Hello,

I don't have a vegetable garden now because I couldn't manage the digging and weeding.

We grew up, though, in houses built in 1946 with large gardens. In those days everyone grew their own. I can remember the big occasion it was when the first supermarket came to the town!

My neighbours are great vegetable growers and have rectangle plots for vegetable growing on what used to be the back lawn. They keep chickens for fresh eggs and have a greenhouse to raise plants from seed, etc. They have also made a lovely wildlife pond.

Their strawberry plot is a great favourite when I look after the garden and chickens while they are away in the summer! The hens love the squashed over-ripe strawberries.

I am thinking about growing potatos in a barrel or tub when I get round to it.

I will pop down now and take a picture of their garden to post.

Good growing to you all.

Penny

[Shadow Bea]

Originally posted by davey7549:
Bea
IMHO I believe many of us never had the opportunity to make do with what we could grow, pick and can for the Family. If you think about it is really our heritage we are taking about and not so much being poor. I believe the poor who till the soil to produce in harmony with the earth for their family are the richest people alive today! No matter how terrible the times get they are always opptumistic and mostly have smiles on their faces.
You stated Work ethic and survival skills........ How true!!! There are majorities who would not know how to survive if the large food stores were not there. Most times I prefer to deal directly with the Farmer for our families needs but alas that is not always possible anymore since the small farmer is loosing their farms or abandoning them for development\ better paying positions.
Here are some of the items I look for directly from the farmers:
1) Fresh Eggs (They taste so different and are terrific!)
2) Farm grown Poultry (You know the one that run loose picking gravel in the driveway for digestion use!) They are the greatest, fresh and natural!
3) Brussel Spouts (Found a Farmer that grows and sells. Got fifty 3/4 stalks for $25.00.) Allot of work cleaning those little buggers and blanching\freezing but they are supurb!
4) Califlower (Many truck farms have these) Lange in Windlake Wisc. sells by crates resonable and you can clean, lightly blanch and freeze. Not as great as fresh but still yummy!
5) Any meats when I can I purchase directly from the small meat shops such as Sorgs in Darien Wisc. There meats are grown locally by farmers or themselves.

Well have to head off to work my pager is going off so they are wondering where I am!

Dave

So ,So true Davie! fact is most would be at a loss if supermarkets etc. were suddenly not there! some people don't seem to know that one can for example get milk from anything other than a supermarket refrigerator LOL!

[Tipacanoe]

I have great memories of part of my childhood growing up in Edmonton. The property had a stream running through it. So dad planted a big plot of potatoes on one side. On the other we had a small cottage we kids used as a club/play house - small wood and enormous veg garden.

Right in front of the veg garden, he planted several rows of sweet peas - the scent and view of the blossoms as you exited the screened back door were stunning all through the summer. Great memory!

My job was to carry buckets of water up from the stream and give each potato plant a "drink" of a couple cups of water each. This only during the dry spells, of course. I tended those taters tenderly, I'll tell you, because new potatos with parsley butter or mint were almost a religious experience for me! And mom had so many ways of cooking them well into winter. To this day, I crave scalloped potatoes - no cheese or other additives, just a white sauce flavoured with butter, onion, and salt & pepper. Yeah!

First year we were there, Dad got a farmer to dump a big load of manure off to one side. That fall we mixed the leaves in. For a couple of years it made great fertilizer, which combined with the especially long summer days in Edmonton, helped grow everything big and tall. Then in the middle of one windy autumn night, I remember being wakened by mom and dad. Quick, grab a bucket, fill with water from the cistern, bring out to the pile, the manure pile's on fire!! That fire smouldered all fall, I think. Dad eventually asked the fire department to have a go. Guess winter finally put it out - or maybe it's still smoldering out there.

Think I'll go out to Alberta . . . weather's good there in the fall . . .

My wife and I have a small garden now in which we grow some potatoes, carrots, tomatoes, onions, chard, beans, sometimes peas, sometimes beets, radishes, herbs, etc. It's just a bitty space and we keep talking about enlarging it. Unfortunately, it gets neglected as we like to sail away or travel in the good weather. But one day I'm going to get serious again.

Happy gardening everyone!

Here are some pictures I have just taken of my neighbours garden.

Parsnips & carrots

Broad Beans

Fig

Young pumpkins

Gooseberry Bush

Greenhouse

Apples grown espalier

[angelize56]

HOW DOES YOUR GARDEN GROW?

Once there was a beautiful woman who loved to work in her vegetable garden, but no matter what she did, she couldn't get her tomatoes to ripen. Admiring her neighbor's garden, which had beautiful bright red tomatoes, she went one day and inquired of him his secret.

"It's really quite simple," the old man explained. "Twice each day, in the morning and in the evening, I expose myself in front of the tomatoes and they turn red with embarrassment."

Desperate for the perfect garden, she tried his advice and proceeded to expose herself to her plants twice daily.

Two weeks passed and her neighbor stopped by to check her progress.

"So," he asked, "Any luck with your tomatoes?"

"No," she replied excitedly. "But you should see the size of my cucumbers!"

[Davey7549]

Bea
LOL I learned early on on my Uncles farm about Milking a Cow. First item I learned was how cows do not respect small people! Seems everytime I tried to help with the milking the cow would either try to step on me or use her massive body to pin me against the stall. I am sure it had nothing to do with with improper milking procedures! I also could not get use to having warm milk in my cereal. We also had to skim the cream off the top and hand crank the churn to make white butter to go along with the newly baked warm bread. I am sure if I stayed longer for the visits I would be 400 lbs by now!

Tipacanoe
I see you know what I mean by the smells of vegetable blossoms and ripening fruit! What a treasure trove of memories you have!

T2
My My seems all the neighbors down the line have great gardens and quite a variety! What surprises me is how far along the plants are! You must have a more temparent climate!
Come on T2 get some planting in so you can enjoy to!

Angel
Oh my Gosh.......... ROTFLMAO!!!!!! Cucumbers Eh Sure it wasn't the pickles?

Dave

[Shadow Bea]

Davie:0
When I was about 12 my mother decided that living in towns was too expensive.
So she decided to return to her roots! She moved us to what I call the little house on the prairie LOL (In the same part of Saskatchewan that she grew up) for 3 years we lived there.. there was no running water or electricity! we had a wood burning stove for heat and cooking, we used cole oil lamps for light and went to a little one room school house that housed 8 grades, and of course we had our garden! interesting memories! When I was 14 My mother remarried to a local farmer we moved to his house it was positively luxurious it had electricity and everything! it also had cows to milk! It is funny because I had the same experiences the first few times I tried to milk! LOL we also churned our own butter and a few other things like the first time I came home from school to find a half a side of beef on the kitchen table ... I was turned off meat for a long time! Still am not a big beef eater! Of course few people live like that any more.
One room school houses are a thing of the past. But it did teach self sufficiency!
and being a self starter! thats for sure.. LOL.

Hello Davey,

Yes, they are great enthusiasts - most of them grow flowerss and tend their lawns.

Our growing season is coming forward all the time! Though my neighbour has to start off her pumpkins in the greenhouse.

Having five dogs it would be difficult for me to grow vegetables until I can afford to, perhaps, fence off part of the garden. I could grown things in tubs, though. Have been thinking about that. Beans, potatos, carrots, parsnips, etc. would all grow in containers. Must look around for some large ones.

As I've got older, I've got less strong and find digging very hard, so things in tubs would be good.

My little front garden is full of flowers and plants. Masses of greenery waiting to turn into tall white daisies!

When I was young I visited my Uncle's farm in Sheffield, Yorkshire, had a go at milking the goat and got kicked for my pains. Went to stand in front of a plate glass window to watch and fell through it!!

Lots of dairy farming is carried out in this area, though many small farmers are selling their cows and growing crops instead. Twice daily milking has no attractions for them any more.

One of the ladies to whom the garden belongs is American. You seem to have properties with much more space than we do, obviously because of the size of your country, and grow more things yourself.
Though there are still allotment associations here, to enable people who don't have gardens to grow produce and flowers.

I think I called the picture of the the French(or runner) beans broad beans - will post the correct picture of the broad beans another time.

Happy gardening.

Hope to see pictures of everyones gardens later.

Bye,
Penny.

[Davey7549]

Bea
Yup had a similiar experience with having old Betsie for dinner except I refused to eat what was considered delicacy and to this day remember the cow that always liked me and came whenever I was present. She used to lick my arm as I petted her! Made me cry when she was gone and never did I want to have her for dinner! I do believe that was the last time I went to my uncles farm to help out willingly! I do enjoy Beef but do not enjoy the thought of eating what I consider was a friend or a pet!
Seems I am a bit contradictory of myself in my stand on beef and maybe I am but I do enjoy meat products.
Sad I know, the contradiction but that is who I am in that respect.

Dave