January 22, 2011
"Grow Your Own Vegetables"
The cost of energy is rising and will continue at accelerated rates as we use up the easy-to-find and easy-to-extract resources. A typical North American's diet uses massive amounts of fossil fuel in its food production and transportation, which means the percentage of your income you devote to food is going to increase — dramatically! So, growing some of your own food makes economic sense.
The host of "Grow Your Own Vegetables" is Cam Mather who has 30 years of experience growing organic vegetables, the last 10 of which he's been off-the-electricity grid, using solar and wind power for his needs. Therefore, he has taken "low energy gardening" to new heights. He shows you practical methods to help you take whatever land you might have and turn it into a produce section, saving you money, and producing a wide array of of healthy, tasty vegetables. You can also check out the film from the CORE library for viewing at home. For more information about the film, go to www.aztext.com. Axtext Press produces Solutions for Sustainability.
We showed only the first half of the film this time:
• Soil Preparation — from lawn to lettuce in one easy lesson!
• Winter/Spring Preparation — starting seeds inside
• Planting — from seeds to transplants
(The second half of this documentary film will be shown at a future CORE Films & Forums.)
After the film, we had an informal discussion and had some of our questions answered by experienced gardeners from our Texoma area. (Many thanks to them!)
“Texoma Gardening Network”
Inspired by the after-film discussion, we've set up a facebook group — “Texoma Gardening Network” — so we can continue to communicate about gardening. It’s an open group for anyone to join, so if you’re into gardening (or just thinking about maybe doing some gardening) consider yourself invited to this network.
We chose Facebook because it has so many features we can use.
• we can have “conversations” — someone can post a comment or question that any and/or all of us
can respond to.
• we can post photos and videos
• we can post working documents that we can jointly edit
• we can post links to helpful websites / articles
• we can post an ‘event’ and invite the group
If you DO already have your own facebook page, simply do a search at the top of your facebook page for “Texoma Gardening Network” then click on “join”.
If you DO NOT already have your own facebook page, simply go to www.facebook.com to set up your personal page, then do the search for the network. When setting up your page, you may provide as little info as you choose. Some folks don’t include any personal info at all.
To participate in the Texoma Gardening Network you do not need to participate in the usual facebook mania (which is kinda fun, though). Opening your page simply gives you access to the network, and does not allow anyone else access to you unless you choose to say 'yes' to a request to be a 'friend'.
