[Loki]

OK, I broke down and read Gideon's response. It's even more moronic than I thought it would be. "Common sense" and observation of his idiot neighbor are all Gideon needs to verify a complex macroeconomic theory. Dear lord, Gideon, just when I thought I couldn't possibly think any less of you.

Oh, and it's Jevons, NOT "Jevon" as you erroneously state. Anyone who has done even 2 minutes of research on the subject knows that. And they'd also know that that even devotees of Jevons admit that his hypothesis is unfalsifiable. Why don't you do a little actual research in the peer-reviewed literature for once? Oh, I forgot, everything you need to know about macroeconomics can be gleaned by spying on your neighbor.

[Loki]

As for the OP, I recently read a study of victory gardens and it was estimated that 44% of the vegetables grown in the US were grown in home gardens in 1944. So there's room for significant production.

Careinke, that actually sounds like a really good way to measure EROEI.

IanC, we absolutely do need to expand gardening spaces in the city, at least here in Portland. There's a community garden less than 2 blocks from my place but it has a waiting list of several years. The closest community garden with space open is 5 miles away, and I live close-in to downtown on the east side. Yet there's a huge parking lot sitting idle in my neighborhood; no one ever parks there, though some people occasionally abandon their vehicle there (and they usually sit for months before someone takes them away). I'd love to tear it up and rehabilitate the soil.

[nocar]

Ok, I am an avid gardener, spending lots of time to grow veggies. I am about 30 sq meters (300 sq feet) devoted to veggies. That includes a greenhouse and a balcony with containers, but excludes 5 apple trees, 1 plum tree and some bushes with raspberry and currants.

Major problems: Soil, heavy clay with little organic content (increasing every year), short growing season due to shade, (lots less sun from August), slugs, deer, slugs, slugs. In season, I think 15 minutes every morning is devoted to slug hunting.

At slug hunting, I keep track on what is growing, learning what is most acute (watering in a special area, fixing support for something, weeding, other pests, hilling, harvesting), so perhaps it is not entirely lost time.

[nocar]

I sent the post above by mistake before completing.

I spend about 10 hrs/week in season, April- October gardening, 300hrs/year. I think I get a return (including too many apples some years) that I could live on for almost a month.

I harvest spinach, salad greens, radishes, beets, carrots, potatoes, beets, parsley, onions, sunflower seeds, rubarb, apples, plums, strawberries, raspberries, currants, squash, cucumber, tomatoes, bell peppers, maize, peas, green beans, fava beans.

Some years some things take a lot of effect and yield almost nothing. Like 2 carrots (pests, slugs and deer take most).

nocar

[Commanding_Heights]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('careinke', 'I') might buy an EROEI of less than one on the initial setup of your garden. But once established, using a combination of organic, bio-intensive and permaculture methods there is no way that your EROEI is less than one. If it were, mankind would not exist.

If you are peak oil aware, and not trying to grow at least some of your own food, I would say you are just suicidal. Learning and practicing growing your own food now (prior to collapse) offers so many advantages it silly not to do it.

1. It gives you the opportunity to fail at a time when it won't kill you.

2. It lets you establish your garden now when it is a LOT easier to do prior to the peak.

3. It gives you a post peak skill that will make you more valuable to your community.

4. The food you grow tastes better than what you can buy in the store.

5. The food you grow is safer to eat than what you buy in the store.

6. It will free up some of your money to spend on other peak oil preparations.

7. It enhances the environment rather than degrading the environment.

8. It's a great form of psychotherapy.

9. It gets you into a proactive rather than reactive mode.

10. It's Fun.


If all your work in the garden used manual labor, you could get a rough estimate of the EROEI by doing the following. Multiply the number of hours you work in the garden by 100. This will give you the number of calories used in producing the food (Your Energy Invested).

Weigh the food coming out of the garden, convert it to grams and multiply that number by four. This will give you the amount of calories you produced (Energy Returned)

divide the Energy Invested into the Energy Returned. This will give you your EROEI. If it is larger than one you are ahead of the game. If it is greater than .1 you are doing better than what you would get5 by buying the food in the store.

OK I know that is an oversimplification but it is close enough.

Cliff (Start a revolution, Grow a garden)

[nocar]

[/quote]convert it to grams and multiply that number by four. This will give you the amount of calories you produced (Energy Returned)[quote]


Unfortunately, I think that method will grossly overestimate your calorie production. Yes, 1 gram of pure carbohydrate is about 4 foodcalories. But fresh veggies are mostly water, 98-60 percent water. So it is usually 0.1- 0.8 calories per gram of fresh veggies. Better get a list of calorie contents of various veggies.

I really agree with all the rest of the post, Careinke.

If it is 100 kcal per hour spent growing, for my own part, I will come out on the plus-side for EROEI. (I have kept track on how much I harvest of each thing and multiplied with it calorie content using a booklet I have.) Not by very much though. There is a reason why my kind of poor soil was not cultivated in preindustrialised times. My neighbor, an 80-year old lady, good gardener with flowers, shook her head at my efforts when I started 'this soil - it is not worth it' she said. Well, with compost, compost, compost it is getting better - another reason to start now!

nocar

[Fishman]

Nocar, slugs in a little soapy water make a great nitrogen source for your compost bin. Cooked, a source of protein?
Careinke, agree with your post except, it can, not, it will enhance the environment.
Other folks, please answer the question of the post, not flame each other, time is short, work together.

[Ludi]

A couple good books to study for this topic are :


"Grow More Vegetables" by John Jeavons

and


"One Circle" by Dave Duhon & Cindy Gebhard

http://www.bountifulgardens.org/products.asp?dept=113


Ecology Action also has published numerous papers and studies about how to grow the most food for the least work and resources in the smallest possible space. Their papers are very inexpensive.


http://www.bountifulgardens.org/products.asp?dept=104

[Laughs_Last]

I like "Gardening When it Counts: Growing Food for Hard Times", by Steve Solomon.
At: Amazon
He writes specifically to issues of insufficient water and fertilizer, poor soil, and needing seed for the next year.

[careinke]

Thanks for the comments on my post. Nocar, I agree your suggestion to use a list of veggie calories is a better method of determining energy received.

I am slowly trying to turn our place (30 Acres on the Puget Sound) into a self sustaining operation. Hopefully I will be able to produce all of our food within the next three years.

I am in the proccess of digging twenty five, 4' X 8' double dug beds for my annual veggies (seven more to dig). I have developed a continuous rotation plan for the beds and am employing a lot of Jeavons bio-intensive ideas. I expect it will take a couple of years to fine tune the planting and harvesting dates.

In addition, I have raised a pair of pigs (Since slaughtered), and am now raising 25 chickens. I'll keep nine hens and a rooster and freeze the rest in a month or so.

Unfortunately there are virtually no level spots on this property (except the tide flats). So it is a bit of a challenge.

Anyway, I'm having a lot of fun doing this. I am thankful I have the luxury to fail and correct before we enter a major depression or collapse. The learning curve has been very steep.

Jeavons and Solomon contradict each other on lots of things (as do most of the other organic gardening books I have read). I figure the only way to find out what works for me is to try different things.

I've just started reading Gaia's Garden by Toby Hemenway. Now I have a whole new way of trying to garden!!! It's a good book on permaculture and I intend to use some of his ideas for my fruit trees and such.

I made a conscious decision about three years ago to leave the rat race and become more self sufficient. I've reduced my income by 80%, yet I have never felt richer in my life.

Cliff (Start a revolution, grow a garden)

[Ludi]

I found the "polycultures" section in Gaia's Garden especially helpful, and had good success growing that way.