Friday, June 8, 2012

Growing Food From Garbage

So today I had my first solely prepper geeking out moment. So you'll need a little upfront information before I go on with the actual story lol. So for those who don't follow my apocalypse "Contingency Plan" on Pinterest.com I'll explain where this starts. A few weeks back I find this "pin" that takes me to a post the explains how you can regrow romaine lettuce from the remaining stump after you use the original product. To which my newly prepperized brain says, hey that's cool, save me some money and potentially create a replenishable product for me and my family, who use a lot of romaine lettuce by the way. So flash forward to two days ago, and we're making a salad and I remember this pin and how I wanted to try it, so I did. I took the remaining romaine lettuce stump and put it in a cup with water covering the bottom 1/2" of the stump. Flash forward again to today, two days later and I notice that there is about a 1/2" of growth sprouting from the middle of the stump...commence new prepper geek out lol. I'm blown away the it actually works and how completely simple it is, can't wait for it to grow to the point where I can eat it. I find it strange sometimes how quickly I got to the point where stuff that could only be exciting to a prepper is exciting to me. The other day I was in the pharmacy and I was glancing over at toothpicks whilst my wife was looking at shampoos when I noticed these plastic toothpicks that had these little rubber like bristles on them...they looked space aged in comparison to regular toothpicks...I'm getting a little off track lol...so these toothpicks weren't what had interested me, what did though was the little carry case they came with lol. The case was clear hard plastic, about 2" long 1-1 1/2" wide and maybe a 1/4" deep. My brain was geeking out at that because I was trying to figure out what I could put in it, so that I could put it in my EDC lol. The things I find amazing these days.

On the topic of gardening, one thing you should know about me is that I don't garden...well before I never did. We decided this year that because the wife wanted to plant some cosmos flowers on the balcony, that since I was the one that would have to take care of them (long story, involves an air conditioning unit being in the way, and my wife's unconditional fear of the balcony...I guess it's not that long of a tale) that maybe I could try some produce gardening to get a feel for it. You know, in case the world ends, one of us should know how to garden... Have I told you I love my wife lol. So I planted a small amount of peas, carrots, green onion, cucumbers, tomatoes and two types of dill. So far they are all mostly growing pretty damn good, for my experience anyway. This far north, we get a pretty late start on stuff like this, being that we were still getting frost up until about three weeks ago. I'm excited about the peas, as I like the way they grow and the way the plant itself looks, and I love peas off the vine....a lot of fond memories of violating my grandmothers garden when I was a kid. She'd be proud of me taking up gardening, as it made he so happy. Come to think of it, my grandmother was kinda prepper until herself, but they weren't called preppers back then, they were called people that knew better lol. So I'm excited about my peas, but the wife is excited about the cucumbers, as she really enjoys them in salads, but is more excited about trying pickle making this year. All this learning sure is fun, hopefully get it all figured out before the shit hits.

2 comments:

  1. Want another really cool growing project? Take up sprouting!

    I won't go into all the details other than to say... if you've got the seeds in your stockpile, water, and the containers to grow them in, you've got fresh veggies year round, regardless of your climate. They don't even need sun! (Some in fact do better growing in the dark!) They are super healthy and can provide great nutrition when in a TEOTWAWKI scenario when you are eating lots of canned and pre-packaged foods. Then start thinking about the bartering ability having fresh produce in the winter will bring you!

    The best place to learn about sprouting is from Sprout People dot org. You can purchase seeds and growing containers from them. The Bio-Set Sprouter is my favorite and the one I use all the time. The Easy Sprout Sprouter works great too. I started out with the mason jars and they work well (and are much less expensive), but the others are just more convenient. There are so many great flavors and mixes of sprouting seeds... I recommend getting a sampler pack to find your favorites... then STOCK UP!

    Enjoy!

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  2. I have heard tat sprouting seeds is very beneficial and that sprouts are very potent

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