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soil
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2021-04-18
Gardening: Feeding the Planet and Ourselves
Gardening is something I learned I loved in the spring of 2019, and I noticed many differences during the pandemic. The garden centers were always busy, much busier than the year before. And often, they would be sold out of things such as vegetables. The article I have shared here I found while researching food insecurity. I have long thought that growing your own food is something that should be more widespread, especially among places of poverty. Of course, this article does not mention the fact that people living in extreme poverty barely have enough water to survive, let alone grow crops with. Regardless, this article makes good points about our soil, our diets, and the future of our planet and species. I think one good consequence of the pandemic is more people will turn to gardening, which opens up many more aspects of life. -
0020-10-16
Revitalizing Cultural Gardening
When the stay at home order hit, I was in a tailspin wondering what to do at home. I couldn’t imagine working from home and teaching my children might last from March to September. Something amazing happened. For over ten years, I talked and dreamed of gardening. I recalled my grandmother gardening when I was a child. She taught all of her grandchildren her indigenous knowledge of growing food from the land. Working from home and homeschooling during the day, allowed us to take breaks and walk to our yard for gardening. The location of our garden in relation to home, work, and school was very convenient. Gardening allowed me to learn the different smells of dirt. The clay and muddy kind of dirt needed to be mixed with finer sand, manure and topsoil. The soil on my land was not sufficient for growing the plants I wanted. We worked early in the morning until the heat became too much to bear. Then we returned in the evening as the sun disappeared from the horizon. Our work included turning the soil, hauling in bags of manure and topsoil, and transporting finer dirt from areas around our home. Once the dirt and seeds were ready, the watering began. I never believed water smells different at different times of the day and months. In the morning, the cool crisp water smells light and pure. During the hotter times of the day, the water smells musky and not as refreshing. It led me to wake up early in the morning and come out late in the evening to water my plants. The smell of the damp earth will forever remind me of the journey of revitalizing cultural gardening techniques taught by my grandmother.