How you can Start a Farm in Heart of the City

[katty]

moe: http://www.alternet.org/environment/118483/how_you_can_start_a_farm_in_heart_of_the_city/

Sick of flavorless, genetically modified, pesticide-drenched frankenvegetables? It's time to start growing food in your back yard.

The Urban Homestead: Your Guide to Self-sufficient Living in the Heart of the City by Kelly Coyne and Erik Knutzen (Process Self-reliance Series, 2008)Share and save this post:

The following is an excerpt from The Urban Homestead: Your Guide to Self-sufficient Living in the Heart of the City by Kelly Coyne and Erik Knutzen (Process Self-reliance Series).

Imagine sitting down to a salad of peppery arugula and heirloom tomatoes that you grew yourself. Or a Sunday omelet of eggs laid that morning, served with a thick slice of fresh sourdough, butter and apricot jam -- all homemade, of course. Or imagine toasting your friends with a mead made from local honey. Where would you have to move to live like this? A commune in Vermont? A villa in Italy?

My husband Erik and I have done all of this in our little bungalow in Los Angeles, two blocks off of Sunset Boulevard. We grow food and preserve it, recycle water, forage the neighborhood, and build community. We're urban homesteaders.

Though we have fantasies about one day moving to the country, the city holds things that are more important to us than any parcel of open land. We have friends and family here, great neighbors, and all the cultural amenities and stimulation of a city. It made more sense for us to become self-reliant in our urban environment. There was no need for us to wait to become farmers. We grow plenty of food in our backyard in Echo Park and even raise chickens. Once you taste lettuce that actually has a distinct flavor, or eat a sweet tomato still warm from the sun, or an orange-yolked egg from your own hen, you will never be satisfied with the pre-packaged and the factory-farmed again. Our next step down the homesteading path was learning to use the old home arts to preserve what we grew: pickling, fermenting, drying and brewing. A jar of jam that you make of wild blackberries holds memories of the summer, and not the air of the Smucker's factory.

[Warpy]

1. The Hanging Gardens of Jamaica Plain

featured tomatoes, lettuce, peppers, and scallions grown in hanging pots from a second floor porch. I don't think his yields were great, but I applauded the effort.

I grew lettuce on a fire escape one summer.

It can be done. I can't be done well, but it can be done.

[XemaSab]

2. Good article

For anyone who is interested in growing food in the city, I suggest a book on square foot gardening.

I was initially VERY skeptical, but after building one 4x8 box I became a believer. We've got more lettuce than we know what to do with, the collards are very happy, the spinach is happy, the cauliflower hasn't flowered yet, and the onions are happy. In January. :o

In a few months I will build more boxes, and hopefully raise most of our veggies for next year.

[katty]

4. yes, it does work,we have a small garden

[lib2DaBone]

6. I think the boxes work better than container gardens...

I have been experimenting with "upside down" tomatoes grown in 5 gallon buckets. Have not had much luck yet. The yields seem very small and the plants break off at the stem frequently.

Planter boxes are equivalent to raised garden beds.. so they should work very well.

[wryter2000]

14. Try one of these

www.earthbox.com

I grow all my veggies in them. They're fabulous for tomatoes. Put two early girls in one, and you have a constant supply of yummy fruits.

[ColbertWatcher]

3. Excellent idea! k+r, n/t

[forestm333]

5. Urban Farming

Lovely article. Can you really have chickens in the city? I have a good sized yard and a greenhouse, I would love to have a few chickens, but I'm thinking there are laws that prevent one from keeping livestock in town. I grow tomatoes, pepper, lettuce, squash and companion flowering plants. Growing your own veggies is great!
Forest :9
Seattle, WA



keep cool shade sails

[lib2DaBone]

7. Just don't get a rooster. The roosters give you away every time.

..unless you want to do fertile eggs and start doing hatchlings. But someone told me you can go to Tractor Supply or your local feed store and buy tray of young chicks very reasonable... cheaper than doing it yourself? Not sure.

[csziggy]

15. You can get live chicks in the mail!

Mail-Order Chickens: USPS Ships Live Birds by the Thousands
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2006/05/060525-mail-chickens.html

I found two places that will ship them:
My Pet Chicken is out of stock until the end of February - http://www.mypetchicken.com/Day_Old_Baby_Chicks-Baby_Chicks___Available_Breeds_for_2009-P212.aspx

Ideal Poultry has chicks listed. The link here is to their "Sex Links" - those are poultry bred so different sex chicks are different colors so can be easily separated. That way you can order just pullets or females and end up without roosters to make noise. Prices seem to be under $3 per chick, less if you order more.
https://secuservices.com/ideal/newideal/Products.aspx?Category=Sex%20Links

[Cass]

8. Great article. We have a container garden on our patio and we love it.

We live in a warm climate and currently have tomatoes, eggplant, arugula, swiss chard, parsnips, bell peppers, and blueberries growing in containers. I took a class on veggie gardening that our town sponsored last year and they spent alot of the class time on growing vegetables in containers so we decided to give it a whirl. So far our patio container garden has been quite successful and it is much easier than I thought it would be.

[librechik]

9. Must be great to live in a warmer climate--growing is not so easy at altitude

You could probably grow cereal already in the boxes--with bananas!-- in Los Angeles.

Here in Denver, the season is short, and it has taken me years to figure out how to get a consistent crop of tomatoes. Even this year half the crop had to be harvested still green when the freeze happened.

My yard is shady, so the good vegetable growing areas are limited. Also, it's difficult to get good crops without pesticides. I know! I make my own compost and don't surrender to chemicals, but after working with our local nursery, I have given up on root crops. They just get eaten up and the tops stay there prettily, letting you think there's something good underneath--until you dig it up.

I love to garden though, and I've not given up. Maybe this year I'll finally finish my growhole. That will extend the growing season some.

[conscious evolution]

10. I do the same thing in downtown Atlanta.

This article reads like it could have been written by someone in my nieghborhood,if not someone from my house,even.
Behind the coop house I live in is a nieghborhood land trust.It is a community owned property that is part educational facilty,part recreational center and part urban farm.
Probably half of the place is used for gardening.We also have chickens and goats and a emu named Lou.We also have are own solar powered well for irrigation and drinking water.One of the nieghbors even has tractors we use on occasion.
One of the things that makes it unique is that we are on a hilltop only three miles east of downtown Atlanta.(The veiw of downtown from our overlook at sunset is pretty killer.)We have a little oasis in a concrete desert.Here we can retreat to the garden or step out the gate and be in the big city with all it has to offer.
All in all,its a pretty cool place to live.

[Nothing Without Hope]

11. I'm a happy member of Waltham Fields Community Farms in Massachusetts. FARM LINKS:

more info:

http://www.communityfarms.org/
http://www.waltham-community.org/CommunityFarm.html

Organic crops, and each week shareholders get both "picked for you" and "pick your own" veggies, greens, fruits, herbs, flowers. You can volunteer as much or as little as you want, both on the farm and in related activities like delivering extra produce to area shelters. Great people, and the children love it too. And the fresh-grown food! Wonderful. Wish I had known about it when my daughter was little.

Additional info on community farms and their impact on neighborhoods:

BBC NEWS | Americas | Urban farming takes root in Detroit
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7495717.stm

Community Gardens: Growing Food Brings People Together - CommonDreams.org
http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2008/07/13/10334/

Community Supported Agriculture - LocalHarvest
http://www.localharvest.org/csa/

And here is a site for locating local farms:
New Farm - Farm Locator
http://newfarm.rodaleinstitute.org/farmlocator/index.php?type=cons&tab=consumer_seeking_farmer

[onethatcares]

12. St Pete Florida here and it can be done

for me, it seems the growing season is backwards from up north. I plant out in August and harvest in December. Tomatos, mesclun lettuces, eggplant, collards and some peppers. I haven't been able to talk my wife into chickens yet, but I'm trying.

[bvar22]

13. K&R

The only way to know for sure is to grow your own.


Even the local Farmers Market can't be trusted.
Some of them use more pesticides and herbicides than big commercial farms, but they will swear all their stuff is organic.