Dig into High Grocery Prices with Food Gardening

I'm starting my own personal battle against high food prices by growing some food.  Gardening is easy to do, and the produce tastes great!  I've started a small garden with six peas, a single grape vine, and six garlic cloves.  I also keep a stock of wild garlic all over my yard all year long.

Gardening is basically a seven-step process:  (1) buy some seeds, (2) use garden soil, (3) start the seeds with a bit of the garden soil in small trays, (4) dig a trench and install garden soil into the trench, (5) put some sprouts into the soil, (6) water frequently and get rid of weeds as needed, and (7) harvest!

It took only a few weeks to get my first pea pod!  I will try to upload a few pictures to show the results of my first garden.  There were four peas in the pod, and they tasted SO delicious. Other pods are maturing on the vines, and the pods are half an inch long.  The peas will continue to flower and produce pods as the vine grows. 

The wild chives are now about 2-3 feet tall with dozens of seedlings on each stalk.  Wild garlic, just so you know, is considered a lawn weed.  They are often the first thing to sprout in your yard when Winter season passes, and home owners do not like the "shag" look that Wild Garlic creates in lawns.  I myself do not mind it because I do not treat my lawn with any chemicals and the chives taste great.

To get the most production from peas, install a trellis for the plant to climb on.  The material can be obtained at Home Depot.  If you want to be really cheap, use long branches and make "tripods" - two of them - and tie string across the two tripods.  Then all you do is wind the pea vines through the string and the peas will start climbing.  The other thing about peas - monitor them and take mature pods off as quickly as you can so that the plant is encouraged to produce more pods.

One secret to successful tomatos - use pots with good drainage - this will reduce the risk of loss from storm flooding.  When my parents did this, everyone BUT my parents lost their tomatos during heavy flooding rains.  My parents had harvested over sixty tomatos from two plants that season.

For more information on gardening, the Marietta Educational Garden Center hosts local garden club meetings and the center welcomes visitors on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday.  Marietta Gardeners is having its next club meeting on June 13 at 7pm.  The address is:   505 Kennesaw Avenue, NW -- Marietta, Georgia 30060.  You can also call (770) 427-3494 for more information.