A Homesteader's Garden: Making it Through the Year

Someone suggested that I plant an awfully large garden. I'm a homesteader. I plant enough to try to get through the whole year without buying vegetables from a grocery store. It has been at least 3 years in most cases since I purchased store-bought canned tomatoes, corn, green beans, lima beans, pickles, jams/jellies, fruit, turnips, peas, okra, or even wine. It's amazing how much one has to can to provide for a family. My family size increased to 5 this year so I have to have even more.

The Ball Blue Book, a canner's bible, has a canner's planning guide based on the US Dept of Agriculture's Daily Food Guide. This is for foods that may be canned and covers a one-year period. It allows for 4 servings of canned meat per week with the understanding that few families serve canned meat at all meals. It notes that 10 other servings of meat, poultry, seafood or eggs are needed weekly, that's 520 annually. This gives you an idea of just how much needs to be grown and preserved.

Amount to Can For a Family of Four for one year

Citrus fruits and tomatoes (includes juices)..............................................252 quarts

Dark Green & Yellow Veggies (spinach, carrots, sweet potatoes)...............144 pints

Other fruits & veggies (apples, peaches, pears, asparagus, green beans, lima beans, corn, green peas, squash, etc.)..........................................................608 pints

Meats, Poultry, Seafood..............................................................................144 pints

Soups.........................................................................................................72 Quarts

Jams/Jellies.........................................................................................160 half pints

Relishes..................................................................................................20 Pints

Pickles, vegetable..................................................................................52 pints

Pickles, fruit.........................................................................................104 pints

This is the amount I work toward. I reach it with the pickles, corn, tomatoes, green beans, and squash. Not with the tomato juice and other things. This does not include peppers and onions and fruit that I freeze.

Burpee, the seed company, claims that just a backyard garden can save a family over $1,000 per year. A small patio garden with a few containers of tomato plants and pepper plants are said to save around two hundred dollars per year.

More later....

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A HOMESTEADER'S STIMULUS PLAN

I'm stimulating my personal economy again this year. I'm planting a garden that I hope will feed my family and me until harvest time next year.

Come along and let's track how well my "IRA" (In-ground Roto-tilled Allotment) performs compared with the ones that the banks sell. The banks are giving about a 3.5% return on the dollar. I think I can get at least 100% return on my investment. Here's how....

Today I bought seeds for my garden. Of course, my time is free, so I can't count that cost. But I do know how much one can of green beans costs so I can compare the cost of the green bean seeds and how many "can equivalents" I get in return.

Here's what my garden has cost so far:

Potatoes $6.00

Corn $4.50

English Peas $0.45

Okra $0.28

Butter Beans (Lima Beans) $0.50

Green Beans $0.68

I haven't bought the tomato plants yet or the bell pepper.

As I see it, I spent the equivalent of 8 cans of corn on the corn seed and 12# of potatoes on the seed potatoes. I should harvest about 120-150# of potatoes and the equivalent of 40 cans of corn...more or less.

The rest of the garden was $1.91...the equivalent of less than one can of each vegetable. The entire garden, so far, has totaled $12.41. I think I'll get much, much more than that back.

We'll see

More later......

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