Grow Your Own Organic Produce

Some years ago, my husband and I replaced a section of our backyard lawn with edible plants and flowers.  It was a full two-day job but we felt so good knowing that we were going to be growing our own organic food.

Following are pictures of the project:

My husband used a sod-cutter to efficiently remove the grass from its roots

Goodbye water-hogging grass and hello organic produce

We hauled the grass away to a green waste recycling facility

We then tilled the soil with a roto-tiller to further remove roots and to aerate and de-compact our heavy clay soil:

Tilling our soil

We then had to amend our heavy clay soil in order to make it a thriving environment for plants and worms.

In our home, we have embraced the gardening staples of composting and use our compost to feed our plants and ultimately feed ourselves.

In our plan, we included water and energy conservation practices as well as incorporating the Three R’s (Reduce, Reuse, Recycle).

Following is a picture of our completed organic garden project:

We plant crops twice a year:

Warm weather crops in spring (April, May)

and

Cold weather crops in fall (Sept., Oct.)

Following are pictures of some of the warm weather crops that we plant in spring (April, May):

Delicious Organic Sweet Corn

Organic Heirloom Yellow Grape Tomatoes

Organic Heirloom Green Tomato Variety

Organic Jalapeño Peppers

Organic Black Sweet Peppers

Our beautiful Organic Peaches and Blackberries

We also plant:

Organic Blueberries, Raspberries & Strawberries

Organic Eggplant & various other varieties of Sweet Peppers

Many, many organic herbs and more

Following are some pictures of cold weather crops that we plant in fall (Sept.,Oct):

Red Beets

Cabbage

Brussels Sprouts

Broccoli getting an organic compost tea bath

 Cauliflower

We also plant:

Asparagus

Carrots

Celery

Turnips

Butter Crunch Lettuce

New Red Fire Lettuce

Rainbow Brite Swiss Chard

Kale

Spinach

Italian Parsley

Basil

Red Zeppelin Onion

Chives

and lots of herbs (including mint for wonderful mint teas this winter)

We also have two apple trees that give us beautiful apples every fall:

And we have an avocado tree that produces fruit around the first day of winter (typically around December 21st).  This variety of avocado is called a “Holiday” avocado tree.  Following is a picture of the beautiful fruit it bears:

Lastly, we have three citrus trees (Orange, Lime & Lemon) that give us delicious fruit.

We practice companion planting as it is based around the idea that certain plants can benefit when others are planted next to or close to one another.  Companion planting exists to provide plants with natural pest control without the use of chemicals and in some cases they can give a higher crop yield.

Following is a picture of borage being used as a companion plant:

As a bonus, bee’s love borage and I love bee’s!

Finally, I have some good news: as of today, I’ve lost a total of 40 pounds on a whole foods, plant-based diet and I feel wonderful.  I am a 1/3 of the way to my ultimate weight loss goal and I’m enjoying every moment by eating the most amazing fresh, organic foods in the process.

I hope that by reading this, I inspire you to grow your own organic produce:-)

Thank you for visiting my blog.

Blessings to you and yours!

Advertisement