When we bought 16 rural acres, a locavore dream of mine came true – to have enough land to grow most of our plant-based food. Subsistence farming of local food. My neighborhood horse rancher delivered seasoned horse manure. I was all set to get my “organic” produce game going.
After 8 years, here are my crops which have reached subsistence production.
That’s lemon balm, chives, and garlic.
Lemon balm hung to dry then hand-rubbed into a quart Mason jar lasts all winter on the spice shelf, adds lemony brightness to anything that calls for oregano. Chives rinsed, towel-dried, snipped and frozen – a quart was not quite empty this Spring. Garlic (see I.Love.Garlic.) is still in good supply as my new crop is producing scapes, so I peeled and roasted the really dry ones in olive oil and broth. The rest is peeled and refrigerated. Not exactly a balanced diet.
Reality of subsistence farming….
Increasing production of other consumables requires an intersection of desire, discipline and natural forces in just-right balance. And six-foot fencing of 3/4 inch hexagonal chicken wire staked to the ground to keep bunnies and deer out. Last summer something got all of my brussels sprout, cauliflower, broccoli plants, plus the first 8 eggplant blossoms. My friend at the nursery, after I shared my sob story in late July, gave me 18 cabbage plants she was about to toss.
Large rabbit on the wrong side of the fence…
… just after replanting. Picture me like Beatrix Potter’s Mr. MacGregor with a snow marker, terrorizing the animal until I saw it exit through a hole in the fence. Patched the fence, that’s that, problem solved. Four plants gone in the morning led me to Have-A-Heart traps, which were heartless to two tiny bunnies.
Reduce Abandon expectations…
Take down the fence, work with the wildlife and just grow some food… that’s all I want. We have 16 large metal cone-shaped pots (4 feet wide, 850 pounds) that served as planters, water fountains, and birdbaths on the former botanical gardens. We aligned 4 of them on a sunny spot near the veggie garden to grow all “deer candy,” ie., brassicas, in raised beds.
At the same time, Jim at the farmers’ co-op gave me another idea for soil nutrient building called “manure crop”, a seed combo of nitrogen fixing plants – buckwheat, fall rye, winter wheat, peas and oats. “Just plant it whenever you want, eat what looks good, mow it twice in late Spring, till and plant.” The first sprouts, featured photo for this post, were delicious dicotyl leaves of something in the mix. So delicious that I did not plow the manure crop in one quarter of the vegetable garden.
Oh so delicious salad of last year’s local carrots, my chives and … tomato from God knows where, simply dressed with olive oil and the brine from my preserved lemons. Jim at the co-op said the mystery sprouts are Kester Trailing Beans. They have bolted and flowered and there are plenty for the rabbits to nibble at and for me to stake them. The immature seed pods might be a fine green bean…
Did just find my next subsistence crop?
Photos by S.A.M. Steiner 2022
