook?" -Food Critic Mimi Sheraton

[email hidden] (Terry Davis) wrote in news:19214-4293F30A-
[email hidden]:

Quoted message said:

I just purchased a home in the country and I am thinking of starting a
small garden to grow my own veggies. I have a wife and a daughter so
the garden will feed 3 people. Is this idea economically feasible or
would I be better off just buying my veggies at the market?

How many in this group grow your own veggies for cooking?

Terry

This really doesn't count but I grow chiles. I'm doing them in pots this
year. I have herbs in pots too. I also have cilantro and creeping oregano
growing (in ground) as they make terrific ground covers and smell terrific.
I am very sun challenged here. While 3 have been taken down, I still have
a bunch of huge pin oaks so sun is not something I have an abundance of. I
may put a small greenhouse on the west side of the house and try to grow
some tomato plants. I do get sun on that side of the house. <shrug> I
could always till up the entire front lawn. The front part of the house
gets full sun most of the day.

Michael

sarah bennett <[email hidden]> wrote in
news:[email hidden]:

Quoted message said:

Terry Davis said:

I just purchased a home in the country and I am thinking of starting a
small garden to grow my own veggies. I have a wife and a daughter so
the garden will feed 3 people. Is this idea economically feasible or
would I be better off just buying my veggies at the market?

How many in this group grow your own veggies for cooking?

Terry

you won't save any money, but home grown veggies are generally worth the
effort. (particularly with tomatoes and other fruit bearing vines)

I'll agree with the tomatoes. My neighbor lets me pick and eat his
tomatoes when ripe. They are better than anything I've gotten at the
supermarket and better than most farmer's markets.

Michael

"Dog3" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

This really doesn't count but I grow chiles. I'm doing them in pots this
year.

Great stuff! What varieties have you got in this season? Do you grow from
seed each year, or do you try to overwinter any? Hope they do well for you
',;~}~

This year I've not done well so far, but if they all survive I have 1, 2 or
so each Jamaica Red Hot, Fatali, Orange Habanero, Chocolate Habanero, Yellow
Scotch Bonnet, (all chinense) one seedling has just sprouted of my Hot Lemon
(IIRC) and that is all.

I have put some Bolivian Rainbow seeds in late to *try* and make up for the
losses, but no sign of any shoots yet. Also got some seeds from pods we
bought that aren't sprouting yet - just some grown in Zimbabwe - 'red' ones,
as well as some from Scotch Bonnets.

Also have a Chiltepin plant that Katra sent me from Texas last year - it
survived winter since they are a hardier plant, but it still took a hard
knock and is taking its time coming back...

Guess next year will have to be my first major chile grow season when we are
better organised - I plan on planting as many chinense/chinensis varieties
as I can next year, including one that chileseeds.co.uk has that's been bred
by a university horticulture department to have lots of that tropical,
fruity habanero type flavour but almost no heat at all - figure that one
will go down REALLY well with the hard-core mild-heads ',;~}~

Quoted message said:

I have herbs in pots too. I also have cilantro and creeping oregano
growing (in ground) as they make terrific ground covers and smell

terrific.

Herb gardens are great aren't they? I love the smell too. We've just planted
a small one up at our plot, and Kath is busy designing and building a big
raised bed for more, too.

Quoted message said:

I am very sun challenged here.

Where is that then Michael?

Quoted message said:

While 3 have been taken down, I still have
a bunch of huge pin oaks so sun is not something I have an abundance of.

I

Quoted message said:

may put a small greenhouse on the west side of the house and try to grow
some tomato plants. I do get sun on that side of the house. <shrug> I
could always till up the entire front lawn. The front part of the house
gets full sun most of the day.

Yes - we lack a bit of sun on our plot, since they built tall properties
nearly all along the southern edge of it, and now with the big polytunnel,
we have one greenhouse that is quite shaded most of the time - guess we will
have to use it to suit.

Till up the *front lawn*? Isn't there someone at your house that would
seriously object to such a move then?

Cheers!

Shaun aRe

"Terry Davis" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

I just purchased a home in the country and I am thinking of starting a
small garden to grow my own veggies. I have a wife and a daughter so
the garden will feed 3 people. Is this idea economically feasible or
would I be better off just buying my veggies at the market?

<Snip>

I grow herbs not veggies.

IMHO

In determining the economy of growing your own veggies you must factor in the
cost of your labor at the going rate for a garden attendant. What if you had to
outsource that labor? Or factor in the cost of your rate of pay. If you spend
several hours a week in the garden you would probably be way ahead of the game
taking a part time job at Starbucks and buying your vegetables.

Do it because you LIKE to garden. Do it because of the better flavor of home
grown vs commercial grown. If you think of it as labor - do not start its hard
work and requires attention constantly to be successful.

Dimitri

cathyxyz said:

Shaun aRe said:

....... and if you're like me, you'll cry when a whole bunch
of your seedlings suddenly up and die for some reason and there's no time to
plant more for the season, heheheheheh!

Or the birds get to the seedlings, as was the case with us. We have
enclosed our veggie garden with very fine shade-cloth over a framework
- keeps birds out and lets the sun in. 😉

That's too much like work and wasted dollars... put up a few decoy owls
and whirligigs... they look really k-ewl and they keep the mauraders
well at bay. Cabelas.com has the best deal on owls and there are many
websites selling very nicely made whiligigs at good prices, or there
may be local craftsmen selling them close to where you live. Birds are
deathly afraid of owls and the sudden noise and motion of whiligigs
keeps birds and small animals far away. For deer there's no getting
around it, you'll need a fence. Unless I had a very small garden or
wanted to protect a few individual plants but covering an entire garden
with netting is something I wouldn't consider.

Sheldon

"Sheldon" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

cathyxyz said:

Shaun aRe said:

....... and if you're like me, you'll cry when a whole bunch
of your seedlings suddenly up and die for some reason and there's no
time to
plant more for the season, heheheheheh!

Or the birds get to the seedlings, as was the case with us. We have
enclosed our veggie garden with very fine shade-cloth over a framework
- keeps birds out and lets the sun in. 😉

That's too much like work and wasted dollars... put up a few decoy owls
and whirligigs... they look really k-ewl and they keep the mauraders
well at bay. Cabelas.com has the best deal on owls and there are many
websites selling very nicely made whiligigs at good prices, or there
may be local craftsmen selling them close to where you live. Birds are
deathly afraid of owls and the sudden noise and motion of whiligigs
keeps birds and small animals far away. For deer there's no getting
around it, you'll need a fence. Unless I had a very small garden or
wanted to protect a few individual plants but covering an entire garden
with netting is something I wouldn't consider.

Sheldon

<snip>For deer there's no getting
around it, you'll need a fence. <snip>

6' high - minimum
Speaking from experience.
Dee

Terry Davis said:

I just purchased a home in the country and I am thinking of starting a
small garden to grow my own veggies. I have a wife and a daughter so
the garden will feed 3 people. Is this idea economically feasible or
would I be better off just buying my veggies at the market?

How many in this group grow your own veggies for cooking?

Terry

Good for you, Terry. I don't think one *saves* a lot of money, but picking
my own lettuce an hour before I eat it means alot. The nice thing about
gardening is that you can pick and choose crops you like best. I grow
mostly herbs (& tomatoes!), my lettuce in window boxes I can move to the
shade, and desert hardy plants. I would definitely spend some time
planning. Plan various types with the eat fresh (oh, the sugar snap peas!)
or preserving method in mind. Check out the growing/harvesting days, when
best to plant (I plant dill in February and September), and soil
conditions. Maybe plant things that like acider soils on one side, etc.
Although if you use good compost this may not be as important as spacing &
trellising, etc. Rhubarb & horseradish need a lot of space. Check out your
local agent or free USDA pamphlets if in USA for amount of crops needed for
family. The _Ball Blue Book_ (a canning bible) can be bought in most
Walmarts for about $7 has a short table on how much to plant common garden
items for how much yield in various forms. _Stocking Up_, another
preserving gospel, has some charts on how best to preserve various crops.
These books ought to be in your local liberry as well. And stop in to
rec.food.preserving and check out people putting up the groceries. Good
Luck!
Edrena

In article <[email hidden]>,

(Terry Davis) said:

I just purchased a home in the country and I am thinking of starting a
small garden to grow my own veggies. I have a wife and a daughter so
the garden will feed 3 people. Is this idea economically feasible or
would I be better off just buying my veggies at the market?

How many in this group grow your own veggies for cooking?

Terry

We do. Until we get a moat or something to keep the deer out we are
confined to growing things in pots on an upper deck. This year it's
sugar snap peas, leeks, zucchini, strawberriess and 7 kinds of tomatoes.

If you grow from seeds it's less expensive than started plants from the
nursery, water costs as does your time and energy working in the garden.
If you enjoy that, then go for it. Produce you grow often tastes better
than what is purchased in the grocery store as it is picked when ripe
and often just before eating.

There is a nice newsgroup: rec.gardens.edible that you might want to
visit.

marcella

Sheldon said:

cathyxyz wrote:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Or the birds get to the seedlings, as was the case with us. We have
enclosed our veggie garden with very fine shade-cloth over a framework
- keeps birds out and lets the sun in. 😉

<snipping>

Quoted message said:

That's too much like work and wasted dollars... put up a few decoy owls
and whirligigs... they look really k-ewl and they keep the mauraders
well at bay.

<snip some more>
We have real owls. They are obviously not "union members" cos they did
NOTHING.... 🙂 Maybe some "Sheldon-puppets" would do the trick 🙂 heh
heh heh

For deer there's no getting

Quoted message said:

around it, you'll need a fence.

We have an electric one... that seems to keep deer out (or bokke as they
are known here... 😉

Unless I had a very small garden or

Quoted message said:

wanted to protect a few individual plants but covering an entire garden
with netting is something I wouldn't consider.

We only covered 12 x 30 feet... just to give the seedlings a chance...
before moving them onto the 25 acre plot (that we use the
trimmer-from-h*ll on) .... 😉

Cheers
Cathy - who is still researching her family trees, or is that roots?