Because the price of food is so expensive and because i always grew up with a garden my wife and i planted one this year. WE got tomatoes, okra, green beans, yellow squash, cabbage, jalepenos, cayanne, and a bunch of herbs. Fresh garden food is indescribable better than anything you can buy.
Does anyone here hunt? That is a great way to get organic meats and there are lots of delicous animals in the US.
I am not as sport hunter not that i wouldn’t like to kill big deer but i won’t kill anything i don’t plan on eating.
I buy alot of organic products, as my local grocery store has a good lineup of stuff. The frozen veggies just look and taste better, the beef is pretty good, and the organic peanut butter is better to me than the processed stuff (which I grew up on). Herb salad, romaine hearts, omega eggs, the list goes on. Some of it is over the line (organic cookies, really??!!) but I generally buy organic if given a choice. The prices aren’t that outrageous, and the health benefits (real or imagined) seem worth it to me.
[quote]OctoberGirl wrote:
does anyone else grow their own veggies or herbs? I don’t have a farm but I am lucky enough to now have a vegetable plot and herb garden.
be careful when planting rosemary, that stuff will take over a yard.
[/quote]
My wife and I use the Square Foot Gardening method. We grow tomatoes, peppers, lettuce, carrots, squash, pumpkin, watermelon and strawberries. We don’t have a lot of sunny space so I also garden on the roof of my work.
We have a separate little herb garden, but, oddly, our rosemary didn’t seem to survive the winter. It always did before.
In addition we have two Asian Pear trees but seriously lack the knowledge to grow good pears. They’re always really grainy. We have a Red Delicious Apple tree that produces great fruit. Unfortunately, again, our lack of knowledge is a problem. The tree has gone bi-annual and we only get fruit half the years.
Btw, composting is one huge pain in the ass.
[quote]jakshafter wrote:
Because the price of food is so expensive and because i always grew up with a garden my wife and i planted one this year. WE got tomatoes, okra, green beans, yellow squash, cabbage, jalepenos, cayanne, and a bunch of herbs. Fresh garden food is indescribable better than anything you can buy.[/quote]
I love the garden! I grow a few things myself and I can taste a difference.
Thank you we have worked really hard on it. Soil tests, 1.5 cu yards of manure, lime and so forth to get it ready. We have more beans to pick today and also some of the okra is ready. Been getting hot peppers for the last week or so.
I am also going to plant 2 apple, 2 pear and 2 peach trees this winter in my front yard.
[quote]jehovasfitness wrote:
rainjack wrote:
Until someone can prove to me that organic is better for you - I’m not going to waste my money paying extra for a buzzword.
shouldn’t the burden of proof be the other way around?[/quote]
edit: the premium is not really the problem. Any one making a health claim on their product must be able to substantiate it.
At the moment, though, the claim “organic,” in the legal sense, is not a health claim (at least in Canada). It is a claim that indicates a particular method of production.
[quote]koffea wrote:
you can grow the 5 gallon and 2 gallon bucket plants inside just fine, but the upside down garden is pretty messy. Once you have tipped them upside down, they pretty much need to stay outside. We had to bring them indoors twice due to potential cold snaps, but it was not pretty.
heres a pic of our light crop setup. (mellons are lower to the ground).
[photo]13469[/photo]
as you can see you dont really need a whole lot of room. which is a good thing cause i dont have it. The water system is automatic and comes on only when the soil reaches a certain level of dryness.
[photo]13470[/photo]
i got most of the pipes from a house that was replacing there galvanized pipe with copper. I spent a total of a little under $70 to build it including the buckets, plants, and irrigation system. hopefully it will pay itself off this summer. Like I said this is our first summer trying it this way, but they seem to be doing well.[/quote]
Koffea, that’s a really cool set up. Can you explain how to set it up so the water comes on when the soil reaches a certain level of dryness?
[quote]on edge wrote:
Koffea, that’s a really cool set up. Can you explain how to set it up so the water comes on when the soil reaches a certain level of dryness?[/quote]
thanks - the plants are actually doing amazingly well so far and I am way ahead of where I was last year at this time (despite the weather). I have since put plants down below as well so the otherwise wasted water, now drips down into bins containing strawberry’s.
the watering system:
this is the part where I splurged a little. I got a Melnor Vigoro Wireless Moisture Sensor system (abt $40 at a local gardening shoppe). I have it setup to test the soil every 4 hours, supposedly it tests the soil and if it is dry, it will water it. We have been getting an unusual amount of rain lately, and it has not turned on once. So I am taking that as a sign that it is working.
Just curious, those of you who eat organic because of the pesticides you’re trying to avoid, do you wash the fruit and vegetables before you eat them? I’m not talking about running it under the faucet for a second or wiping it on your shirt, but the recommended soak in vinegar solution.
It seems there’s a lot of disgust and outrage over the condition of our food, but not a lot of simple steps taking place to address them.
[quote]atypicaluser wrote:
Just curious, those of you who eat organic because of the pesticides you’re trying to avoid, do you wash the fruit and vegetables before you eat them? I’m not talking about running it under the faucet for a second or wiping it on your shirt, but the recommended soak in vinegar solution.
It seems there’s a lot of disgust and outrage over the condition of our food, but not a lot of simple steps taking place to address them.
[/quote]
I use Veggie Wash on any produce I eat, organic or not.
I buy organic salmon (for taste and a better 03:06 ratio), coffee because crazy Poliquin said to.
Fruit and veg - would like to but they don’t last long enough if you do and I don’t want to spend any more time in the supermarket (to stop me spending more cash).
Would like to buy organic milk but don’t drink enough of the stuff to warrant it. Good topic on the PN forum about why you “should”.
There’s a certain logic to buying organic, chemicals can’t be good. Agree you can’t cut this out completely but it’s rational to think that less is better. I don’t need a study to proove this, as it’s my body, my money and my choice.
Europe is no “better” than the US for pesticides etc, the only difference is GM crops aren’t legal.
Its funny, I made something recently with organic spinach instead of regular spinach, and my friends told me it tasted very “spinachy.” I didnt know what to think of this, only that perhaps since they never tried organic spinach they werent used to the intense bitterness of it. Sue me for trying to be healthy, bastards.