Anne Pratt wrote:Cheli, Margaret, welcome! So happy to have you here.
This thread has had some discussion of modifications we can make to our practices to make gardening accessible as we get less strong and mobile, and I would like to encourage more of this talk!
What else, folks, can we do to make our homesteading lives last longer?
We talked about higher raised beds. What about specialized tools? Modifications to pathways? Perennial vegetables and flowers? Congregate living?
I wanted to expand my garden this year but at age 76 the prospect of digging out sod was disheartening. My soil is also very rocky. I opted for straw bale gardening. I used 32 conditioned bales to provide a raised surface to plant into. Another plus is no weeding! I used landscape cloth for paths and did wide spacing. After the growing season ends I'll take up the cloth and spread the de-composting straw on the ground. That will be my path area next year and I hope to move to a Ruth Stout planting style after that. Most plants thrived in the straw- tomatoes in particular. I am now exploring was to preserve my harvest with dehydrating and fermenting.
