You Will Love These Folks!
June 18, 2011 at 2:12 am
Imagine a space one fifth of an acre in size, about the average city lot, 66×132 feet. Now of course on that space is a little house, a garage, driveway, paths et. So when you subtract all of those you end up with one tenth of an acre. Gosh doesn’t sound like a very big space does it? And you are right, it isn’t a very big space.
But with a great deal of effort and determination that small space has done something really really amazing. In 2010 that ONE TENTH of an acre,( just .1) produced 7,030 pounds of fruits and vegetables! WOW! NO GMO crop could possibly do that! NO Chemical Company can produce those kinds of yields in modern American Agriculture in any way shape or form! They do not even come close!
BECAUSE in PER ACRE amounts it totals: 70,300 pounds. No current big farm agriculture can possibly produce 35 TONS of fruits and veggies on an acre of land!
NOW, imagine if every person that could possibly do this, would do it. Where ever they live. Even if they didn’t manage these ginormous yields, but just think if every one grew their own salad, potatoes and green beans?
Think of how beautiful our cities would become with all that green. Think of how much pollution of all sorts would be reduced. How about whole city blocks of people getting together and landscaping the whole neighborhood together, with everyone sharing the produce of the different trees? That alone would be priceless.
One of the things America has surely lost in most places: a sense of place, of belonging, a local food system, a sense of caring and community. This is a way of beginning to get it back.
The Dervaes family have a number of websites, all of which you can access from this link.
Now around here, it is hotter than blazes and half the state of AZ seems like it is burning up with no rain or let up in sight. So I will dream of fall and winter and early next spring….hopefully the next pea crop will be as good as this ones was:
But with a great deal of effort and determination that small space has done something really really amazing. In 2010 that ONE TENTH of an acre,( just .1) produced 7,030 pounds of fruits and vegetables! WOW! NO GMO crop could possibly do that! NO Chemical Company can produce those kinds of yields in modern American Agriculture in any way shape or form! They do not even come close!
BECAUSE in PER ACRE amounts it totals: 70,300 pounds. No current big farm agriculture can possibly produce 35 TONS of fruits and veggies on an acre of land!
NOW, imagine if every person that could possibly do this, would do it. Where ever they live. Even if they didn’t manage these ginormous yields, but just think if every one grew their own salad, potatoes and green beans?
Think of how beautiful our cities would become with all that green. Think of how much pollution of all sorts would be reduced. How about whole city blocks of people getting together and landscaping the whole neighborhood together, with everyone sharing the produce of the different trees? That alone would be priceless.
One of the things America has surely lost in most places: a sense of place, of belonging, a local food system, a sense of caring and community. This is a way of beginning to get it back.
The Dervaes family have a number of websites, all of which you can access from this link.
Now around here, it is hotter than blazes and half the state of AZ seems like it is burning up with no rain or let up in sight. So I will dream of fall and winter and early next spring….hopefully the next pea crop will be as good as this ones was:
Heavenly Blue morning glories cover an arch by the front gate.
The small sunflowers are still blooming. They attract a lot of butterflies and bees of all kinds.
One of the surviving Heritage raspberries has put on a few fruits.
The Moon & Stars watermelon is going strong, tho no fruit yet.
Elephant Ears & Canna lily
The Jicama are going strong, just hope they are making nice big roots!
Can’t hardly walk beside the house for all the plants out there.
Delicata squash almost ready to pick.
The eggplants in pots on the patio are doing very well.
A couple of Rio Grande pepper plants loaded with fruit.
The back garden. The two empy beds in the middle are for carrots and parsnips.
Kentucky Wonder green beans cover a 5′ wire cage. So far it’s been so hot they haven’t set any beans, but I found one yesterday so we should have lots of them soon.
Apache Purple pod beans cover part of the greenhouse. They are just beginning to bloom.
Cucumbers & beans. I don’t think we’ll get many more cukes tho, they are severly infested with aphids. I think I should probably just pull them out.
Four o’clocks bloom by the front gate.
16 baby artichoke plants in their pots. Just not sure where I’m going to plant them!
The 11′ Lima beans, which still have yeilded no beans.
Heavenly Blue morning glories cover part of the greenhouse. You can just see one of the Kabocha squash in the leaves at the lower left.
Here you can see that corner of the greenhouse on the right, then the baby corn, the row of paste tomatoes and on the left some cucumbers and an apple tree still in it’s pot.
Yesterday and again today it is raining. Actually when I took this pic through the front door it was also hailing. We got .4″ of rain yesterday and it is very dark and rainy again today. We were going to go to the lizard walk at the arboretum today, but don’t think that is going to happen. This rain looks like it might hang out all day. It is 9 AM and it is as dark outside as if the sun were nearly down! And I’m loving it and so it the garden.
This squash started out innocently enough, just a little sprout in the compost in the corner of the greenhouse bed…..I now believe it is an alien bent on taking over the garden!
Liberty said we had to grow pickles and so we are, here’s a couple still on the vine 
Here’s the greenhouse from the other side. The big bushy plants in the tubs are huckleberries. I haven’t grown them before but they are doing very well, loaded with flowers and green fruit.
I just finished potting on some eggplants and peppers into these 2 1/2 gallon containers. The peppers are Rio Grande. The large leaved plant just behind the peppers is my little fig tree, growing from a cutting I took last fall. Behind everything are some of the potted potatoes.
A Delicata squash grown in a large tub. I love these little winter squash, they are very sweet and tasty. Much better than any acorn I’ve ever tried.
Purple de Milpa, a purple tomatillo from the Seed Saver’s Exchange.
On the patio the Trombocinno is taking off and so are the yard long beans.
A young Trombocinno squash
these “Snow White” tomatoes are certainly misnamed, tho they are sweet and juicy.
The Jicama have finally quit pouting and started growing now that is warmer.
The grey water filter tub is growing a good crop too. Kabocha squash, Elephant ears, canna lilly
A Moon & stars Heirloom watermelon seedling. This time of year nothing is safe from the birds and every little seedling has to be caged to keep them from being ripped up and eaten.
The King of the Garden Lima beans are still going at it. They are now 11 FEET tall!
Bloody Butcher corn is doing well. some of the popping sorghum and broom corn were wiped out in an afternoon when the chickens got loose, but there are still some plants left.
Looking along the driveway from the front steps, the bergamot is blooming, the grape vine thinks that everything is there just for it to climb on, like the apple tree.
This is a Blacktail Mountain watermelon. It’s one of the ones growing on the compost pile out back.
Here’s another little watermelon along with a cantaloupe. We would be much closer to eating cantaloupes except for the darn rodents that ate every single developing fruit! as well as munching on the vines. They are making a comeback now though.
Baby Blue Hubbard squash on their compost pile. They look a bit sad because I forgot to water them one day and when I got to them they were badly wilted. They are doing fine now though, with several small squash coming on.
Here’s one of those Baby Blues, next to the compost thermometer, which still registers 140 degrees. It actually went down to 130 but a good watering and it went up to 150, but has settled back down to 140 again.
We had a nice thunderstorm this evening and I spied this double rainbow when I went outside after the rain.
The Maxi Golt peas were done for, so out they came, to be replaced by Burgandy okra and several inches of sawdust mulch
Some of the Sugar Snap peas come out and are placed by Double Yield cucumbers [thanks! www.freedomseeds.com] and Kentucky Wonder pole beans
Chires Baby Corn seedlings. These are the little baby corns in Chinese cooking, or left to mature they make popcorn.
The strawberry bed is interplanted with purple bush beans.
The Elephant Garlic is blooming. We got almost 5 pounds!
A spell of cool rainy weather gave the Blueshokker peas a new lease on life.
A Grimes Golden apple grows with Mammoth sunflowers, asparagus, Swiss chard, cosmos and nasturtiums.
Super Italian Paste tomatoes in large cages. Despite a wind storm knocking them over and breaking some branches, they are doing ok.
A Lemon Gem marigold. It really does smell and taste of citrus.
On the patio looking down the SW side of the house. The big green bushes in front are some of the potted potatoes.
This sad looking Red Currant tomato nealy drowned. It’s planted in an old ice chest and I didn’t realize the drain plug got closed up. But it’s making a come back and even delivered up our first taste of homegrown tomatoes.
Yard long bean seedlings in a planter by the house. They’ll grow up to shade the laundry room windows.
The trombocino squash is taking off.
On the patio tomatoes grow in old ice chests and peppers in the orange pots.
!st big red tomato, an Imur Prior Beta, it weighed 1 1/2 ounces and tasted delicious.
The Kabocha squash was rudely pruned by a pack rat
The buckwheat is blooming. mmmm buckwheat pancakes, coming up!
The chickens enjoy scratching in their new spot.
A wild sunflower with very tiny seeds volunteers in the raspberry bed.
The Baba raspberries are showing some color.
The new garden area: paths laid, beds made, planted with popping sorghum, quinoa and Bloody Butcher corn.
Potatoes in the ground out front aren’t as big and lush as the potted ones on the patio, but doing ok under 6 inches of sawdust mulch.
Bloody Butcher corn seedlings. The sticks along the edge of the bed are guides to keep small children on the path.
King of the Garden Lima beans are taking off up their trellis.
Pencil pod yellow wax beans await transplanting.
Poppies and wildflowers bloom along the driveway.
A strong smelling sage blooms
WOW! look at those melons taking off.
Yippee! A baby watermelon
The Baby Blue Hubbards are blooming. That compost pile is still hot, 138 degrees!
More wild flowers, poppies, a corn flower and a baby apple along the drive way
A bee buzzes a bright red poppy full of pollen.