Re: food gardening up or down? - Farmers Market

**Jeff Ball j*@usol.com**

Pat,
Your garden sounds absolutely wonderful. Even in my homesteading days  
I didn't have that kind of production or variety.  Of course you  
realize that the kind of gardening you describe is followed by maybe  
5% of all America's vegetable gardeners, and that figure could be  
high.  Living in central Michigan in an agricultural area, there are  
a fair number of vegetable gardens in the county, but most of them,  
if not all, are managed the same way my grandmother used for her  
garden in 1946.  There is no mulch, ever.  The whole garden is  
rototilled to death every year.  There are no raised beds.  There are  
no season extending devices.  and I'm guessing very few are organic.   
In Michigan about 50% of the population is obese, so vegetables are  
not a priority.  I overheard a man at a restaurant the other night  
tell the waitress he never ever ate vegetables in front of his three  
kids, two of the three being seriously overweight.
I was just thinking that I see more skinny people shopping at the  
farmer's market and more serious obese people shopping at the super  
market.  I wonder if that is a coincidence?

Does anyone know about any data showing the progress of the Community  
Assisted Gardening movement where some one sets up a market garden  
and the customers sign up for fresh vegetables every week at a set  
fee.  The customers also work in the garden for so many hours a  
month.  We have several in the county and they are in fact very  
organic.  That would seem like the kind of thing that might show up  
in areas where the farmer's markets are not yet established.

Jeff Ball
jeffball@usol.com
810-724-8581
Check out my daily blog at www.gardeneryardener.blogspot.com
Check out my extensive web site at www.yardener.com

On Apr 20, 2006, at 10:27 AM, Pat Meadows wrote:

On Wed, 19 Apr 2006 14:27:56 EDT, you wrote:

> Coincodentally I met with a local farm market group -
> www.freshfarmmarkets.org - and they reported a huge increase in  
> them in the last 10 years - I think
> they had a stat like 500%.
>
> But I take that with a grain of salt in that I think there were a  
> lot of
> independent markets and farm stands out there before - they just  
> were not known
> beyond their immediate neighborhoods nor listed nationally.
>
> Personally, I think if you do the math (including price of seeds,  
> garden
> tools, etc. along with your time and efforts), it is not only  
> easier but most
> often cheaper to buy from a local farm market than grow your own.
>

Assuming that a local farmers' market or farmstand has what
you want, when you want it.  Organically grown, if you want
it to be.

This doesn't happen here.  I started eating from the garden
March 25 this year, with the help of a hoophouse and cold
frame.  I hope to be eating from the garden through until
the end of December.  The Farmers' Market here doesn't open
until Memorial Day and it closes Labor Day.

I grow over 50 different varieties of veggies. So far, local
markets have had only basic veggies (corn, green beans,
Better Boy tomatoes, etc.).  I *love* a lot of the Asian
greens and other (fairly) exotic things.  I love a lot of
heirlooms too.

But our area is very rural, somewhat isolated, and not a
farming area.  Very discouraging, as far as buying produce
goes.  It's a good thing I can grow what I want.

I don't grow corn, however, for lack of room, and I can buy
that here.  I tend to buy winter squash as well.

Pat
-- 
Gardening in northern Pennsylvania.

Eat local food, change the world for the better!
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