Recession/gardens/fruit trees (Knoxville, Oak Ridge: sales, apartment complex, transporting)

[TennPing]

　
The recession (depression) hopefully is making a lot of people stop, slow down, take a deep breath and start getting back to some basics. That includes stopping the crazy spending and instead trying to save and invest for the future…….and…..using it as a teaching lesson for the kids. So many people are so tied to using credit cards that they have forgotten what money is.

Everyone needs to start having their own gardens and trying to raise some of their own food. According to the news reports, in the future more and more vegetables will need to be imported…..because of the very dry conditions in the west (California etc.) You do not know what you are getting when you eat imported unprocessed vegetables etc. Now is the time to find a good spot and dig it up. If you own some land, let people know that you will rent some garden plots. Make a little extra money. Everyone benefits.

This fall as you eat your apples, keep the seeds. Dry them out a little and then next spring start planting them. If you are a hiker, take the seeds with you and carry a stick. Just push the stick into the ground about four inches, drop in a seed and step on the spot. If enough people would do that, just think of the apple, peach, pear, cherry etc. (nuts also) trees that would eventually bloom and hopefully bear some fruit. Fruit not just for people but also the animals. A good way to maybe help the honey bees survive. If the bees die out, people will have to climb the trees and fertilize each blossom with something like a q-tip. Already in one country this is being done. The orchards must hire employees to do the job that used to be done by the bees. Can you imagine getting up in the morning knowing that you will spend the day in a tree?

Of course, keep in mind that supposedly only about one in three seeds will grow but it does not matter. It did not cost you anything to start with.

Just my thoughts today as I eat my golden delicious apple and listen to all of the depressing news on tv!!

[mdvaden]

Seems like a good idea just to enjoy doing it. As for saving money, realize that if you don't buy as much food, that puts other people out of work. Say for example you cleaned windows, now they would just save money due to lost income by doing their own window cleaning.

So there are two ways to look at this.

For the more part though, I think if earth at homes can grow food, it make sense to put that land to use. It saves energy by not transporting stuff as far.

We doubled our vegetable garden size last month, ready for growing next spring. Added half dozen fruit trees on our urban lot too.

Cheers,

M. D. Vaden of Oregon

[sassykat&joe]

One problem with just saving and using the seeds from store-bought apples and other fruit is that most of them are a hybrid of some sort. Shop local farmer's markets and buy fruit that is from some of the old open-pollinated varieties and use them instead. I think also apples graft onto a stronger rootstock usually, not sure how well using the seed would work. I'm planning on planting some fruit trees in the spring, and getting heritage trees mail order from a specialist nursery.

[RememberMee]

Originally Posted by TennPing

　
The recession (depression) hopefully is making a lot of people stop, slow down, take a deep breath and start getting back to some basics. That includes stopping the crazy spending and instead trying to save and invest for the future…….and…..using it as a teaching lesson for the kids.

You don't understand little bit of something about American (or world economy). All money are created as debt. Stopping crazy spending would freeze economy as we know it; it's getting frozen as we speak. To put it even simpler, you are able to save because of another guy who's spending beyond his means. If you both will decide to save - glorious free market economy no more. The hordes of the hungry would devastate your garden and orchards, quite possible - you'll be hanging on the tallest fruit tree you've planted.

So many people are so tied to using credit cards that they have forgotten what money is.

Money is debt, simple as that. No debt - no money, no economy, no jobs. Bankers have us at their pleasure. If a banker pulls $100,000 out of his arse (literally, the money loaned to you to buy a house did not even exist before you've signed mortgage papers) he wants $250,000 back in 30 years. But he loaned you only $100,000, where would you get an extra $150,000 to pay off the mortgage? Right, 2 other suckers should buy homes (or run up credit card debts), a banker will create $200,000 for them too, through a convoluted sequence of money transfers you have a chance (just a chance) to accumulate needed $250,000 to pay off your mortgage. But if there are no suckers to put into debt, you do NOT have even a chance to save $150,000. Pay attention to the fact that you need REAL physical efforts to earn $250,000 in money transfers, while bankers create $100,000 for you literally out of nothing. If you'll fail on payments, bankers will appropriate all the REAL efforts you put into paying off your home. Land of the free, huh?

Everyone needs to start having their own gardens and trying to raise some of their own food.

I've been to every corner of USA. Gardening is a rarity, even poorest of the poor don't even try to grow some of their food. I am not quite sure why this happened but people don't do it, just stupid grass moving from sea to shining sea. Many towns have ordinance against gardening not to create image of poverty and keep home prices up. BTW, gardening would shrink GDP My guess would be if (not a chance, but if) gardening will become a rage, federal government will intervene to tax it/regulate into extinction. Government (and American corporate elites it works for) are bent on depopulation of rural areas, elimination of self-sufficiency and breeding perfect disposable wage slaves for corporations.

There is known Supreme court case:

Wickard v. Filburn, 317 U.S. 111 (1942), was a U.S. Supreme Court decision that dramatically increased the power of the federal government to regulate economic activity. A farmer, Roscoe Filburn, was growing wheat to feed his chickens. The U.S. government had imposed limits on wheat production based on acreage owned by a farmer, in order to drive up wheat prices during the Great Depression, and Filburn was growing more than the government's scheme permitted. Filburn was ordered to destroy his crops and pay a fine to the government for being too productive.
The Supreme Court, interpreting the United States Constitution's Commerce Clause (which permits the United States Congress to "regulate Commerce . . . among the several States") decided that, because Filburn's wheat growing activities reduced the amount of wheat he would buy for chicken feed on the open market, and because wheat was traded nationally, Filburn's production of more wheat than he was allotted was affecting interstate commerce, and so could be regulated by the federal government.


Feeding yourself is not any different from feeding your chickens, it reduces the amount of food you buy on the open market and thusgrowing your own food affects interstate commerce.

[2mares]

I've been to every corner of USA. Gardening is a rarity, even poorest of the poor don't even try to grow some of their food. I am not quite sure why this happened but people don't do it, just stupid grass moving from sea to shining sea. Many towns have ordinance against gardening not to create image of poverty and keep home prices up.

Apparently you havent been to my corner. I'd say 75% of those that are able have a home garden and can. Not to mention raising beef, goats, chickens, etc. I dont know of any entire town that has and ordinance aganist a garden, perhaps a HOA.

[RememberMee]

Originally Posted by 2mares

Apparently you havent been to my corner. I'd say 75% of those that are able have a home garden and can. Not to mention raising beef, goats, chickens, etc. I dont know of any entire town that has and ordinance aganist a garden, perhaps a HOA.

I have been to lots of corners around Knoxville, Clinton, Oak Ridge, Lake City, Greeneville, Bristol and so on. I'm sure there are a few tomato plants hidden out there, a few are visible, I've seen a few small gardens (it would not feed a midget for a week) and a single medium garden. However, gardens don't make even a smallest dent in the ocean of the moved grass out there. I have yet to see a fruit tree with fruits on it. I spoke with locals who remember their parents growing bulls and cows (for personal consumption) and having substantially sized gardens, you can't find anything like that today. It's just obsessive grass moving.

[RememberMee]

"ordinance aganist a garden" doesn't necessarily mean that one is prohibited to have a garden (even though there are all kinds of crazy homeowners associations who prohibit it), it just means lots of stipulations (a.k.a. extra $ and headaches discouraging people).

[mbmouse]

Originally Posted by RememberMee

I have been to lots of corners around Knoxville, Clinton, Oak Ridge, Lake City, Greeneville, Bristol and so on. I'm sure there are a few tomato plants hidden out there, a few are visible, I've seen a few small gardens (it would not feed a midget for a week) and a single medium garden. However, gardens don't make even a smallest dent in the ocean of the moved grass out there. I have yet to see a fruit tree with fruits on it. I spoke with locals who remember their parents growing bulls and cows (for personal consumption) and having substantially sized gardens, you can't find anything like that today. It's just obsessive grass moving.

Sorry, but gonna have to disagree with you here on the amount of gardens in this region. I lived in Greene county and had a huge garden. Best veggies I ever grew and canned. But when I had enough for me and anyone else I knew who would take veggies, I could not give them away. Why? Because everyone had a garden or related to someone who did. I even tried to give them away at an apartment complex. Even there, everyones Ma, Pa, granny, aunt or uncle had a garden and had more than enough. I now live in the Tri-Cities, ticks me off that the ground is hard clay so that it is very hard to grow veggies, but they are easy to obtain because again, every 5th or so household has a garden or a friend/relative close by that does. It is also much better because getting veggies from a local garden are much more fresh and usually doesn't have pesticides and other chemicals on them. Much healthier for you and your family.
Agreed, we can't just stop purchasing, those that can need to spend money, especially at their local Mom and Pop businesses to keep them going, as well as sales tax collection etc. But there is a much better reason to grow your own food if you can, it is call for your health! But a secret, it is more expensive to start a garden than it is to buy at a grocery store. It really doesn't start paying off for several years.

[KnoxBrian]

As another poster said, many store bought varieties of fruit (Rome apples, Bosch pears, etc.) and Vegetables are grown from grafted rootstock and produce sterile seed. To save seeds to germinate next year, you must start with an open pollenated, non-hybrid seed that sets viable seed. That counts out prob most store bought varieties. It is a lot of work to raise a garden, but in my opinion, the results, and sense of pride from raising your own food outweigh the input costs.

[2mares]

Originally Posted by RememberMee

"ordinance aganist a garden" doesn't necessarily mean that one is prohibited to have a garden (even though there are all kinds of crazy homeowners associations who prohibit it), it just means lots of stipulations (a.k.a. extra $ and headaches discouraging people).

What stipulations? I have never heard of any fees, stipulations or ordinances against having a home garden. From what I have been seeing, community and patio gardens are even encouraged in citys like NY city. I recently saw a segment on one of the morning shows about city dwellers raising chickens.

When I lived in Dayton, OH as a child I remember dad plowing up most of our small yard to plant a garden. We also had 2 pear trees, 2 apple trees a cherry tree and grap vines. Didnt leave much room to play.