Sustainable Living

For the third year, I wanted to create a food forest in our backyard garden so that we can live as waste free, natural and as sustainable as possible. We follow no till/no pesticide/no chemical fertilizer approach with our homegrown food so we rely heavily on composting throught the year, heavy mulching for water retention and companion planting to deter pests.
This year was a little different due to the pandemic, and limited shopping around for garden items so I was very happy to have saved heirloom seeds from last year that I was able to start on time and ordered many different varieties of vegetables to sustain us for the coming seasons. What I did different this year was focused on planting all vegetables from heirloom seeds, not bringing in outside plants and tried to limit my growing to less different kinds of plants and focused on what we actually eat. We added raised garden beds (8 in total) to work on building and keeping rich earth and limit competing weeds.
We have marigolds for pest control, calendula and bee balm spread throughout the beds to encourage pollination, poppies and wildflowers thrown into every free inch of space and have an overgrown wildflower bed with lettuce for our bunny friends.
We have seen much more animal activity visiting our backyard and lots of new pollinators including the beautiful hummingbird moths. My 5 year old has gotten even more involved and calls it his garden now. I am so happy that we can teach our children these important lessons on growing your own food and taking care of out environment. This program has inspired me to learn more about biodiversity and take action to teach others.