Entries Tagged 'Garden tally' ↓

Compost bin built out of our old back fence, filled with leaves and last winter's food scraps

• Money
• Seeds: $4.58
• Time
• About 9 hours removing our old back fence and building a compost bin out of it, building and turning a compost pile of leaves raked from our and our neighbor’s yards and partially composted food scraps (mixing them together should make them break down faster than either the leaves or food scraps would on their own), sowing green manure in empty areas planned for summer crops, edging the sidewalk (it was getting rather narrow due to overgrowth) and starting seeds.
• Harvest
• A couple small handfuls of basil and marjoram from indoor plants
• Improvements
• Compost bin built and busy composting dead leaves and the winter’s food scraps

I’ve been wondering about my garden’s rate of return (the value of the harvest compared to the time and money invested), so I’ve decided to keep track of how much money and time I spend on the garden this year, and how much harvest I get in return. Calling the value of my harvest a ’savings’ on groceries would be a little bit of a lie, since there are some things I’m growing that I wouldn’t buy at grocery store prices, like fresh raspberries. I’ll be preserving other items, like the Asian Pickled Green Beans and Jalapeno Vinegar that Shaun loves and that I’ve never seen sold, but also freezing and canning some tomatoes – should those count at fresh produce prices, or can-of-diced-tomatoes prices? I guess I’ll have some time to figure that out, since my big preserving time is still months away. Anyway, here’s the first installment, and the tally for January and February:

• Money
• Seeds: $71.30
  [Clarification: I purchased seeds from 5 different places, so $14.70 of this was for shipping, leaving $56.60 spent actually on seeds. I know I should have concentrated my orders more, but there were certain varieties I really wanted to try, and each seemed to only be available from one place!]
• Soil & Amendments: $6.75
• Time
• About 2 hours actually planting (starting seeds indoors and winter sowing) so far.
• I spent a lot of my spare time in January planning – flipping through seed catalogs, making a planting calendar and drawing up a plan of my yard to figure out how to expand the garden this year. I have no idea how much time I spent. Many hours, many of them probably unnecessary, but I was having fun.
• Harvest
• A couple sprigs of basil and marjoram from my overwintered indoor plants