My five month “sabbatical” is over and it’s a great feeling to be back scratching out the garden column.
It’s five years since I submitted my first column for approval to the editor, Alistair Taylor.
The interest in small space gardening was to be the focus, whether it was bowl on the window sill or a pot on the deck.
There was a host of readers out there spanning several generations who had no experience in raising even a small patch of greens.
The skills we had learned in the 30s and 40s had not been passed down to our descendants.
The great shift in society occurred when mothers began to hold full time jobs outside the home. Keeping the family fed was solved by wheeling into the grocery store on the way home from the office. There was no time for the demands of tending a food garden.
The Slow Food movement, which began in Europe late in the last century, eventually engulfed our continent.
Embracing the idea of fresh, locally-grown organic food was considered very cool, in fact it was enthralling.
Fortunately, my editor was adept at reading the interesting shifts in community development and he supported the idea of a column based on small space veggie production for emerging gardeners.
This column was only a small cog in the simultaneous changing attitude and interest in the process of growing one’s own food. What a revelation! North Island College was on a parallel track and has since produced a constant stream of classes, film nights, and hands-on experience with raising food for its students and the public. Two community gardens are thriving and there are more under consideration. Residents flock to the classes held at the Community Garden Centre beside St. Peter’s Church. Watch the Mirror this month for the unveiling of Campbell River’s Online Food Map! To view my gardening blog go to www.islandfocus.blogspot.com
