March 19: Gardening

Melanie: 

Biophlia design helps to understand that we as human beings need to include other living systems in our lives. When we design our cities we need to include the environment. Many people actually are bio phobic and don't actually do anything to help the environment, but they will donate money to organizations just to make themselves feel better. This is really cool if we would instill this concept more in our lives. The point of this is that we must be willing to change and take care of what we have, for people that are coming after us, without it we have nothing.

Growing Indoors:

Planting indoors is good; it helps keep plants away from all the harsh Florida weather that can happen. You must have the proper lighting, the correct pot. Don't get a pot that will collect a lot of water.

Seeds must b taken outside occasionally, they can get sun burns, which is next I never thought that seeds could actually get a sun burn. It sounds funny to even talk about.

Growing your our food can be empowering, many say it's a way to learn how to be self sufficient. Being able to grow your own food is the way to freedom and this can teach you important values. You don't have to rely on anyone beside yourself. 

Meredith:

By growing our own garden, we begin the journey of sustaining ourselves and maintaining a healthier lifestyle. If you have ever had fruit or vegatables from a tree or vine, you know that it instantly tastes fresher than foods you have purchased at a grocery store. Gardening should be fun and enjoyable and you will learn something new each year, whether that be a new growing technique, a new harvesting sign, or a new tool to use. It is important to make certain that you learn from your mistakes and begin to improve your garden every year because the more you grow, the more you will learn.

Beginning with a small, well-maintained garden is better than a large, unkept one when you start gardening for the first time. Keeping a garden journal will ensure that your garden continues to get better because one of the trickiest thing to do when living in Florida is knowing what and when to plant. Growing fruits and vegetables is all about location. It is importnat to choose a site where plants won't grow long and strectched to a point where diseases and insects will move in. Do not plant fruits and vegetables where there is competition for water and nutrients because you want to make sure they prosper. We grow by interacting with nature, so instead of cutting it off, we need to surround ourselves by it on a daily basis.



Cristina:
I really enjoy that we have reached a point in the class that where we are learning how to be proactive and can do it in a fun way. Over the last couple of weeks I have been doing service learning at the Food Forrest and have learned tips on how to grow  vegetables and fruit. My experience itself has been awesome and challenging in the sense that there is always something new to learn every time I volunteer. More importantly I loved being able to pick up the required reading and connect my experiences to the material. I enjoyed watching the video at the end of class because it highlights the success of someone who is applying the knowledge every single day.

Some tips I've learned along the way:
1. Plan, plan, plan: do your research
2. Start small: plant only what you'll know you'll use and what you have time to maintain
3. Stay optimistic: its a journey
4. Continue to do research
5. Have fun! & enlist help from others

Kristin: 

I learned alot in reading and doing some research for the chapter we presented this week. I don't know much about growing my own food and I have never had my own garden so I enjoy learning about how one starts their own garden. I think there were a lot of useful tips and I think that I could start my own garden with more confidence because I read this chapter. I think that the charts on when you can plant what could be very helpful. After reading this I see how important it is to plant at the right time n I really like having a resource such as these charts to help me if I decide to start my own garden. I like that our chapter wasn't so much focusing on the past and what has gone wrong but rather on helpful tips and information to help us move forward and become more informed on things such as growing our own food.