Peace and freedom is one of the highest priorities for me. So when I discovered how dependent I really was on the state and it's corporate minions, I knew in my heart that the way to resolve that issue was to become as independent as possible. I know that much of the food that we buy from stores is not grown on the roof or in the back 40. Most of it is out of season or is transported from thousands of miles away. It is insane to contemplate how much energy goes into moving food around. I also object to all the chemicals, genetic modification and other nasty things that people do to food to get it to the shelf. It is no wonder that people are sick. On top of that, corporations are in a rush to copyright the genome, so I'm having nothing to do with that. Food is now an industrial product and is not healthy at all. I would not even call it food anymore.
The only solution is to grow our own food, save our own seed and achieve food sovereignty. In order for us to accomplish that, we would need to grow plants, lots of plants. So we started looking for heirloom seeds, no matter where we could find them. The good news is that people started sending me seeds. My community is fantastic. Because of their fine example, we now share our seeds too.
Blue corn, colored corn, pueblo tobacco and misc other seeds gifted to us
When we started saving seed and replanting them the next season we noticed something. The plants started to acclimatize themselves with the environment and I also believe that they start producing the nutrients that we need to maintain our health and vitality. In fact, our food becomes so alive that it just cannot wait to grow again. They get really excited and just want to produce. Our food serves us and as a result, I have not seen a doctor in over 16 years!
Spaghetti squash surprised us!
When I was a boy, I spent many summers in the garden, although admittedly I was not a willing participant. I did remember a few of the basics but one thing that really stood out was how much we avoided plants going to seed. It seemed that once they went to seed they were no good any more. I now know different in that when I see a plant go to seed it is like I found gold.
Sprouting carrot tops, growing the greens and then transplanting into a pot for seed production during 2nd year.
What we found out is that some plants produce seed each year, while others produce seed in the second year. We tested this out with the carrots we got from the store. Did you know that you can eat the carrot, sprout the end of the carrot and grow a new carrot plant? This plant will then go to seed. Kale works the same way. So we needed the Earthship to over winter these plants so that we can harvest seed from them. The earthship saves the day ... AGAIN!
Watermelon we grew in our garden - with lots of seeds
I designed a greenhouse using the same principles as an earthship to prove that we can grow food all year round, off-grid, no electricity or natural gas! The idea was to have a space where we can grow food even when the weather is so unpredictable. The idea was to build a greenhouse inside a greenhouse.
FreeDome Greenhouse. 365 day a year greenhouse (interior 10x10), 240 day a year greenhouse (exterior 30x30)
FreeDome Greenhouse being back filled around the West, North and East sides, facing south.
We built a thermal mass heater in the interior greenhouse. So when it is -35C outside, it will be about -15C in the large greenhouse. The smaller, interior greenhouse, while only experiencing -15C can maintain +10C with a little help with the thermal mass heater and the thermal mass of the greenhouse. We were not able to grow tomatoes and cucumbers. However, we were able to grow wheat grass, barley grass and other sprouts that could easily be used as food stock for animals or micro greens for us!
Racks of wheat in interior 365 day a year greenhouse, late December. Snow and very cold outside.
Wheat sprouting in the middle of the winter time in the FreeDome Greenhouse
Where we live, there is so little solar energy, growing complex vegetables during the winter was out of the question. However, growing them in the summer ended up being spectacular! We grow tomatoes, multiple varieties of cucumbers, kale, onions, corn, strawberries, lettuce, carrots and other veggies in the greenhouse. The tomatoes, corn and cucumbers always grow up to the ceiling which is 8 - 13 feet from the ground. By the end of the season it is difficult to move around in the greenhouse.
Greenhouse too green to move
It is not unusual for us to pull hundreds of cucumbers and tomatoes from the greenhouse. It has been a fantastic project and proved that we can provide for our food ... all year around ... off grid!
As for our gardens, we have about 8200 square feet under cultivation and put most of it into production. We found that with the earthship to start the plants in March / April, the greenhouse and the gardens is enough space to provide food for a family of 4 for a whole year. However, our gardens will start to shrink as we are learning how to forage for wild food and medicine from the boreal forest as well.
Zucchini, potatoes, tobacco and cabbage (behind the tobacco).
Good potato harvest this year
As for the potatoes, we keep the smaller tubers as seed and eat the larger ones. 500 lbs of potatoes will last a year and the extras are used to plant potatoes the following spring. By saving all our own seed and tuber stock, we can now give seed to others and grow our own. The seed is acclimatized which means we get better productivity and germination too. So no matter what the food industrial complex tries to do, we cherish our seed stock and refuse to use their frankenfood. We are about 85% of the way towards accomplishing food sovereignty. There is a lot to learn and it takes years. Best time to start ... NOW!
My desk tonight as I wrote this blog entry. left to right: lettuce, tobacco, pumpkin, sunflower, pepper, hemp, corn, grape, dates.
