Urban oasis

my garden is my place for leaving my troubles behind. when we first planned the garden we started with three raised beds, then after we acquired 2 allotment decided to grow mainly flowers and some perennial vegetables, three years ago we completely re designed the garden loosely copying the design of a pendant I wear depicting the eye of Horus, i love tall flowers like foxgloves and lupins so there are plenty of them we have two vines, hops and clematis growing up arches made from wood we coppiced from a patch of scrap land, we have kept chickens for the last 5 years, at the moment we only have two hens but have kept up to 4 at any one time and do plan to get more, at the bottom of my garden I very successfully grow hellebore and during the summer have a magnificent thistle that attracts 100s of bees, there is also a large patch of wild garlic that is thriving, There is no grass in my garden every inch apart from the patio is crammed with all sorts of plants. My proudest achievement is that I grew 100’s of foxgloves form seeds I collect myself

Stony Run Farm

We have raised most of our own food for forty years. Twenty at Stony Run. We have gradually shifted from “traditional” row crops with fertilizer to a no-dig polyculture a la permaculture principles. Spring crops do well here, summer crops are more of a struggle. The season sometimes ends abruptly before the winter squash are ready. Our best achievement is the poultry moat and letting the poultry into the garden in winter — holds down the slugs and snails and other pest eggs.

Lost Boys Acre

We are a small urban farm serving five families. We have just shy of one acre of land and have experimented with many different types of gardening to maximize production for our environment. We have also planted a micro-orchard that is just coming to fruit this years. We do garden tours and provide educational opportunities to children and adults in gardening methods, composting and backyard chicken keeping. We hold several open houses each year in an attempt to build community and connect like-minded people in our area. I have been veg. gardening my whole life and can’t imagine not doing it. It makes me heart-sick to see that people don’t know where their food comes from or how it is grown. I am very saddened that some in our neighborhood think that this practice is only done by second-class people and don’t want it to ‘bring down their property values’. We will continue to fight for garden freedom!