Self-sufficiency in a kitchen garden: Part 1

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Back when I was a young single bloke with a head full of dreams and a few dollars in my pocket I purchased John Seymour’s book ‘The complete book of Self-Sufficiency’; life was never the same thereafter.

Looking back over the intervening forty years, I must admit that I was charmed by the drawings and the idealized lifestyle portrayed. It took me decades to realize that self-sufficiency was only for the rich, much like the formula for becoming a millionaire: “Start with $10 million and work your way down from there”

‘The complete book of Self-Sufficiency’ was written by an Englishman in England. If I needed to drain a field, jug a hare, pluck a pheasant or choose between a horse or a tractor to plough a five-acre plot in the English countryside this book would have been perfect. For a backyard gardener in the fiery climate on the Adelaide Plains in South Australia I had to start from scratch. So

Tip #1: Start soon, because it takes decades to understand your patch of soil and your local climate.

Of course, five acres in the city – where I needed a job to support a growing family –  was never going to happen, even for a dreamer like me. So

Tip #2: Buy your house for the land, not the house upon it.

I did that, and spent another thirty years fixing up the house so that the cook could suffer to live in the place. But houses can be renovated; if you don’t win some garden soil from the real-estate agent the small self-sufficiency of growing ones own fruit, herbs, eggs and vegetables will be a dream still-born.

Earning a living, studying, raising children, staying married, staying in touch with extended family and friends – these are all things that eat into a gardener’s gardening time. So

Tip #3: If you want to live off a garden, you have to live in it.

This may well be why so many folks only get gardening when they retire. If you put it off until then, you’ll find yourself surrounded by jobs that require a 35-year-old back, not a 65-year-old one.

But at a more fundamental level, kitchen gardening is a very time-consuming life-style; if watching sport on TV or endless rounds of socializing is what rocks your socks, you’d better stick with the lawn and the white roses.

If you’ve found a patch of garden behind your house that gets full sun and is not invaded by tree roots, then

Tip #4: Buy compost, not stocks and shares

Enrich and protect your soil: healthy soils produce healthy people. Kitchen gardens will win you small returns in savings at the local shops but big returns in exercise, sunshine, friendships with down-to-earth people (other gardeners), a connection to nature and the satisfaction that only growing your own food can bring.

More next week, I guess…