Interesting Statistic

[JRmom]

Yesterday, I was thumbing through my Encyclopedia of Country Living, and read this:

For every $1.00 you spend on your garden, you will get a $5.00 return in food.

For every hour you spend working in your garden, you will get a $15.00 return in food.

I was really glad to read that first one as I bought 800 lbs. of composted cow manure yesterday!

 

[TanksHill]

You bought?? So how much does 800lbs of poop cost? My dh used to work up the road where you could stop and shovel a pile for free.

I need to get some more.

g

 

[JRmom]

Yes, unfortunately I had to buy it - $50.00 for 800 lbs., but my garden space really needs it (it's sand), and I enlarged my space this year. I'm looking at it as an "investment" LOL! My compost is going good now, so hopefully that's my last purchase of poop.

 

[TanksHill]

Worth it's weight in gold. I am sure you will get more money back in veggies 10 fold.

 

[patandchickens]

Uh, I think those are more in the way of *metaphors* than actual *statistics* ...

...but 800 lbs of manure is definitely going to be a big asset to your garden! For sure worth a lot more than a measly fifty bucks

Good luck, have fun,

Pat

 

[Dunkopf]

I wish it was real instead of metaphors. So far everything I've seen in the way of food production isn't really saving much. It does however provide you with a better quality safer product. It also makes it so that if prices on fresh produce get seriously out of hand there is always a plan B.

Of course I live on the high plains of Colorado. Our dirt takes 5 or 6 years of constant attention to make it usable. I'm sure that the Midwest and southern states get a much better yield than we do here. Our growing season is only 90 to 120 days if your lucky. I know there's plenty of stuff that grows in that time.

 

[HEChicken]

It definitely depends on what you plant. Last year I grew corn. Right around the time it was ready to pick, the local grocery store was selling it 5 for $1. I can't grow it cheaper than that! On the other hand, DH and I just about live on salad during the summer, and can grow salad greens for a fraction of what we pay for them at the store. This year I plan to quadruple my production of Swiss Chard, Kale, Collard greens and I'm adding Mustard greens and Spinach as well. In addition I'm growing lots of tomatoes and peppers, both of which we can use in salad and preserve excess via other methods. I'm not going to grow corn or squash, both of which take up valuable space and produce a crop that is relatively cheap at the store.

 

[patandchickens]

I wish it was real instead of metaphors. So far everything I've seen in the way of food production isn't really saving much.

Depends MASSIVELY on how much you spend and what you are planting.

REalistically, the more you spend the less your %-wise return... Martha Stewart (or even just Good Housekeeping) style gardening is never going to save you money. But if a $50 dumpload of manure is ALL you spend on the garden this year other than some cheap seeds, there is more scope for profit. And of course it depends on whether you plant things that can be bought dirt-cheap, or things you really WOULD realistically buy and would be significantly expensive.

It's all relative though. IME a $2 packet of lettuce seeds (which even giving away some of hte seed will last me years) is a huge savings over buying all that lettuce myself. Even though the *actual monetary* savings is minimal -- maybe, what, 40 heads of lettuce at a buck a pop? -- growing the lettuce cost me only 5% of what BUYING it would have. (Because I am not building raised beds or buying tools or buying soil amendments or fertilizers... of course if I *were* doing those things, it would be vastly different)

JMHO,

Pat

 

[Boogity]

<snip> I can't grow it (corn) cheaper than that! <snip>

Great observation. Every year I sort of kick myself for dedicating so much space to sweet corn when the market prices are cheaper than the money and effort I put into growing it.

The feed corn is an even worse return on my money and effort.

I may change my crop planning philosophy.

 

[Wifezilla]

Dk, I kept a bit of a spread sheet and entered the prices on everything I bought to grow and harvested vs the cost of buying the food at the store. Life got in the way and I lost track about 3/4 of the way through the growing season, but there was a definite payoff. Especially if you price your grown veggies at store veggies grown in comparable conditions. That means looking at the organics for most of us.

How much is 100 lbs of organic seedless grapes going for? We are on track to harvest about that much this year based on the vine growth last summer. That is what we had 2 years ago.

In our area, we are going to be more limited on the types of crops we can grow. It is a bit of a challenge trying to figure out what will work. Since I have a small space I can do small scale experiments.

Basically we need to look for things that are short season AND heat tolerant. Cool season veggies that many can plant in Spring do better as a fall crop for us since we go from Winter to DANG IT'S HOT so fast.

I have a hard time growing peas because of this. I keep trying different varieties. I will let you know if I ever find one that is nice and productive.

You might want to try these...

Dragon tongue beans (always get good yields)
Mini bok choy (Puts down a deep root though. Must have good soil. Matures fast enough to avoid the bolting problem.)
Red leaf lettuce (went crazy in my front yard with partial shade)
Grapes (particularly well adapted to our climate)
Squash (I live near a pumpkin farm that has been around since the 30's. If you can keep the squirrels from stealing the little fruit, you will be up to your ears in pumpkins)
Zucchini (can get fungus late in the season, but a diluted milk spray keeps it at bay)
Mini melons (Collective farm woman, Rich Sweetness 132, etc... Small melons actually have time to ripen. I can never get the full sized ones to.)
Sunflowers (They grow wild here anyway. Plant useful varieties like BOSS. Jerusalem artichoke are a sunflower relative. I planted a patch about 7 years ago. It comes back every year.)
Sweet potatoes (not normally a Colorado Crop, but I had a good garnet harvest. This year I am planting Korean Purple. They are a short season variety and should do even better)
Purple Viking potatoes (a friend grew these and had great results. Late season fungus problems can attack the leaves. Diluted milk spray will help.)
Purslane (it grows wild here and is loaded with omega 3's)
Dandelions (yes, it is a crop. If you don't use it for people food, give it to your chickens and ducks. They LOVE IT!)

Certain gardening techniques will help give us an edge. I experimented with a 3 sisters garden last year using Dutch Bantam Sweet Corn, Pole Beans and Jaradale Pumpkins. I only planted a few hills in a small place but it worked rather well. The only issue I had was squirrel related damage. I am expanding the 3 sisters growing area this year and will do more squirrel trapping.

Wall-o-water set ups really help. It lets you plant much sooner, and keeps the night time temperature plunge from being so severe. This worked really well on our tomatoes. We had a LOT of black plum tomatoes. The vines got huge and we harvested for months. The larger tomatoes like Purple Cherokee did ok. Like the melons, it seems the smaller fruit gives you a much better chance of having them ripen during our short season. Cherry tomatoes, Sweet 100's, plum tomatoes, etc... are your best bet. I wont even attempt beef steak tomatoes.

Lasagna gardening has been one the best things I ever tried. Using layers of cardboard, compost and then dirt instead of tilling saved me so much time and effort when it came to weeding. I hardly had any weeds. In the past when I tilled I ended up fighting bindweed and every other invasive species you could think of. Tilling just made those things take off and take over.

Anyway. Got a little long winded there. I'll have to turn this in to a blog post or something. Hope this is helpful.