Ok, tomes have already been written about this. Between Barbara Kingsolver’s Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, and Michael Pollan’s The Omnivore’s Dilemma, I’m not sure how much I can add that isn’t bordering on mindless cliche.
That said, I’ll still sum up.
1) Food grown in your garden requires minimal fossil fuels. Sure, the tools, fertilizer, and seeds are likely shipped from somewhere, but once you’ve made those investments, there is no oil required. Even if you don’t aspire to be an advocate for the environment, in this day and age of high food prices due to high fuel prices, that can be chalked up as a win.
2) You (somewhat) control your food supply. Without getting into politics, there are a lot of reasons to want to have some control over your supply of fresh food. If you need more information, I highly suggest the books listed above.
3) The almighty dollar. So long as you stick to the basics, gardening can be economical. I’m fairly certain that my lettuce crop alone will more than cover my gardening expenses for the year. Not to mention the spinach, chard, onions, shelling peas, snow peas, herbs, et. al. that are gracing my table.
4) Nutrition. If you have no other reason to garden, the food is devastatingly tasty. Sure, at some point you may be doing battle with slugs or feeling compelled to do a rain dance, but at the end of the day, the food is simply top notch. Eating vegetables should be a joy, not a chore.
Ki —— Lettuce eat veggies! I’m so glad you’re having fun w/your blog. I need every bit of helpful veggie garden advice I can find since I’m in such an inhospitable Zone 3B/4 and I’m completely unprepared to cope w/unseasonal things like late spring snowfall, hail damage, burrowing gophers, etc. My raised beds didn’t quite evolve enough for me to plant very much in the way of lettuce varieties this year, but we’re going to take off like bolting spinach next spring. I’ve got some; just not enough to have the salads every day that I’d planned on this summer. That was also a great tip about the Swiss chard. I’d never sequentially harvested those before. Well, off to delve further into your photos….. Thanx!