[Pil-pc-oceania] work load of a garden

[jedd]

On Tuesday 24 April 2007 6:41 pm, Dr Bob Rich wrote:
> Ted, at one time I had a 3 m x 3 m garden. It took a lot of work to
> set it up because it was on sterile clay fill, but I used a no-dig
> method and in effect built topsoil from compost. Once it was
> established, it yielded all the vegies for a family of two adults and
> two little children all the year around, for about half an hour of
> work per day.

 Hi Bob,

 That's pretty impressive.  I've heard varying estimates on how much
 space you need to sustainably produce vegetables for a single adult,
 but it's usually cited at somewhere between 50 and 100 square metres.

 I suspect that includes a bunch of storage vegetables (tubers, dried
 beans, pumpkins, and so on) so that there isn't a month here and
 there where you're eating nothing but radishes and spinach.

 I also gather that any tree crops are typically excluded from these
 estimates, as the space they require varies so much between sites.

 (Presumably because it's implied that they tend to fend for themselves
 once established, as compared to fruit and veg that is assumed will
 pretty much always be in an artificially (water, weed control, mulch)
 assisted environment - so you *can* squeeze the space down.)

 Did you keep a record of what you planted and when with that plot?

 Jedd.