Tomatoes could save us

·         Grow High-Value Fruits and Vegetables—choose your favorites that are expensive. Grow heirloom that aren’t available at stores. Allow a percentage of your heirlooms to go to seed and trade at online seed banks for free. ·         Year over year garden production varies. One season a glut of zucchini pops up. Make bread, add to spaghetti sauce  and save the seeds that are desirable to someone else. ·         Make your growing season long. Build recycled cold frames. Be creative with plastic liter bottles in a sunny window to start your seeds while it is still cold outside. Make tunnels, cloches and other devices to stretch the season and grow food. That goalie net the team is throwing away plus some plastic make a free plant shelter. Get a head start on spring salads by at least two months.  Extend your fall crops by using row covers to protect them from frost and deer.  Extend both seasons to grow more cold-tolerant greens and root crops for food production.·         Grow early-bearing fruit and berries—Grow June-bearing strawberries and early raspberries. Don’t be stuck with only one type or breed. There is nothing sweeter than fresh berries, and antioxidant. My family eats them so fast I never have any left to freeze or make jam. They can be frozen in simple ice cube trays to add to drinks or tea. In the fall, there are late-ripening raspberries that fruit.  I’m fond of trading or gifting fresh fruits and vegetables. Friends and family reciprocate with things that will surprise you.·         Grow natives and foods suitable to your climate zone. Some crops will be easy to grow in your area while others can be a challenge. Soil type also determines what will grow where you live.I have two compost piles and have my local coffee shop save grounds to amend my soil that tends to be alkaline and clay. After three years of digging in compost and rotating, my soil sustains a huge variety of fruits and vegetables with no fertilizer and no chemicals.·         Grow beverages—Mints, sage, raspberry leaf and nettles make delicious and healthy teas.  Mint is hardy in my climate I have to be careful not to let it take over. I learned to keep mint in pots. ·         In Southern California it is easy to have a lemon tree – I have Meyer, Lisbon, Ferminello St Teresa (my favorite for the smell of the fruit and flowers). Picking a lemon off one of my trees and squeezing into salad dressing, a sauce or drink give me joy. I know the fruit was not touched by pesticides. Lemons stay fresh on the tree longer than in the refrigerator.·         I wish I could grow apples and cherries. I planted them at two different homes with meager success. We just don’t get enough cold. Right now I’m experimenting with avocados because we enjoy them so much. Unfortunately it will take my seedlings seven or eight years to bear fruit. Patience is part of the fun.·         Perennials such as asparagus, rhubarb, and bunching onions are easy. These keep paying you back every year.·         Cherry tomatoes in yellow, lemon and red are the easiest fruit producing plants. The seeds of fallen fruit and that which birds nabbed will spread. Cherry tomatoes could save us in a disaster. ·         Culinary herbs maybe started from cuttings or gather seeds from friends. Thyme (my favorite) dill, basil, rosemary, sage, parsley and mint grow in most any summer garden. I have couple types of thyme and sage as the bees love them and the perfume when you brush past them is heavenly. ·         We eat about half of what I grow. My kids try anything. They grew up pulling weeds and napping under peach trees. They have the same love of gardening. One of life's special things is the taste of a tomato warmed by the sun, rinsed off in the yard and popped into your mouth.
I wish you every happiness. Eat healthy, enjoy fresh