Whether you’re a beginner at gardening, or a seasoned gardener, now, in these strange and chaotic times, we encourage you to grow your own “Victory Garden”. To be a victory gardener is to plant more to have, store and to share.
Whether it’s digging up the lawn, adding space-saving vertical structures, raising chickens, or starting early with protective covers… whatever it takes to grow more, it a worthwhile endeavor for many reasons.
What is a Victory Garden?
Victory Gardens originated during times of war as governments encouraged their homeland citizens to grow vegetable gardens. Growers felt empowered to contribute to the cause while becoming more self-sufficient.
Home gardens not only increased the food supply, leaving more rations for war effort, but growing one’s own food became a morale booster.
Traditional garden crops included fresh vegetables like leafy greens, like lettuce, spinach and collards, and root crops like potatoes and carrots.
“The Department of Agriculture and the State Extension Services have been advocating more and better farm gardens for many years. I think we should continue our gardens – not only for the food, but for the deep satisfaction they yield. And for the war years the extra food produced by town and city gardeners might be looked upon as insurance – insurance that we will have enough of the health-giving fresh vegetables.”
~U.S. Department of Agriculture, Victory Garden kit, 1945[1]https://www.nal.usda.gov/exhibits/ipd/small/exhibits/show/victory-gardens/victory-garden-aids
In This Covid-19 (Corona Virus) Era in History
During the first year or so of Covid-19, a number of our favorite online seed companies had temporarily shut down in order to catch up with the demand. The shipping time that ordinarily takes days, now takes weeks. For those seed merchants that continued shipping, many crop seeds were “out of stock”, especially the heirloom varieties.
There is an upside to this situation. More and more folks have taken up gardening as a measure of health and food security. And yes, there may be some who are hoarding seeds for scalping, and a few from fear of scarcity, or FOMO.
Yet, we’re convinced the main reason for the rush on garden seeds and other supplies is due to regular folks looking to be more resourceful about their food. We’ve seen news reports about this “green wave”sweeping across the country. [2]https://www.foxbusiness.com/lifestyle/americans-growing-food-coronavirus-pandemic
The Benefits of Gardening Abound
The benefits of growing your own food extend beyond ready access to healthy food. The psychological and social aspects cannot be overestimated. Research has proven what gardeners already know: that gardening therapy is real.
We know you feel good being out there in your garden space, and involving kids in gardening can create positive life long memories of the life affirming joy of planting a seed and watching it grow into food.
The “Victory Garden” notion has become rampant and that’s without much government prodding. We’re big fans of the Victory Garden movement.
Food Security
A part of the GardensAll.com mission is to bolster food security.
Given that there’s an ongoing pandemic that has put most of the world onto a wartime footing, food production and food availability are among our highest priorities. We’ve never been in circumstances that involve social isolation, stay-at-home-restrictions, and no definite time frame for when we’ll be done with all this.
As of the original writing of this article in March of 2020, we’re about done with the winter garden. Now, it’s time for spring planting and sowing.
Here’s a quick clip from our garden artist in residence, Coleman Alderson.
Planting a Victory Garden Can Make a Difference
- Food you grow is food you know (good and healthy).
- Extra food can be shared or preserved for the future.
- Transform lawns into a backyard garden or edible landscape
- Self reliance – no worries about empty produce bins when your garden is full and your pantry is stocked
- Less risk of exposure to outside world and germs
- More healthy than store bought because it’s fresher (and hopefully organic) to help bolster immunity
- Gardening therapy is healthy exercise in sunlight and fresh air (both are disinfectants)
- Morale boosting and lifts spirits and depression through exercise, sun and soil microbes.
- Gardening is economical savings of time and energy spent going to stores.
- Not buying store produce allows more for those who have to buy food.
- Family gardening, like the the family farm, creates positive experiences that teach skills and bond memories for life (family legacy)
14 Ways to Grow More Food and Health
- Expand your food garden space with new garden beds
- Save space by growing vertically
- Succession planting for crop rotation and companion planting
- Plant space saving, high yield crops such as pole beans, peas, zucchini, salad greens, tomatoes, cucumbers
- Plant as many perennial vegetables as possible
- Save all your food scraps and make your own organic compost
- Grow in straw bales to save time, space and soil – see benefits of straw bale gardening
- Grow in Plant towers and other containers (indoors or outdoors)
- Plant shade tolerant plants in semi-shady spots
- Grow edible landscape plants – see foodscaping ideas
- Grow microgreens and sprouts
- Start early using frost covers and cloches
- Grow culinary herbs for added flavor and nutrients
- Plant a medicinal garden of herbs for cold and flu, and antifungal herbs
We know every gardener looks to the next growing season as a fresh start to grow more and grow better. We hope this call to plant a Victory Garden inspires you to do more gardening this year than ever. Do this in support of your family, your community, and our country.
For a very interesting docudrama about wartime farming in England, check out this BBC film series. We watched all the episodes and as a result, gleaned what service a Victory Garden can deliver under the direst of circumstances.
Garden Village Dreaming
Community gardens are a great idea for urbanites and others without enough space for their own garden.
But imagine an entire neighborhood where each home has a garden and has the capacity to be on or off grid. How wonderful that would be!
We’re dreaming of creating a such gardening community. If you know of any, please let us know so we can check it out and learn from them.
Let us Know About Your Victory Garden!
So friends, we welcome your emails, comments, and photos. Please let us know if you’re doing anything this season to make your garden into a Victory Garden. We send our best and brightest hopes out to you.
Sow the seeds of Victory! Plant and raise your own vegetables. Every garden a munition plant.
May you be safe, well and keep on growing!
G. Coleman Alderson is an entrepreneur, land manager, investor, gardener, and author of the novel, Mountain Whispers: Days Without Sun. Coleman holds an MS from Penn State where his thesis centered on horticulture, park planning, design, and maintenance. He’s a member of the Phi Kappa Phi Honor Society and a licensed building contractor for 27 years. “But nothing surpasses my 40 years of lessons from the field and garden. And in the garden, as in life, it’s always interesting because those lessons never end!” Coleman Alderson
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