Feed Themselves

16 Comments

1. 

   Otto Hildebrand February 20, 2012 at 7:57 pm -

   Simply put and clearly understood….but we all need to follow our understanding with ACTION!
   Thanks Mel

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     Mel Bartholomew February 20, 2012 at 9:17 pm -

     Thanks so much for your comment Otto, but tell me what you consider action? Do you agree that we should help those in need until they can start helping themselves? But then the problem is, everything I can see in past history is that it becomes easier to continue helping people than it is to help them learn to become independent as soon as they can. For example, feeding the hungry. We’re not talking about emergency situations here. We’re talking about long term hunger and malnutrition. It becomes much easier for an organization to solicit funds for donations, order a lot of food packed in tins and boxes, ship them over and hand them out.

     It’s easy then to say, “There, we’ve done our bit and it makes us feel good about ourselves.” The recipients are enticed to think that this can be a permanent solution to their hunger problem and it requires no more work than standing in a line. The end result is that no one is really happy, it’s not really a solution, they will continue to be hungry and the organization providing this wonderful aid will still be in the business of providing aid forever.

     There are obviously many people in the world that will not be able to help themselves because of their health, conditions or location. We’re not talking about those. We’re talking about the majority who could learn to become independent and self-sufficient.

     The other general thinking that I have observed is that it’s easier to try and teach them our methods, like big agricultural farming, improved seeds, fertilizer, tractors, lots of land, transportation, etc. However it has been proven again and again that they won’t use it, can’t use it, and don’t want to use it. I would challenge anyone to find an easier, better way for anyone in the world to start feeding themselves healthy, fresh, organic vegetables than to grow them in a Square Foot Garden. If you study all of the advantages of SFG, you’ll realize that it truly is possible.
     Thank you again for your letter Otto. If you have any thoughts or solutions about people and organizations taking the right action, please share them with us.

     Best Wishes,
     Mel

2. 

   Otto Hildebrand February 20, 2012 at 11:36 pm -

   Mel,
   No, I agree your summation of the problem and the solution. Give a man a fish and feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and he will feed himself for life….or something close to that.
   I do think that SFG is the answer!
   Thanks

3. 

   Tom February 21, 2012 at 10:09 am -

   Well said Mel. Especially the “dependency cycle”. A lot of folks “stay in business” due to this approach. Not that I’m against business’ per se (I work for myself) but this is one area that needs a “break” in the cycle.

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     Mel Bartholomew February 23, 2012 at 9:21 pm -

     Dear Tom,

     I’m intrigued by your thinking, Tom. And your observation about “being in business.” Let’s do a little talking and brainstorming on that point. What do you mean by “being in business” for the dependency need of someone? Do you mean, for example, a corner convenience store who is able to charge fairly high prices for food and drinks because there is no competing big box or grocery store nearby? They have to pay a high rent and a high insurance to be in a city area and they stand to take a huge loss from any vandalism. So maybe it all works out.

     Another example might be even a government agency whose employees only have jobs because of the workload, and if that workload were to decrease, their job might be in jeopardy or their hours might be cut back. I guess we could find all kinds of situations where you would want to perpetuate your job, even if it’s sweeping the floor, you might make it necessary to sweet in both directions, thereby filling the hours of the day. That kind of seems like just human nature. We want to protect ourselves.

     I remember in the army, when things were slack, we were all told to grab our shovels and half of the group went out and dug ditches. As we moved to a new area, we found out later that in the barracks, another group had the job of filling up our ditches. That kept everyone busy and out of trouble, with no need to grumble about their lack of work.

     I remember reading about Mayor Rudy Guiliani of New York City, who stated that he found a primary purpose and motivation of the education department was solely to keep their jobs and fill their hours. That seemed very critical, but he said it had nothing to do with teaching the children and giving them a good education. We all laugh and criticize any road project as we point out how many people are standing around with their hands on their shovel while one or two people dig the hole. In addition, we see several supervisors standing with their arms folded or hands on their hips, watching the whole operation. Is this allowed in private practice? Not if they want to break even or make a profit.

     I don’t know what the solution is for all of these things, especially because you’re fighting against human nature. We probably all agree it should be done, but maybe it’s the old “I’m all for it, but not in my area!” situation. Are those the kind of situations you’re thinking of, and can you add any to them, along with a suggested correction of the problem? I guess we could sum up most people’s attitude that if you really need something, I’ll give it to you. But I expect you to do something to supply yourself the next time. If you’re entitled to something, that’s a whole other ball game. And that’s where a lot of different opinions come in. Thanks again for your thoughts.

     Best Wishes,

     Mel

     Best Wishes,
     Mel

4. 

   John Wheeler February 21, 2012 at 12:50 pm -

   Mel, I have been a fan of your system since before the PBS show came out. I agree that the solution to world hunger is teaching people to feed themselves.

   I think there are two systems that are better at feeding people: John Jeavons’ Biointensive is more productive, and Bill Mollison’s Permaculture is less work. However, they are both far more complex than SFG, taking months to learn and years to master.

   For people who are just learning to garden, or those who only know what the seed packets tell them, I highly recommend they learn SFG first. For those who lack time or energy, I point them to your new system; those for whom money is the limitation I tell to choose your old system. (I prefer your old system myself, simply because I have a desk job and actually want the extra effort of the old system.)

   Both John Jeavons through Ecology Action and Bill Mollison through the Permaculture Institute are teaching people around the world to feed themselves. I’m glad to see you are concerned too.

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     Mel Bartholomew February 23, 2012 at 4:15 am -

     John,

     Hey your letter was very welcomed and quite a challenge to answer. You mentioned two other systems that are popular and I don’t think the French intensive method is more productive. Actually, it wastes more space than Square Foot Gardening, but of course nowhere near single row gardening, so that’s good. It also is a foreign farming method that’s been modified so it could be used in backyard gardens, which is good. It’s been very popular and I remember when I studied it and tried to do it, the reason I tried and quit was because it’s too much work.

     I thought if we were going to get most of the Americans and then people around the world to garden, the non-gardeners, we need a method that is almost no work whatsoever. And it’s practical in anyone’s backyard, even if they live in the city, so that’s why I developed Square Foot Gardening, and I think it accomplishes all of those things. You summed up very nicely the other two systems by saying that they are both far more complex than Square Foot Gardening, taking months to learn and years to master.

     John, if we’re going to get everyone to garden, they’re not going to even listen if it’s going to take months to learn and years to master, and we’re certainly not going to get the world that’s starving to do the same thing. It’s hard enough to get them to start Square Foot Gardening, which is so simple. We’ve modified it for third world countries, and it could, started and done, and producing within three to six months, and that also includes making their own compost and producing their own growing soil.

     I also like how you’ve said people learning to garden and those who only know what the seed packet tells them. Well, of course, we know the seed packet says sprinkle a whole packet of seeds out along your row, then once they sprout, go out and thin out 95 percent of them, so you leave only one spindly stalk every six or nine inches. What a waste of seeds. When we have groups going overseas, the first thing they ask us is, “Can you give us a lot of seeds to take?” And I say, “Study the SFG system, and you won’t waste seeds. You only need 5 percent of what you’d normally take.”

     I was also interested in your comment that you prefer the old system, which the original book, published in 1981, said dig up six inches deep of your existing soil in an area four feet by four feet, pile it off to the side, and on a tarp and mix in two inches each of peat moss, vermiculite, and compost, thereby resulting in twelve inches of improved existing soil. Put that back in your hole, which you’re now in need of a six inch deep box to contain the twelve inches of improved soil.

     As I went around the country lecturing, a lot of people came up and said, well, it works pretty good but – and you know when anyone says “BUT”, that trouble’s ahead. They said it was a lot of work digging up that six inches away of the worst soil possible here, and it’s tough digging, and it takes a lot of tools, and I thought, okay, let’s go back to the drawing board, and that’s when I developed a no-dig method and after experimenting for several years, I found out that all plants will grow in six inches of perfect soil better than twelve inches of improved soil. Why do you need to dig? You don’t!

     That was one of the big problems I had with a French-intensive method. My Lord, that’s called double digging and you have to go down, I think, nine inches, and then another nine inches, eighteen inches, some even said twenty-four inches. Holy mackerel, and you’ve got to to do it every year. Square Foot Fardening, there’s no digging, and think now, that means you don’t need any tools whatsoever. The only tool you need for working in your soil is a trowel. A simple trowel. And in third world countries, we use a stick. How easy can that be? The other big reason that is so simple is because we never walk on our growing soil. It never gets packed down, and you don’t have to turn it over every spring when it’s wet and mucky and you ruin the structure of the soil by digging in it. Our Square Foot Gardens are put to bed in the fall, covered, and in the spring they’re ready to plant. The soil makes us continually improve by adding a handful of compost every time you harvest a single square foot, and replant it with a different crop.

     But I know what you mean about you need the exercise, so you like to dig and that’s why you like the old system. That was just one of the ten major improvements in this system, when I wrote the, the 2007 version of Square Foot Gardening. It eliminated digging and all the tools you need, but if you still like to do that work, go do it. But please, teach any friends and neighbors the all-new system where there is no digging. I think they’ll like it much better.

     I’m glad to see you concerned too about solving world hunger. That’s our main mission, is solve world hunger using Square Foot Gardening or, as we’ve now developed, it’s Square Meter Gardening. I think it’ll work. I think people will take to it, they’ll learn it, and they can do it. They don’t need any land. They, first of all, they don’t own any land, and they don’t even need permission, cause we’re just growing in boxes. I’ve been doing world hunger stuff for many, many years with projects in Indian, Africa, Haiti, the Philippines, Peru, all of South America, all of Central America, just all over the place where we can get people that would like to improve their well-being and start becoming self-sufficient, especially those that live in urban areas that don’t have a lot of land. People can grow a dinner salad in just a four foot by four foot box, and another supper, vegetables in one more four by four box. In Haiti, we’ve even put the boxes up on their flat rooftops. That worked very well for vandalism and the marauding goats that come and eat everything down there. Thanks again for your letter, it was very stimulating and I really appreciate all your information and thinking.

     Best wishes,
     Mel B.

5. 

   Jacques Richer February 21, 2012 at 6:07 pm -

   I consider SFG a tool. It’s a very good tool, and I use a technique very much like it in my own garden. I don’t think it’s necessarily _the_ solution to this particular problem, but I do think it’s a useful part of the solution. Bridge aid will probably be necessary in many cases – so that people don’t starve while waiting for things to grow. Water harvesting and composting techniques will undoubtedly be necessary to provide the infrastructure needed for your techniques to be effective. Soil building methods will be helpful in many cases, while probably not strictly ‘necessary’.

   I agree with what you’ve said as far as it goes, but even something as basic as SFG has underpinnings that are important to having it work correctly. I believe your approach is simple, and possible – but by no means easy.

   • 

     Mel Bartholomew February 22, 2012 at 9:22 pm -

     Dear Jacques,

     I’m glad you like Square Foot Gardening and consider it a tool. I think it’s a very effective tool. Especially when you remember that the only tool, the real tool, you need in Square Foot Gardening, is a trowel. In third world countries, Jaques, we use just a stick. So that’s free.

     I’m not sure why you don’t think SFG is not the solution to the particular problem. I’m not sure what problem you’re referring to, but if it’s third world countries or feeding the homeless or solving world hunger, I think it is the solution. The world has tried everything else and they’re still sending food overseas and it’s never worked. So why don’t we try something new, especially if it’s free, simple, and easy, and everyone can do it? But I appreciate your say in that it’s a useful part of the solution. We’ve got to bend your arm a little bit so you can see that it is the total solution if it’s really put into place.

     Now bridge aid, yes, of course, it must be there in place to get people before they can become self sufficient. That’s a no brainer. And we’re going to have to continue to feed and take care of people until they learn to take care of themselves, but that’s part of the problem, is no one seems to be trying to show them how they can take care of themselves and become self sufficient. We just keep doing for them and they’re never going to be on their own. They’ll never have a chance if we don’t show them how. You’re absolutely right. We don’t want them to starve while they’re waiting for things to grow.

     In fact, when we went into third world countries before and we told them all about the wonderful Square Meter Gardening system, and it’s not made with regular Mel’s Mix, it’s too expensive for a poor person, so we have them grow in pure compost, homemade compost. Well, they’re all excited about planting, but then we tell them it’s going to take three to six months to make enough compost for your garden. They lose interest right then and there. “That’s too much work,” they think. So what we’ve done now is we go in the third world country and we ask around the village or get the mayor to sign up people that like to learn and earn some money, is “How would you like to make a product that will bring in money for you and it’s free?” Well everyone raises their hand, we teach them composting and it is free to make. You make a compost pile out of things that everyone else is throwing away.

     It doesn’t matter where you are, what country you’re in, everyone has material for composting. In fact, most third world countries are in the tropics and they have lots of growing stuff that’s just thrown away or never used. Once they learn how to make compost and start it, they then have a product they can sell. There’ll always be someone that wants good homemade compost for their garden and these would be the middle class or upper class. Once they start a small business like this, we then suggest they keep a little bit of their compost out for themselves and start building a Square Meter Garden. That will bring in more money, and so they put the grid on and start growing and pretty soon they’re in business.

     They’re also tempted and hopefully will start eating some of that produce. They say we’ve bridged that gap of waiting for the crops to grow or the compost to ripen. As far as water harvesting, don’t forget Square Foot Gardening. It takes only ten percent of the water of conventional row gardening. That means you have to go down to the stream and bring back just one bucket instead of ten buckets to water your garden to get the same harvest. How’s that for a big savings? The end result is soil building will be helpful, but totally unnecessary with Square Meter Gardening. So why try and improve it?

     It’s the same thing in our country. Every state I go in, everyone says, “We have the worst growing soil here you could imagine.” So I say, “Why do you keep doing single row gardening where you have to improve your existing soil and use all that fertilizer? Forget about that. Do Square Foot Gardening where you don’t improve your existing soil, you don’t even dig it up. No tools needed, no money spent.” Your last paragraph, Jochs, said even Square Foot Gardening, as simple as it is, or basic, has underpinnings that are important to have it work correctly. I think we’ve covered all the underpinnings, I’m not sure if you would want any more.

     Please write and tell me what else you can do that would detract from a simple, easy, gardening method that is extremely successful. We’ve taken care of the soil, we’ve eliminated fertilizer, we’ve made everything free so far, we’ve cut out 90% of the water, it also cuts out 80% of the space needed. So even those in third world countries who don’t own any land can still have room to garden. They don’t need a lot of property and they don’t need permission to garden because they’re not digging up the existing soul.

     And please write and tell me about your last sentence. You said, “I believe your approach is simple and possible, but by no means easy.” I can’t imagine anything easier than Square Foot Gardening. Remember, three simple steps. Build a box out of scrap free lumber, fill it with Mel’s Mix, add a grid, and start planting. What could be easier than that? The soil lasts forever as long as every time a square food is harvested, you add a trowel full of your homemade compost, which is free, and you replant that square foot with a different crop, that’s where you get crop rotation.

     I really appreciate your letter because it gives me a chance to explain perhaps a little bit fuller the simplicity of Square Foot Gardening, and why it all ties together, one part of it affects another. And the more you think about it and the more you realize, no tools, reduction in everything, and yet there’s 100% of the harvest. If I missed anything, please let me know. I’d love to hear it and be able to talk to you about it. Thank you again for your letter. It was very stimulating and I can see you’ve done a lot of thinking on this. Question, have you been involved in any of the Feed The Homeless or help other people start a Square Foot Garden or done anything humanitarian overseas? I’d be interested in knowing about that and perhaps offering some suggestions and ideas if you are.

     Best Wishes,

     Mel B.

6. 

   David Martinez March 7, 2012 at 4:15 am -

   Hello Mel,
   I came across your videos online and I can really see that you have a good heart and a passion for what you do. After watching and reading about your square foot gardening system, I am convinced that it can help many people throughout the world. I already ordered your book and it should arrive soon. I am excited to put your system into practice, plus I plan to build one for my sister and her family.

   I am also interested in learning the process of teaching square meter gardening to third world countries, because my wife and I have been talking about doing something in the sense of mission work. I think by learning this system and then going on mission trips with our church, it would be a great tool to have if we see opportunities to teach the system.
   But to tell you the truth, I have never gardened in my life, nor helped solve the hunger problem, so it would be all new to me. Even so, it does make me think that maybe I could help out a little with this problem…
   My wife is Brazilian and speaks Portuguese and I speak Spanish, so I think we could help some people in Latin America.

   Anyhow, I am getting ahead of myself! I guess I should see if I can make my own garden work first!! haha

   I just want to say thank you for the work you are doing and the passion you have for people.

   Best Wishes,
   David Martinez

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     Mel Bartholomew March 9, 2012 at 3:36 am -

     Dear David,

     Thank you for your very complimentary letter. It’s good to start small, gradual, get the hand of the simplicity of Square Foot Gardening and then you can expand. We like to suggest that in the spring, a new person starts either one or two boxes, that’s all per person, 4×4. Then, when they’re successful with their spring crop, in the summer, they build another box. They’re doubling the size of their garden and do a spring, a summer crop, warm weather crop and then in late August in the fall they start another, add another 4×4 tripling their garden. That way they do it gradually and they’re not overwhelmed with so much to take care of.

     one year you’ll become an expert at square foot gardening. Quite often we have people that used to garden, had a big single row garden and they replaced the entire area with boxes and then they become overwhelmed because square foot gardening grows four time as much in the same area. They don’t realize that at first.

     I was intrigued by you tell me that you speak Spanish, your wife speaks Portuguese, boy we could use someone like your family in getting a lot of our work translated. Back about 10 years ago when I was in Utah and working with the Mormon student training center as well as the church, we had a lot of volunteers that were translating everything in all different kinds of languages for us. Since then, unfortunately we had a loss of all that information and we lost our website and the whole usual sad story of computers.

     As you start your garden, perhaps you, both of you will be willing to do just a page or two of some of charts or diagrams that we could then put on our website and offer this to many other people that don’t speak English and could use it. We also could distribute that out to all the people that are going out overseas with other types of organizations. The square meter gardening is so easily adapted from square foot gardening. When we did school gardening, realizing that children could not reach in as far, we made a children’s, a child’s garden 3×3, instead of an adult garden 4×4. So there’s 9 squares and we suggested the teacher take the center one and then she would have eight squares all around that for the children, each child gets their own square foot.

     Well when we started going overseas we realized that everyone uses meters instead of feet. So I realized we’d have to convert it and I had a lot of experts tell me how decimals of inches and centimeters is going to get confusing, it will take a lot of work. I looked at it and I said, you know a meter is 39 inches long, a yard is 36 inches long, for every foot that’s a difference of one inch. And the plants won’t know the difference, whether they’re growing in meters or in inches, so it doesn’t matter. And it turns out a square meter garden is almost identical to a square yard garden, 3 feet by 3 feet. So that’s what we teach overseas, a square meter garden is divided up into nine individuals, so that would be the 99 plus centimeters divided in three parts would be 33 centimeters for each square. And the number of plants in each square remains identical with square foot gardening, one, four, nine or sixteen. Remember we just take our figure and divide those squares up into either half or thirds, so you could do the same thing with a square meter garden. One nice thing about a square meter garden is that it’s small enough to have a ply wood bottom and be able to pick it up and carry it. Two people can easily pick it up and move it about.

     I tried something with the LDS church called a “humanitarian kit”, and all of the men got together in their workshops and cut and built 2×2 boxes with plywood bottoms. They used thin fencing cedar for the sides and 3/8″ thick plywood for the bottoms with drainage holes. We filled those with Mel’s Mix, added a 2×2 grid, and the original idea was for these to be stacked on a pallet and shrink wrapped. We would add some books and seeds (in SFG quantities) and ship these overseas.

     David, you’re in a perfect position to do square foot gardening and become a leader and even an Ambassador both in your church and perhaps around the world. You’re a beginner and you have never gardened before. We like to say in our lectures that if you’re in that situation, you can learn the entire system in about one hour.

     Now if you’re an expert gardener or a traditional single row gardener it’s going to take you about 3 weeks to learn this system. And the reason is of course a new person understands the information, they look at it and they say, well sure, that makes sense. An expert or a long time gardener looks at it and it’s so different from what they’d been taught all their lives, they start questioning every little thing and then they even get into, well that wouldn’t work, I don’t think that can happen. So, just go ahead and learn the basic system and you’re going to do real well.

     Please keep in touch and join our forum on our website and add your thoughts as a beginner. Take some pictures of how you start and then write a little narrative and pass that on and share that with others. And as you gain more experience you can start helping others start their gardens and then as I mentioned before perhaps both you and your wife could become certified instructors, that’s also on the website of how to take that course and how to do it. Then you’ll have your own website that’s just for certified instructors and they communicate with each other, share pictures and experiences. There’s also a way to make a fair amount of money doing that also, you give classes charge for them, you sell books, videos you can give workshops, you can do all those things either for free as a volunteer helping many people in organizations or you can do it as a small business. So thank you for joining the ranks and good luck with all your endeavours.

     Best wishes and happy gardening,

     Mel

7. 

   Jane Jordan April 17, 2012 at 5:04 pm -

   Hi Mel, just started my own square foot garden, mainly to test it for a project a friend and I are starting in a tiny orphanage in Tanzania. We want to install a garden in the orphanage and then take the concept to the village as a community garden. Our biggest question was the growing medium – and this article has completely answered it! You’ve evn given me an idea for a small business for the orphanage as in making compost to sell. So simple, so genius.

   THANKS! I’ve become a huge fan

   Jane

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     Mel Bartholomew April 25, 2012 at 8:02 pm -

     Jane,

     Oh, I’m excited about what you’re doing: starting a Square Foot Garden for an orphanage. That’s been one of my favorite projects. I’ve always thought that an orphanage would be a perfect place in a third world country. First of all, there are usually buildings and there’s usually a courtyard which is fairly protected from outside influences. It’s run for children and they have a kitchen there and there’s room for gardens in the courtyard or in the surrounding areas. And kids love to garden, and if we could teach them at an early age how they can be self-sustaining and grow their own food, then they’ll be healthier and happier for the rest of their lives.

     I’m so glad that you’ve found the answer and, of course, it is compost. And it’s made from all free things that other people throw away. The kids love to go out and it’s almost like a scavenger hunt. We did that that in a couple of countries where each child was given a list of a couple of things they needed to get. And it really was a scavenger hunt; they had to get manure from a cow and manure from a donkey. And of course they went out and collected it in a plastic bag and they brought it back and then we had them get certain kinds of weeds and different things like that. Part of it would be they had to bring back eggshells and all the different things that people throw away that belong in a compost pile. It made it so much fun that they thought it was a game! But the pile grew and pretty soon, they were making compost.

     Your idea of making it to sell; yes, that is perfect. What we do, if we go to another country or sometimes right here in the USA, we tell a neighborhood or a group of people how simple and easy square foot gardening is, they get all excited and they’re ready to start. They want to build their boxes and get their soil right away. Well, if they can’t afford the peat moss and vermiculite and the compost, we then tell them that you have to make your own compost if you can’t buy it. Well, that takes a long time. That takes weeks and weeks, sometimes months depending on where they are and what they put in it. By the end of that period they’re all discouraged and they forget all about gardening so the whole project fails.

     What we decide to do is go in at first and say, we’re going to teach you to grow your own but first you have to have compost. It’s a viable crop, a viable product, and you can even sell it. We’re going to show you to make enough so you can sell half of it to earn some money and the other half can go to your garden. Well, they just love that idea so you’re right on target recognizing that. I’d love to hear more of your ideas, Jane, I think you’ve got quite a few of them. You might also consider getting certified, taking our home study course. Maybe both you and your friend, and maybe find a few others and get a discount on getting a group study course. That would cover all third world projects, also, and give you lots of ideas starting a small business, is that yourself or the people that you are teaching? Thanks again for your wonderful letter.

     Best Wishes,
     Mel

8. 

   Taga Migi July 26, 2012 at 5:08 pm -

   Thanks for sharing about your time in Haiti. I have been volentering in Haiti since 1995, anywhere from 2 weeks to 11 month visits. I teach in orphanages and at feeding programs.

   This year (being my first summer back in Canada I decided to try gardening (in my parents 1 acer plot. Doing reserch I came across your SFG idea and have set up 4 boxes to try next year.

   Before I came across your book (which I bought today) I had this plan to start a comunity compost in my town with the proceeds going so that I may return to teach the Haitians how to gaurden to provide or their families….

   As hard as Haiti is I believe your method will work…. THANKS!!!

   • 

     Mel Bartholomew August 2, 2012 at 1:39 pm -

     Taga,

     What an inspiring letter you’ve sent me. I want to help you get back to Haiti, and I’m particularly interested in you teaching SFG at orphanages. I thought about who we can teach with the most long term effect, and of course it points right towards children. The children are usually in a household with other family members, and have no say in family activities, along with no control of the facilities.

     However, an orphanage is the perfect place to have a kitchen garden planned, planted and harvested by all of the children. Think of the short term effects: free food, healthy, educational, activities, worthwhile environments. The long term effects are a lifetime of healthy eating.

     I’m very interested in what/why/when/where orphanages you’ve been in. Do you still have a connection so you can go back to those? We can help you out by giving you a project grant of books and videos, some even translated into Haitian creole. In addition, we will be able to give you free seeds to take along.

     Our good friends Pat and Connie in Wisconsin also have projects in Haiti. To learn the system and their context, maybe you would like to go with them this next winter and share you expertise in their projects? Then you could strike out on your own with experience and confidence. If that sounds interesting to you, we want to encourage you to proceed and make plans for your travels and projects in Haiti. Please let me know your thoughts.

     Happy Gardening,
     Mel

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     Mel Bartholomew August 21, 2012 at 4:08 pm -

     Hi,
     Usually Mel’s answer is posted in print here, but he wants to try something new and different! So what else is new? He wants to record his answer so not only will the person asking the question can hear it, he wants to let you hear his answer so it will be posted as click here to hear Mel’s answer. How’s that for an idea?

     Click Here