In just one year, the consciousness of consuming locally grown food, either grown by a local farmer or in your own backyard garden, has grown exponentially all across the country. Roger Doiron suggests making this 4th of July, Food Independence Day. Read his commentary on that after the jump. [click to continue…]
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Hydroponic growing recirculates and recycles water and uses way less per plant than soil cultivation. It also contains the nutrients in a closed system so that it doesn’t pollute the groundwater. Despite what the organic purists say, when used with organic nutrients (hooking up a compost tea brewer to the nutrient tank) it is a sustainable way to grow food. Even though they can’t be certified organic, more hydroponic growers are using organic nutrients and techniques in their growing operations.
I have personally visited over a hundred commercial hydroponic vegetable operations all over the world. I think this video shows the Mirabel lettuce operation near Montreal, Quebec, Canada. It is a very efficient and productive operation using a floating raft technique.
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A Spanish study has found that men who ate a diet of high-antioxidant fruits and vegetables had higher sperm counts. Fertility and Sterility Journal reports that the study suggests too much meat and dairy can depress sperm counts. The researchers found that men with lower sperm quality had higher intakes of yogurt, meat products (especially processed meats like sausage), and potatoes, while men with high-quality sperm ate more shellfish, vegetables, apricots, peaches, and skim milk.
Right photo credit: Santa Rosa OLDSKOOL flickr.com photostream
Left photo credit: Jenny Downing flickr.com photostream
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Last month’s news was the White House organic vegetable garden soil contained 93 parts per million levels of lead. There was a lot of speculation of where the lead came from. Lead paint? By product of vehicle exhaust when lead in gasoline was allowed? [click to continue…]
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Recently retired Jim Nordmann grew up on a farm and once owned an 80 acre farm where he raised cattle, corn, tobacco and u-pick strawberries while working full time as a mechanical engineer.
Now he lives in a suburban sub-division and grows a variety of vegetables on an 800 square foot garden. He cans and freezes much of what he grows for off season consumption. But it is not enough for year round supply. He figures he would need around 5,000 square feet to do that.
Photo credit: Matt Stone/The Courier-Journal
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All around the U.S., subdivision developers are building housing developments around organic farms in hopes it will increase the chance of someone buying their newly built homes.
The success of two initial developments, one outside Chicago and the other outside Boise, Idaho, proved the concept worked, and like-minded developers around the country are trying it on inactive farmland and even on formerly industrial land. Over 200 development projects around the country are using agriculture and working organic farms as a key sales component of the projects.
Photo credit: Paul O. Boisvert/The New York Times
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To order the new Hydroponic Tomato Crop Production book by Dr. Lynette Morgan click below:
