This year, because I'm righteous like that, I've been trying to follow commandments that heretofore I didn't feel really applied to me, namely, planting a garden and amassing my year's supply of food.
The food storage is going pretty well. We went to Sam's Club and spent about $200 on our 3-month supply, which Tyler has already broken in to for the Lucky Charms. But we now have enough pancake mix, syrup, flour, sugar, raisins, oil, oatmeal, cereal (minus the Lucky Charms), yeast, spaghetti, and chocolate chips to last in the event of disaster.
The garden is going less well. You may remember I planted a garden a few years ago. It looked so great at the start, but, in the end, it was a flop. The birds ate all my tomatoes, the zucchinis had tough skin, our watermelon rotted from the inside before it ripened, the radishes and lettuce died, and the yellow squash plant turned out to be a cucumber, which I had no use for because they're gross.
Try, try again, right?
Our backyard is unfinished, and in discussing the landscaping, I asked Tyler to put in a planter, so we could have a garden. One day. Because my last gardening attempt went so well, ahem, I decided to prove my prowess by growing an indoor herb garden. I bought a little kit with a container, dirt, parsley, chives, and basil seeds. I kept it on my kitchen counter right by the sink. I planted the seeds and they sprouted. I faithfully watered them, and even had Lillian spritz them with water, on account of the dryness.
The parsley didn't last a week.
The chives made it maybe two.
The last of the basil finally succumbed yesterday. They weren't looking good (they were almost dead) and I was too embarrassed to ask anyone to water them while we were in California. The 4 days without water were too much for the little guys.
I told the ladies at church yesterday about how my garden died-
Ladies: That's because you don't have a drip irrigation system. All my gardens died until I got one. You need one here in the desert.
Me: Oh, um. It was my indoor container garden.
Ladies: Well, um... Better luck next time...?
So, what do you think? Should we spend the money to put in a planter (and drip irrigation, apparently), not to mention sacrifice space in our already not-that-big backyard, for a garden that is probably just going to die?
4 comments:
From one desert dweller to another- don't fool with the veggies. Spend your money on fruit trees instead. http://ag.arizona.edu/pubs/garden/mg/fruit/foundation.html
I don't know. I am working on the food storage thing as well, but the idea of a garden both irritates and frightens me. I'm impressed by YOU though for trying!
Tucson is a barren wasteland incapable of sustaining life and you should just accept it and come to terms with buying all your produce at Fry's, FOREVER.
I'm not the only one who thinks this - Barbara Kingsolver, even the authoress of Animal, Vegetable, Miracle agrees with me, too.
(If you really want help, though, you should get in touch with Becky Mack. I think she has had some success on the gardening front.)
If you really want to garden, you should do it, but if you're only doing it because you feel like you have to, I think it would be a waste of money, time, energy, etc.
Post a Comment