I thought it was spinach
I consider myself an outdoorsy person, which only means I like being outside. So, it was with more enthusiasm than sense that I joined my neighborhood gardening group this spring. With visions of raised beds, hands in the dirt, sharing our surplus food, and helping each other weed, this was my first year of community gardening.
I am taking creative license to suggest Rachel Carson would have completely supported my decision to experiment with growing food in organic straw bales. My BFF of 45 years mentioned that is how our formerly industrialized hometown grows food in their community garden, and since many of those gardeners and I graduated from the same high school, I felt qualified to succeed in this new challenge.
The instructions are easy to follow. Organic straw, not hay, grown without herbicides or pesticides. Two weeks of pretreatment with a nitrogen source, fertilizer, and regular watering to break down the straw. The eventual gentle placement of newly germinated seeds into a bed of planting mix with the care of a first-time mother laying her sleeping newborn into a prepared crib.
And then it got real. Despite fertilizing, watering, and my words of encouragement, the spinach is actually nasturtium, only one of the many carrot seeds grew into a carrot, and my flowers look like they belong in a succulents garden. Yet somehow, a corn cob, wild mushrooms, and random grass I didn’t plant seem to be thriving.
With the hope of the uninitiated, I remind myself the season is young. In sympathy or solidarity, my seasoned gardening and homesteading neighbors keep me plied with fresh spinach, radishes, and freshly laid eggs. In this respect, I have had a very successful growing season – heavy on the community, less so on the gardening.
– Celena, RCE Explorer Member, June 13, 2024