395 "Survival Garden" Basics

Show Transcript

395 TRANSCRIPT Survival Garden

Farmer Fred:

[0:00] Today, Master Gardener and Vegetable Expert Gail Pothour and I explore the concept of the survival garden, not just as a means of year-round sustenance, but a pathway to nutritious living. We discuss the practicalities of growing calorie-rich yet nutritious family foods such as corn, beans, potatoes, and a lot more while considering their yield and family preferences. Get tips on high-fiber foods, year-round crops, and effective harvest preservation, all aimed at enriching your diet and gardening experience. It's episode 395 of the Garden Basics with Farmer Fred podcast, Survival Garden Basics. We're podcasting from the Barking Dog Studios here in the beautiful Abutilon jungle in suburban purgatory. Let's go!

Farmer Fred:

[0:47] Although the term ‘survival garden’ does sound kind of ominous, It's a term that for a certain generation of listeners just might conjure up images of an impending nuclear holocaust or serious social unrest. Well, let's make that term a bit more user friendly today. Consider a survival garden if you're attempting to wean your family away from ultra processed foods and get them eating a little bit healthier. Or maybe you're aware of the blandness and nutritional deficits of grocery store fruits and vegetables due to the demands of commercial agriculture to produce food that primarily looks good and it can handle the rigors of shipping long distances and can last a long time in a warehouse storage bin. We've talked about that in the past on this show, about studies that have shown the nutritional decline in modern hybrid vegetables versus the varieties of more than a a half century ago, which had much more nutritional quality.

Back in October of 2024, there was an issue of Modern Farmer magazine, and there was an article entitled “Growing a Survival Garden, 10 calorie dense crops you can grow at home”. It looked at those crops that were the easiest to grow, that are the greatest sources of calories or nutrients that will fill you up and keep you satiated. And the crops mentioned included corn, beans, winter squash, potatoes, beets, lentils, chickpeas, garbanzo beans, Jerusalem artichokes (sometimes called sunchokes), sweet potatoes, and mushrooms. Well, the article was okay in its limited way, but there's definitely more to growing food than just picking those that are good sources of calories and nutrients.

Farmer Fred:

[2:23] There are questions you have to ask yourself, though, if you're going to be starting a survival garden. Which crops produce the most food? Even though corn is on the top of that list in that Modern Farmer article, one stalk of corn may only produce a few ears per six-foot stalk, maybe as low as just two ears. Nor is it a crop that will last very long nutritionally in your refrigerator. Corn has a short life, with one notable exception, and we'll talk about that. Winter crops. This article didn't go much into cool season vegetables that you could grow so you could also eat fresh in winter and spring. Most of the crops mentioned in the article will produce their finished product during the warm months. What are the cool season crops, including the perennial cool season crops, that you can harvest, especially in more mild climates during the winter and spring? Which crops, by the way, will your family eat? That's always a question a lot of beginning gardeners forget to ask themselves. It's better to plant test plots of unfamiliar ones before committing a lot of garden space in the survival garden to something that doesn't have a lot of what we will call local popularity in your household. And perhaps the biggest question that needs an answer that wasn't answered in this article is, which crops have the longest storage life and how do you store them? We'll be tackling a lot of those questions today. Sacramento County Master Gardener and Vegetable Growing Aficionado Gail Pothour is with us.

Farmer Fred:

[3:47] Gail, that was a very interesting article, wasn't it, about the 10 most, I guess you'd say, filling crops, really, and nutritionally dense crops that one could grow.

Gail Pothour:

[3:56] It was an interesting article, and I can agree with some of what is in the article. I also agree with what you said, that some of it may not be a wise thing to grow space-wise. You may not get a lot of bang for your buck. But there's a lot of other vegetables that aren't on that list that I would put on that list.

Farmer Fred:

[4:18] I found a few myself, too.

Gail Pothour:

[4:19] Oh, yeah. And I think, for me, the most nutritious vegetables are going to be ones that you eat regularly, that your family enjoys, and that you're going to eat. I mean, all vegetables have nutrition, and some just more than others. And, you know, in my way of thinking, the most nutritious ones are the ones you're going to be eating regularly. In your diet, a wide variety of different kinds of vegetables because they have different nutritional value, different vitamins, antioxidants, and that sort of thing. So yeah, we could really add to that list.

Farmer Fred:

[4:56] One subject she did not tackle, and I'm surprised the article doesn't touch on those crops you can grow that have a lot of fiber, because if you're looking to be satiated from what you've eaten, well, nothing slows down your appetite more than a high fiber food.

Gail Pothour:

[5:13] And fills you up.

Farmer Fred:

[5:14] exactly. And keeps you away from snacking or whatever. So we'll probably mention a few high fiber foods that could be added to this list. So let's start with corn. by the way, folks, this won't be a negative podcast about this article, but we just want to tweak it a little bit. I think growing sweet corn might not be the best use of your land if you have a limited amount of land and your whole goal is to grow as much food as possible.

Gail Pothour:

[5:45] I agree. I am growing corn this year. I don't grow it every year, but about every other year just because I love fresh sweet corn. But because of the way it's pollinated, it's pollinated by the wind. And so you can't just grow a few plants. I've seen people grow four plants in a container. You're not going to get very good pollination. So you need to have at least a block, four by four minimum, a little bit larger if you could, so that all those silks get pollinated, fertilized. Each one of those silks becomes a potential kernel of corn. So there's a lot of pollination that has to go for corn. And it does take up a fair amount of space. And you may only get one or two ears per stock. And it's not generally a quick-growing crop, depending on the variety you're growing. It could be a late-season crop. It takes three months, depending on what you're growing. So yeah, it's something I do enjoy growing, just because I like the sweet corn. But it may not be the best use of the space if you're trying to get a lot of crop that you could store. Or you could dry, you could freeze, or whatever your manner of preserving would be.

Farmer Fred:

[6:59] And with corn, your preservation is limited, but we'll talk about one cure for that in just a second here. A lot of people don't realize there are a lot of different sweet corn variety groups, if you will. You've got the SE, the SH2, the SU, things like that, the synergistic ones as well. The SH2 probably would be the best one to use in this situation. It has twice the sugar content of the SU varieties and the rate of conversion of sugar to starch is slower. And that extends, as they say, the post-harvest quality. So SH2 varieties of sweet corn are going to last the longest and also be the sweetest. And they included such varieties as 3680B. Oh, don't you love a good 3680B?, Aspen, challenger, and super sweet jubilee. I planted a super sweet jubilee in my yard this year. So we'll see how that turns out.

Gail Pothour:

[7:58] Yeah, the SH2, those are the super sweets. And sometimes they will just be listed that way as super sweet. Whereas the SE are the sugary enhanced. So there's a lot of different types. The old fashioned corn that some of us grew up on are the standard sugary. There's also triple sweets. So, I mean, there's a whole lot of new types of corn that they're developing. With the old standards, it was always promoted that first you boil your water. Once the water is ready to boil, then you go pick the corn and put it in because the starch converts, the sugar converts to starch pretty quickly. So, a lot of these hybrids, the sugar enhanced, the super sweets, they stay sweet a little bit longer. So you don't have to boil the water and immediately harvest it. It will last longer, but over time, they will still get a little bit starchy, you know, so you can't keep them in the fridge for weeks.

Farmer Fred:

[8:59] The old standard varieties, though, could germinate better in colder soil. That's one of the drawbacks of the super sweets is they need really warm soil. You wouldn't be putting those in the ground until June, for example.

Gail Pothour:

[9:12] And with the corn being wind pollinated, if you're growing several different types, it can interfere with the pollination. And some of your super sweets could have some starchier kernels. And yeah, so it's kind of complicated. Typically, cross-pollination would only manifest itself in the seed for next year, if you saved the seed. But with corn, it's a little different. So it will affect this year's crop.

Farmer Fred:

[9:41] Yes, you will see it if things have gone awry.

Gail Pothour:

[9:44] Especially if you're growing popcorn next to sweet corn, that type of thing.

Farmer Fred:

[9:48] Well, you can if you time it right. That's what I'm trying to test in my garden this year with growing corn, is I put in the early variety, the SU variety, I think it was silver queen, which is a white corn. And it's already three feet tall. And I'm sure I'll be harvesting it because I planted it in early April, I do believe. So that's, I think it's 100 days for that. No, it's 88 days for that. So what would that be like, May, June, mid-July? But because it takes a while for them to tassel to produce that pollen, you can go ahead and plant popcorn if it was, if that first, ordinary sweet corn had 88 days to harvest, then probably by day 70 or so, you could be planting popcorn because it won't be ready for quite a while.

Gail Pothour:

[10:42] Typically, you need to isolate. You can either do it by distance, which means none of your neighbors could be growing corn, you know, so you have to isolate by quite a while, or by their maturity date when the silks and the tassels come out. So you could do it that way. I don't have a large enough garden to do that. So I grow one type. That's it.

Farmer Fred:

[11:05] Yeah, I've actually got three types of corn going. I've got this in a bed in a four by four section, the Silver Queen, which is the early season variety. And then that super sweet variety I have is called Super Sweet Jubilee. And oh, you're going to like this. I have that growing in a barrel. Okay. But I just want to test it, so I'll probably get at least one ear.

Gail Pothour:

[11:28] Sure. I mean, and you could go out there and shake the tassels and all that and hopefully get some fertilization, but it's always fun to try it differently. But generally for corn, you need to have it in a good size block in order to get good pollination.

Farmer Fred:

[11:44] Right. So I'm just doing it as a test. I've grown sweet corn in barrels before, and production is small.

Gail Pothour:

[11:50] To say the least. And I've had not so good pollination in a block that's six by five. Maybe there wasn't enough wind or the wind direction was the wrong way. And, you know, so I don't get a lot of the kernels filled out. But I still get some great sweet corn. But yeah, you can isolate either by distance or by time. So if you planted several different types a month apart or so, that might work. You just want to be sure that they're not, all that pollen isn't flowing at the same time.

Farmer Fred:

[12:20] So my popcorn is going to go into a bed at the end of June in a bed that will be empty by then because the onions and garlic will have been harvested.

Gail Pothour:

[12:30] Fingers crossed. Yeah.

Farmer Fred:

[12:31] Well, I've actually harvested most of the garlic already.

Gail Pothour:

[12:34] Really? I've harvested some. I've got about half of my bed still there.

Farmer Fred:

[12:37] All right. But soon, you know, that bed will be bare and I'll rework the soil and then plant the popcorn seed. And it will be ready, historically, whenever I've planted at the end of June, the popcorn is ready by October. Usually the second week of October. I like to say when Major League Baseball playoffs begin is when the time is  to harvest the popcorn and then let it cure for a while to get to the 13 to 17 percent moisture level in a cool, dark place.

Gail Pothour:

[13:07]  I don't know how you do that, how you determine it.

Farmer Fred:

[13:09] I'll tell you how. And I really want people to grow popcorn, especially if you have a survival garden, because it is the longest storing corn that I know of. Because if you can get it to 13% to 17% moisture level, and that's pretty easy, just leave it in a cool, dark place, and then to test it, you take off four or six of the kernels, put it in a fry pan with hot oil in it, and make sure they pop.  and actually pop it.  And if they pop, go for it. If they don't pop fully, it's not quite dry yet. If it just burns up, it's too dry.

Gail Pothour:

[13:44] Okay. So when it pops up, it’s ready to go.

Farmer Fred:

[13:46] and then you can put them in jars. Give them a tight seal. I like to use canning jars and put it on a kitchen shelf and it'll last there for years.

Gail Pothour:

[13:55] Literally. And That humidity that you need to have, certain moisture level that you need to have in the popcorn, in a canning jar, it will remain that way? It won't continue to dry out?

Farmer Fred:

[14:07] So far, so good on that. And I've been growing popcorn for 30 years. But what I have done sometimes, if when I've popped those four kernels, and if all of a sudden it seems like, hmm, it seems a little dry, you can add a few drops of water to that jar and shake it up and then put it on the shelf. And that seems to restore a lot of the moisture level.

Gail Pothour:

[14:27] Oh, that's good to know. One year I grew Glass Gem. It's now more readily available, but this was about 10 or 12 years ago. And I was on some mailing list and I got in the middle of the night and it said the glass gem is ready. And I ordered it, so I got some. It is an ornamental corn that can also be used as a popcorn. And I didn't try it as a popcorn. I use it for ornamental purposes because it's got all the different colors in one ear, purple and pink and orange. It's just really pretty. but it can be used as a popcorn. So that's good to know. You may try that.

Farmer Fred:

[15:00] There are a lot of decorative heirloom popcorns as well. Among the more colorful ones are Cherokee Long Ear, and Black Dakota. But if you're just looking for a plain white to yellow kernel that pops up white, historically I've loved Pennsylvania butter-flavored popcorn, which is an heirloom that goes back to 1886. And a newer heirloom, if there is such a thing, called Dynamite, which is very prolific. And you can usually get three or four ears per stalk. And they're tall stalks with long ears of corn as well. So it's really a nice thing to have. The reason I like to promote popcorn, if you have a survival garden, it's going to last a long time. You get a goodly amount of calories in a cup of popcorn, 30 to 40, which doesn't sound like much, but the amount of fiber in it, which is around 1.2 grams per serving, is enough to slow you down after you've gone through a cup of unpopped popcorn.

Gail Pothour:

[15:56] And if it lasts a long time, see, that would be something you'd need for a survival garden is something that will last multiple years. Have you ever grown a popcorn that is a mushroom popcorn as opposed to the butterfly type?

Farmer Fred:

[16:08] I did. And I think the reason people grow the mushroom popcorn and one of those is called Gourmet Mushroom F1, Harris Seeds carries it. And that's a hybrid variety. if people like to have kettle corn or caramel corn, yeah, the round ball mushroom type popcorn is perfect for that. I don't find its flavor to be as full as with the other kinds.

Gail Pothour:

[16:32] But if it's covered in caramel, are you going to...

Farmer Fred:

[16:34] Yeah, well, you see, that's the downside of popcorn. That's what makes it not as nutritionally sound you know.

Gail Pothour:

[16:42] By putting all that sugar on it.

Farmer Fred:

[16:44] Yeah, exactly. And they also suggest, too, for the healthiest popcorn is to air pop it with an air popper. I use a microwave popper. It doesn't require any oil.

Gail Pothour:

[16:52] We do have an air popper, so we like that where I don't have to use oil or even put butter on it.

Farmer Fred:

[16:56] Yeah, or cinnamon or any other thing that you might like that's low calorie and somewhat nutritious.

Gail Pothour:

[17:04] Ooh, hadn't thought about that. That does sound good.

Farmer Fred:

[17:06] All right. So anyway, corn is on this list in Modern Farmer magazine for one of the things to have in your survival garden. And I like to think of, again, the survival garden is not because you think there's a bomb coming. Although I got to tell you, if you have a bomb shelter, That does make a great root cellar. And that's how you keep food longer.

Gail Pothour:

[17:28] Which I would love to have. In our climate, we're so hot and dry that it is difficult to store root crops and things like that. So to have some kind of a bomb shelter would be great. In fact, my husband had some training, he's a civil engineer, he has some training on building bomb shelters back in the day. So maybe see if he can work something out there.

Farmer Fred:

[17:52] If you can maintain a temperature around 50 degrees, between 40 and 60, ideally, you can preserve onions, you can preserve garlic, you can preserve a lot of your canned goods, too.

Gail Pothour:

[18:04] Yeah. And that's something I really miss here. You know, people in the Midwest, they all have basements, and so they're able to preserve that way.

Farmer Fred:

[18:12] Fortunately, we live on a hillside that slopes downward towards the backyard. So the back of the house is raised to the point where you can go in through the rear, at ground level, and you can stand up through the entire basement. It's not a basement. It's just under the house. So I said, this is great. This is a root cellar.

Gail Pothour:

[18:31] Absolutely.

Farmer Fred:

[18:32] Oh, OK. So you can always move.

Gail Pothour:

[18:34] To a hillside. That's true.

Farmer Fred:

[18:36] Right. Another crop mentioned in this article are beans. Now, you and I both like beans, and beans are very nutritious. 135 calories per serving, 24 grams of carbs, 9 grams of protein per 100 gram serving. There are all sorts of beans, though. In your estimation, which bean varieties will produce the most and last the longest?

Gail Pothour:

[18:59] There are two different types, typically, of beans, bush beans and pole beans. The pole beans would have the potential to produce more beans because they produce over a longer period of time. Where bush beans are more determinate, they grow two feet tall and set their beans and are pretty much done. Pole beans will grow a lot longer. So, for the space, the yield would be more with pole beans, I think.

Farmer Fred:

[19:28] Plus, you're growing it vertically.

Gail Pothour:

[19:30] Exactly. Yeah. So, you don't take up as much real estate. You can get the plants closer together. and they're growing taller. Most people, when they think of beans, probably think of a green bean, a snap bean that you eat fresh. And  that's one of my favorite. I like to grow those every year. They don't last a long time in the refrigerator, maybe a week or two, but you can freeze them. Just blanch them and freeze them. If you have a pressure canner, you could can them. But then I also grow the dry beans. I do like dry beans because those are the type of bean that would sustain you over a longer period of time. And you let them grow until the bean pod gets dry and that the bean inside gets dry. But it takes a lot of beans to feed a family. I was showing you, Fred, that I grow every other year, I grow a variety that's called Yellow Indian Woman or Buckskin. And it's a small little yellowy bean that is reminiscent of a black bean in its flavor and the way it holds together. And I grow an entire bed of these beans and I have them in a one quart jar. That was my yield. It takes a lot of plants to produce a lot of dried beans. this is just a family for two of us. So if you had children and other people that you're providing for, you need to grow a lot of beans to get dried beans that are going to sustain you over the winter.

Farmer Fred:

[20:57] There certainly are pole beans that are dry beans.

Gail Pothour:

[21:00] Right. The one that I grow happens to be a pole bean. Okay. And to say I had, what, 60 plants, I think, and I have a quart of dried beans. So yeah, it takes a lot, a lot of plants to produce a lot of dried beans. Bush beans will provide a lot of fresh beans and over a short period of time. So,  I grow them every year in the summer because we do like fresh beans.

Farmer Fred:

[21:25] What is the spacing for a pole bean versus a bush bean?

Gail Pothour:

[21:30] On the pole beans, I do them about six inches apart and I run a string up. I have a trellis at both ends and I have a copper tube that goes across the top and then I run the strings over that. So it goes over the pole and down the other side. And so I end up with about 60 some odd plants. They're about four to six inches apart. Bush beans would be about the same. Depends on the variety because bush beans tend to be broader. Pole beans tend to be long and skinny and they grow up. But I do them about the same, maybe six or eight. Yeah, six or eight inches maybe apart.

Farmer Fred:

[22:06] Doesn’t that become a bean jungle then?

Gail Pothour:

[22:08] It pretty much is. But I also put up supports even for my bush beans. They don't usually need supports because they only grow about two feet tall, but they still want to flop over. And I don't want any of the beans to actually touch the ground, even though I mulch with straw. I still will put up some kind of support, whether it's bamboo stakes around the edge and run twine. At the horticulture center, we are using bicycle wheels that we put around the edges and we'll run twine between them. Some way just to keep the plants from flopping onto the ground.

Farmer Fred:

[22:39] The beauty, too, of growing beans in your survival garden, it is a protein.

Gail Pothour:

[22:45] Correct. And there's a lot of different varieties. There's the Italian flat, more like a Romano bean. They're a little bit meatier. You've got the Haricots Verts (French green beans), the filet beans, the French ones that are real thin and tender. They're green. They've got them purple and yellow. So a lot of different varieties, a lot of different flavors. And then when you go to the dried beans, There's a lot of heirloom dried beans and even some new hybrids where the bean themselves that you save, the dried bean part, are speckled or they're striped and purple. Yeah, different colors, kind of jewel tones.

Farmer Fred:

[23:23] I think my favorite was Bingo.

Gail Pothour:

[23:25] Oh, I haven't heard of bingo. Yeah. But I do like this buckskin or yellow-Indian woman that I grow every year. It's a really good bean.

Farmer Fred:

[23:32] I think of all the crops we'll be talking about today for a survival garden, beans are the ones that are going to grow the quickest, give you a heck of a lot of nutrition. And they improve the soil.

Gail Pothour:

[23:43] Absolutely. As a legume, they will affix the nitrogen from the air into the soil onto the roots as long as the right rhizobium bacteria is there. So you usually want to inoculate your beans, but you don't have to. And then it will affix those nitrogen nodules to the roots of the plant. So then when you take the plant out, what I do is I'll cut it off at the soil level and leave those roots in the ground. So those nitrogen nodules are there for the next crop that's being grown. Excellent idea. They can utilize the nitrogen.

Farmer Fred:

[24:18] And by the time you get around to planting there again, those will have broken down.

Gail Pothour:

[24:21] Right. And microbes will have broken them down. So, yeah, it makes it available to the next crop that you grow.

Farmer Fred:

[24:27] One guest we've had on the show before, the fresh physician, Dr. Laura Varich, is very fond of beans. She says legumes like beans, peas, and lentils are wonder foods. They contain nutrients known to be anti-inflammatory, anti-obesity, antioxidant, and anti-carcinogenic, which decreases the chance of cancer. A study of multiple societies around the world demonstrated that eating legumes was the most important dietary predictor of increased survival, with an 8% decrease in premature death for every two tablespoons of legumes eaten per day. It's not saying you're not going to die, but it's saying you're going to live longer.

Gail Pothour:

[25:05] Right. And lentils and garbanzos or chickpeas, those are both legumes that are easy to grow. I don't produce a lot. I did grow garbanzos one year just for the fun of it. I had never grown garbanzo beans before. And there's only one or two little beans in each of the pods so that they're not huge producers, but because they're more bush type plants, you can grow them a little closer together. Just know that you're not going to get a lot of yield out of each of the little pods. They don't have a lot of beans in them. But I've never tried growing lentils. I think it would be fun. That's something I think we ought to maybe try to do at the Fair Oaks Horticulture Center, try to grow some lentils.

Farmer Fred:

[25:48] How much room would you need for that?

Gail Pothour:

[25:50] Our beds are four feet by 20. I'd say we could do a half a bed. That could be kind of fun just to see how they grow. My understanding is that lentils are more of a cool season legume. Most of the beans we think of, the regular snap beans, the green beans that we eat fresh, Those are warm season crops. You have to have warm soil before the seed will germinate or they'll just rot. And they go through the summer. Fava beans are a cool season legume that grows through the winter. And apparently lentils are as well. I've not grown lentils, but my understanding is it's more of a cool season crop that I would assume you would plant maybe in the fall, maybe September or so.

Farmer Fred:

[26:31] It depends where you live in the country.

Gail Pothour:

[26:32] I'm sure it does, yeah.

Farmer Fred:

[26:33] According to Modern Farmer, you would plant lentils April to early May or whenever temperatures are consistently above 40 degrees Fahrenheit. Most varieties take about 100 days to reach maturity. So, it's a long growing season.

Gail Pothour:

[26:47] It is. So, it's more of you plant them in early spring then.

Farmer Fred:

[26:50] Well, I don't know where this Modern Farmer author lives. So, I would think that they would sort of split the country up and say, well, let's do this for USDA zone 7 and 8. Because once you start getting to nine, we can talk about a lot of great survival garden crops to grow for California, for example, that you wouldn't have a chance in other parts of the country. Right. Things like artichokes.

Gail Pothour:

[27:14] Yeah. Oh, yeah. Because our climate is so different from other parts of the country. But I know that the University of California does have some information on growing lentils. So I will be looking that up because that could be kind of an interesting thing to grow.

Farmer Fred:

[27:26] Another crop on the list of survival gardens from Modern Farmer magazine was winter squash. Pumpkins are a winter squash. There's certainly a lot of recipes, soups, or a side dish that can last a long time. And winter squash, that can last a long time.

Gail Pothour:

[27:43] And some people think that the difference between summer squash and winter squash is that summer squash is grown in the summer and winter squash is grown in the winter. And that is not correct. Winter squash is grown during the summer just like a zucchini and patty pan squash. It's just that it takes a little longer to mature. The skin gets a little tougher. The stem gets a little woody. And it stores over the winter. That's why it's called a winter squash. So then a root cellar would be great to have.

Farmer Fred:

[28:13] Exactly, yeah, for the winter squash. Right. Summer squashes are nice, but storage of zucchini, I've never experimented with storage of zucchini.

Gail Pothour:

[28:22] The only way I have stored zucchini is when I've preserved i