I’ve been spending some of my recovering-from-surgery time sorting through my seed collection, my large seed collection. If I had the space to grow more vegetables, I’d definitely take advantage of that opportunity. Sadly, that’s not going to happen this year. I don’t have garden beds or wildlife fencing in place to expand my food growing passion. What a can do right now is .. plant what I can in the spaces I have available. Starting something is always better than nothing. Right?

I was brooding about my lack of growing space but then reminded myself to strive for an abundant mindset. Perhaps I can’t physically grow a lot of food this year BUT I can talk a lot about growing food and encourage others to “do what they can, with what they have, where they are”. ~ Theodore Roosevelt

If many people do a little bit then the whole community will be more food secure. We can share knowledge about growing food in our area, trade seedlings, care for each others gardens during vacation and even help with physical labour, if the need arrises.

When it’s a reasonable endeavour we can even save our own seeds. This helps to increase local plant health and biodiversity. We can also encourage each other to buy seeds from local growers as often as possible instead of distribution seed purveyors such as WestCoastSeeds. Having said that, West Coast Seeds does provide a wealth of information about timing of seed planting for different regions. I appreciate the effort they have put into research trials and literature which helps people grow successful gardens.

These are a few small things that I can do to promote my passion for growing food.

• Pots on the patio or any sunny/partly-sunny location. I’ll set these up a close as possible to a water source so that it will be simple to keep the pots hydrated.
• In those pots I will plant herbs such as chives, basil, parsley, rosemary, thyme, mint and cilantro. Nothing perks up meals, salads, dips, beverages and desserts quite like fresh herbs.
• All herbs can be nipped regularly throughout the growing season and added to our dishes, except for cilantro. Cilantro is best re-planted every two weeks to provide a continuous harvest.
• Sunflower seed and pea sprouts are extremely nutritious. They are an easy fast way to add greens to our everyday meals without requiring space in a garden.
• In our larger concrete planters I am going to plant several varieties of kale in amongst the flowers. I’ll also grow at least three cherry tomato plants in large planters.
• I have a couple of empty soil places around our home that won’t be disturbed during home renovations. In those areas I plan to grow tall teepees of Cascadia snap peas and Scarlet Runner beans from seed I saved.
• I’m going to build a “Little Seed Library” in my neighbourhood. With the motto “Leave Some, Take Some” to encourage people to start going different varieties of vegetables and flowers.
• I will save seeds that are simple and easy to save. Those include peas, beans, basil, cilantro, parsley, lettuce, spinach and chives. I’ll simply let portions of my crop flower and go to seed then collect the seed when it’s fully mature and dry.

If you’re interested in more on this topic, I thoroughly enjoyed reading this article by Zia Gallina at Resilience where she talks about Saving Our Seeds.