The Husband of a locavore

As this is a blog about the adventure of both Todd and not just Bethany.  I feel that I should add my feeling upon the matter of locavorism.  When Bethany started to talking about only eating local food this summer I first thought it was a just a thought and not one that would be implemented.  However, as Bethany continued to talk about it I soon found that she was full-heartedly planning on following her desire to eat locally I know there was no changer her conviction.  At first this did not bother me for I would only benefit from that task of eating locally for Bethany would make, as she always does, some delicious food.  But as the spring season come and the local farmers market would be starting I also became excited about the idea of eating locally.  And after talking with my wife about the culture behind eating locally I found that it is a family task and I wanted to participate in the task.  Being a student of horticulture I decided to participate by growing a garden.

Being students and living in an apartment building we do not have land to grow.  The year before we had rented a 10 by 10 plot of land through the school to grow but the soil is horrific and the area has no wind protection.  We were not planning on growing this year because of the conditions of the plot, but if we were going to eat locally I wanted to contribute to our summer goal by growing some of our own food.  And I would have to say this year is going a lot better in spite of the two late frosts that our garden has faced and the 30 to 45 mile per hour winds that we have had excessively this year.

I got stared this year on our garden by starting seeds indoors.  I was able to get a florescent light fixture from my dad and set up a germination bed in our extra bedroom.  Its not the best set up but it works for us.  I planted beans, peas, basil, bell peppers, broccoli, brussel sprouts, zucchini squash, and spaghetti squash.  The sad thing about this story is that we grew these indoors and then transplanted the beans, peas, and basil just a few days before a late frost come and killed them most of them.  Beans and peas are easy to grow so was not that bad of a lot but the basil as a great loss; lucky for us I only transplanted about half of the basil outside and the others I transplanted into window garden and they are looking beautiful and smell good too.  The basil is doing great in our window along with our rosemary, lemon thyme, oregano, sage, and chives.

Well now we are in the end of June and our garden is all planted and doing well.  I would have to say some of our plants are a little behind because of late frosts but it is looking good.  Compared to the other student gardens we have the most variety packed in our little 10 by 10 plot.  Starting from the top left corner we have brussel sprouts, four kinds of tomatoes, leaks, shallots, and yellow onions.  Second row we have bell peppers and fennel.  Third row we have green and red beans, and peas.  Fourth row we have bok choy, carrots and beats.  The fifth row we are trying to grow cilantro and basil and in the last row we have zucchini and spaghetti squash, and broccoli.  And I forgot that along the edge at the top of our plot we are growing sunflowers and along with them we are growing Asian beans.