Vert-à-Go

photo: Library of Congress archives

Earlier this year, Kitchen Gardeners International launched a campaign to plant edible landscapes in high-visibility locations. At the forefront of the campaign is a petition to ask the next US president to convert part of the White House lawn into a large organic food garden that would supply the White House kitchen and local food banks with fresh produce.

Roger Doiron, founder of KGI, explains that there is a well-established precedent for ‘eating the view‘:

“The White House lawn has been a sustainable and edible landscape in the past, notably at times of national emergency. In 1918, for example, Woodrow and Edith Wilson did away with gas-powered mowers, replacing them with a hungry herd of sheep. Later, in 1943, First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt planted a Victory Garden on the White House lawn inspiring millions of citizens to follow suit. For the really obstinate opponents who say “that was then, this is now,” you can point them to the governors of Maine, New York, and North Carolina who are already happily eating their view and saving tax-payers money along the way.”

In his victory speech last night, President-elect Obama declared the importance of embracing a spirit of service and sacrifice “where each of us resolves to pitch in and work harder and look after not only ourselves, but each other.” I think taking responsibility for feeding himself and his neighbours would be a terrific way to start. Vote for the Eat the View proposal at the On Day One web site or “buy” a parcel of the lawn to fund kitchen garden projects!

This Lawn is Your Lawn from roger doiron on Vimeo.

(photo: Tigerella and Green Zebra by Strata Chalup)

I am pretty close to having everything I need for the garden; now I just need to get the ground all worked, add manure, and finish hardening off the bedding plants.

This year I went to a couple of new (to me) greenhouses for my bedding plants. I first stopped at Shaughnessy Gardens, who offer a variety of unusual/heirloom tomatoes, as well as organic herbs. There, I picked up all my herbs (bar parsley and cilantro, which were sold out/looking a tad leggy), as well as some bell peppers, roma tomatoes and three nifty tomatoes which I have never seen here before: Thai Pink, Tigerella, and Green Zebra. At least a couple of these tomatoes, along with the peppers, will be taking up residence in our community garden plot, which gets a lot more sun.

I then stopped off at Floral Acres, where I picked up a Sweet Million cherry tomato as well as some Sweet Gold cherry tomatoes as well (I just adore those little guys in salads). And a butternut squash for good measure–I haven’t had a good crop of sweet peas in years, so this year I’m going to grow some squash up the fence instead!

Unfortunately, I wasn’t organised enough this year to get my seeds at Seedy Saturday in March. Jim Ternier from Prairie Garden Seeds in Humboldt has a big booth there with loads of interesting heirloom and prairie-appropriate varieties. He also sold some of his seeds at Steep Hill Co-op on Broadway, and if you are more organised than I was this year, you can order them directly by mail too. I did buy some of his garden huckleberry seeds from Early’s, which my mom started under grow lights and which we will both be trying out this year.

(photo: Yin Yang/Orca beans from the Park Seed Garden Journal, Geo. W. Park Seed Company)

I picked up the rest of my seeds at Early’s–lettuces, spinach, beets, carrots, green beans, and so on. I also placed a very last-minute order with Salt Spring Seeds for their orca beans as well as some Strela Green lettuce, an attractive variety that dates back to the 1500s. The orca beans are ridiculously cute, but I don’t know if they are going to arrive in time to get them in the ground. They are an early producer, apparently, so hopefully I’ll still be able to try them out. This seed company specialises in heirloom varieties and has a lot of really cool vegetable seeds.

Work is continuing apace on the front garden—you can see a new long bed for anemones extending along the sidewalk, with a new rock border. This border creates a nice wide edge with space for bulbs, and make it harder for our two small people to stomp across the middle of the yard and through the flower beds.

We stacked the old pieces of sod up along the edges of what will be the path, to get it out of the road while we’re working. I’ve been burying some of it upside down in the newly dug beds (about a foot down) so it can compost all by itself.

And what’s that poking up in the middle?

It’s the beginning of the herb spiral!

I shovelled dirt into a mound (could have gotten rid of some more of the upside-down turf on the bottom of it, but for some reason I forgot to stick it in), and then I started pressing rocks into the base to see how big we needed to make it. We actually enlarged it somewhat after this picture; it’s about 1.3m across.

We stacked up two layers of rocks all round, then once we got all the way around, started moving in to create the spiral and a small planting area at the top. We finished building it after it was too dark to take a picture, so I’ll have to post one tomorrow! It was a really fun project.

The Victoria Day long weekend is the traditional time for Canadians to put in their gardens. This year, the holiday really falls on the early side of the 24th of May, so I’m not panicking to get everything planted this weekend. I haven’t even bought any bedding plants yet, although I did plant some lettuce seeds in pots on the deck about 10 days ago, which are now enthusiastically poking their heads out of the dirt. I’ll plant some more in the next day or so so that I have nicely staggered crops of salad greens throughout the summer, and plan to put in some other cool-weather vegetables like carrots, beets, radishes, and spinach. Tomato seedlings could probably do with another week under their cosy coats, just in case.

One thing that we did start work on today, which I’m very excited about, is removing the grass from our front garden. I have been gradually chipping away at this pathetic area of sod for the past few years, expanding the flower beds and putting in low-maintenance perennials instead. Our house faces north and we also have a very old maple tree in the front yard, which means that it is an awkward area for gardening. Part of it is in total shade, part of it is about half-shade and half-blast furnace, and all of it tends to be very dry because of the tree cover. There really isn’t enough sun there for grass, and because I don’t like wasting water on a lawn, it can look pretty terrible when it’s dry. We do have a small patch of grass in the back garden for the kids to play on, but we never just go and sit on the grass at the front. So, its days are numbered!

We are planning on extending the perennial beds, putting in a path, and also a raised bed in the middle. We are still deciding between putting in a herb spiral (I think that it might be difficult getting the right kinds of stackable rocks for it–my mom and dad’s farm tends towards producing round, not flat rocks!) or something star-shaped like this raised bed kit from Lee Valley. I plan to put in most of our lettuce and greens out here, and will be launching an experiment with herbs and carrots to see how well they do with the somewhat limited sun.

So, we’re getting the ground prepared and then we’ll have a look at our rocks and see how they stack up. I’m also planning on getting some willow branch cuttings from my mom and dad’s farm to make an obelisk for scarlet runner beans…my sister’s branches actually took root and started to leaf out again, forming a beautiful living obelisk. Sweet!

City dwellers are becoming increasingly excited about the possibilities for growing food in the space that is traditionally dominated by a barren patch of grass. I’ll be posting more about the burgeoning Food Not Lawns movement in the coming week!

Do you have a pesky gardening question? The University of Saskatchewan’s Gardenline is now open for the season and is taking calls from domestic gardeners and small-scale commercial growers.

Gardenline offers information and advice on everything green. You can ask about starting seeds, growing vegetables, fruit, houseplants, trees and shrubs, yard and garden plants, and find out how to deal with diseases and pests.

The free phone line (966-5865) will be open until 31 August on Mondays to Thursdays, from 9am-noon and 1-4pm. You can also email questions to gardenline@usask.ca.

Gardenline’s web site also has a ton of very informative articles grouped by category (they are rather awkward to search, but fun to browse). You can find advice on planting early vegetables here.

Face the Fear is a series about a dozen things that you can do right now to feel better about what and how you eat.

(right: the first chives poking out of the snow in my back garden a few weeks ago)

Go one better than the 100-mile diet and try the 100-foot diet this spring–by planting something that you’ll enjoy eating all throughout the summer. Fifty years ago, nearly every household had a vegetable garden–probably the most famous were the Victory Gardens that provided millions of people with home-grown food during World War II. But in the post-recession boom of the 1980s and 1990s, the number of people growing their own food really dwindled. How many times do you see ‘vegetable garden’ listed as a home feature on present-day real estate listings, especially on new suburban developments?

But food gardening is starting to make a comeback. In the UK, vegetable seed sales are soaring, and a similar trend is being seen in North America and Australia. These days, the humble vegetable patch goes by many different names–edible landscaping, micro-farming, urban agriculture, potager, or (my favourite) the kitchen garden. But the basic aims are the same as they always were for previous generations of gardeners: to grow fresh, delicious, healthy produce and save money on grocery bills at the same time. The added bonus of growing your own food these days is that it not only increases your personal food security amid rising food prices, but it can also cut your CO2 emissions as well.

But I don’t have anywhere to garden, you might wail. It’s true, not everyone has a nice big sunny patch all ready to go in a backyard (I’m personally challenged by the nearly-hundred-year-old maple tree and the orientation of our lot). But nearly everyone can find somewhere to sow a few seeds or pop in a few nursery vegetable seedlings–maybe on a balcony, or a sunny back step or window ledge. If you can find space for two or three large pots (and you re-seed at regular intervals), you can keep yourself in lettuce and herbs for most of the summer. In fact, very small spaces can be amazingly productive, especially if you use some simple vertical gardening techniques.

You could also try finding garden space elsewhere (but still close by–you don’t want to have to drive to it!). Do you know someone in the neighbourhood with an old vegetable patch that is lying dormant? Many elderly people don’t have the energy to garden for themselves anymore, but would love to see their old garden back in action. You may also have a community garden in your neighbourhood that has plots available. Or how about that front lawn?

It may not seem like a few pots or a dozen plants on a small patch will amount to much at first, but every scrap of food that you grow yourself is something that doesn’t need to be put on a truck and shipped 1000-1500 miles, burning expensive fuels and creating harmful CO2 emissions. It’s also something that you don’t need to pay for at the grocery store till. Just imagine the impact this could have if everyone tried it. This spring, join the growing revolution!

Further reading:

Northern Gardening’s kitchen garden resources
University of Saskatchewan Gardenline (vegetable advice section)
Lois Hole’s Vegetable Favourites
Square Foot Gardening