More try to grow food at home to save money

Ventura County Star / Scripps Howard News Service
April 7, 2009
By JANE RUFFIN

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Beth Granai yearned for a vegetable garden, but her history with homegrown produce was not pretty.

"I just put the tomatoes in the dirt, no soil preparation," she said. "We weren't really sure what happened to those tomato plants. They didn't produce a single fruit."

It's a situation many others face as they pursue home gardens, often for the first time.

A dismal economy and a new consciousness about food safety have led to a 19 percent rise this year in household gardens, according to the National Gardening Association. Even first lady Michelle Obama has helped plant a White House vegetable garden.

But while images of fresh produce tantalize, gardening can be hard work. That's particularly true in areas where gardeners must battle clay soil, withering summer heat, ravenous deer and abundant weeds.

Gardening experts and volunteers are staying busy helping the newbies get their hands dirty.

Granai, who lives in Cary, N.C., awakened her inner gardener by enrolling in a four-hour, $45 workshop taught by Ginger Zucchino, who offers weekend classes through her part-time business, The Gardener's Kitchen.

After a glass of wine and a light lunch from her garden, Zucchino lays out for her students an intensive, raised-bed organic gardening formula. There are precise instructions on how to assemble a frame, create the right soil mixture, plant and harvest.

"I would not have been able to do this if I hadn't had her tell me exactly what to do and how to do it," said Granai, a mother of three. "I just don't have that kind of time to do the research myself."

Zucchino ties the renewed popularity of home gardens to people's need to provide for themselves.

"Food is something so basic to everybody that it's a great way for consumers to take back control," she says. "It's like a positive effort to feel like they are doing something good in the world when everything else in the world is out of control."

Wanting to take control is one thing. Doing so takes patience, cautions Morris Dunn, urban horticultural environmental specialist with North Carolina's Wake County Cooperative Extension.

The agency has noticed more people inquiring about gardening these days. Some are newcomers who are disappointed to learn, for instance, that North Carolina's climate is not kind to the likes of bananas and pineapples.

"We try to tell them if they have a bad experience, understand it takes several years sometimes to really learn and make decisions about growing vegetables," Dunn said.

Reach Jane Ruffin at jane.ruffin(at)newsobserver.com. For more stories visit scrippsnews.com

NOTICE: In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving this information for research and educational purposes.

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