About

When you read the news about climate change, dead zones in the Gulf, oil spills and the eventual end of cheap energy, do you ever say to yourself  “I wish I could do something…”?

Growing all my own food on my small city lot won’t fix any of those problems – but every head of lettuce I eat from my own garden will be one head of lettuce that isn’t grown on land saturated with chemicals that leach into the ground water; one head of lettuce that wasn’t cultivated or harvested by machines that use fossil fuels; and one head of lettuce that didn’t travel a thousand miles to my local store. Sure, it’s only a head of lettuce – but it’s something.

My goal – to grow as much food as one person can eat, with plenty to share, and with as little work as possible, on my 60′ X 110′ city lot. I hope to reach my goal in three years. In three years I’ll be 63 years old, so I’ll be using as many labor-saving ideas as I can find. I’m not old yet, mind, but I’m getting there…

Is it fair to call my tiny lot a farm? Actually, yes. The definition of a farm is:

A tract of land cultivated for the purpose of agricultural production.

So that means that my tiny plot qualifies. According to Brett L. Markham, author of Mini Farming: Self-Sufficiency on 1/4 Acre, you can grow all the veggies one person can eat on 700 square feet of ground.

When I’m not planning my garden, building chicken coops and digging in the dirt, I’m an author, sculptor and web publisher. You can find my paper mache sculptures at UltimatePaperMache.com.