Organic Vegetable Garden on White House Lawn
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This post is a part of Food Renegade’s Fight Back Fridays.
A huge victory for locavores and advocates of organic food was announced yesterday, in the form of a White House victory garden. The Obamas are going to plant an organic vegetable garden on the White House Lawn.
The NY Times reported yesterday:
On Friday, Michelle Obama will begin digging up a patch of White House lawn to plant a vegetable garden, the first since Eleanor Roosevelt’s victory garden in World War II. There will be no beets (the president doesn’t like them) but arugula will make the cut.
While the organic garden will provide food for the first family’s meals and formal dinners, its most important role, Mrs. Obama said, will be to educate children about healthful, locally grown fruit and vegetables at time when obesity has become a national concern.
Any overflow of food from the garden will be donated to local food pantries. They are even going to keep bees for honey.
What’s most exciting to me about this news is that this happened because of extensive lobbying from everyday people using online tools like Facebook, YouTube, Ning, and Twitter. Thanks to Kitchen Gardeners International, a Maine-based 501c3 nonprofit network of 10,000 gardeners from 100 countries and their Eat the View campaign launched in February 2008. Eat the View is a campaign to plant high-impact food gardens in high-profile places.
Thank you, Michelle and Barack Obama, for listening to the people and taking action. And thanks to everyone who joined the cause on Facebook, signed the petition, forwarded YouTube videos, and emailed blogged about it. Our voices do matter and we can make a difference.
Let’s hope this garden inspires many other people out there to get out in the backyard and start growing food.
Join me in taking action! I’m going to go pick up some tomato and basil starters this weekend, and get some seeds in the ground.
If you don’t have a garden or room for a garden on your lawn, you can always start some plants in pots on a patio. My friend Annie started this awesome container garden in the common area of her apartment building. You could also join or start a local community garden or find some neighbors who want to do “yardsharing”. For to find or create a local yardsharing group, visit the Hyperlocavore blog.
Yes we can!
For more stories about taking back our food supply, visit Food Renegade’s Fight Back Fridays.
Photo credits: Eat the View and NY Times
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20/03/2009 at 6:27 am Permalink
Yay! It’s so good to see Michelle taking a real step, not just a symbolic one. I hope this energizes our nation the way Eleanor’s did.
20/03/2009 at 6:39 am Permalink
This is truly an amazing thing! I am so darn happy and really hope it show people how important that organic needs to become the new conventional!! Plan on getting my garden in order tomorrow, super excited!!
courtney’s last blog post..Are you a Real Food Renegade?
20/03/2009 at 6:51 am Permalink
This is really great news. We were planning on planting our first garden this year, but are now reconsidering b/c of our busy schedules. I’d hate to plant something only to watch it fail b/c I didn’t invest the time & energy into it that I’d need to. We only have another week or so decide since the time to plant in Austin is NOW.
FoodRenegade’s last blog post..Fight Back Fridays
20/03/2009 at 7:21 am Permalink
This is super super awesome, and gives me even more inspiration as I go out this weekend to plant my pepper and tomato seedlings in my community garden lot, and start more seeds.
Princess Edamame’s last blog post..Annual Fourth of July Party is On its Way!!
20/03/2009 at 7:45 am Permalink
Kristen,
If you do a garden the right way, it takes almost no effort. I should know, I’m the laziest gardener alive!
The trick is a sprinkler system. Set it to go off early in the morning. Ours goes on around 5 or 6 am.
If you don’t have or can’t afford a sprinkler system, you can easily rig up a cheap DIY system using soaker hoses and a battery-powered timer. You can get all this stuff at your local hardware store. I’ve done this a few times in different homes where I did not have sprinklers and it’s easy.
As far as weeds and pest control, you shouldn’t have any problems if you put down adequate compost. I use a mix of compost and steer and chicken manure. You can sometimes find these elements organic.
The best way I know to start a thriving garden is to use the book “Lasagna Gardening” as a guide. It’s a wonderful book. I’ve done a number of lasagna gardens and the plants really thrive and grow HUGE.
Lasagna Gardening: A New Layering System for Bountiful Gardens: No Digging, No Tilling, No Weeding, No Kidding!
Oh and I should have mentioned this, Melinda at One Green Generation is running a neat blog challenge called the Growing Challenge
Check it out here: http://1greengeneration.elementsintime.com/?p=703
20/03/2009 at 10:31 am Permalink
I love Ruth Stout’s books about gardening. My favorite is “Having a Green Thumb Without an Aching Back.’ Sounds good to me!
I have a backyard garden this year and my kiddos and I are sooo excited. We have lettuce, radishes, spinach and peas planted now1
rachel’s last blog post..
20/03/2009 at 2:04 pm Permalink
Super great post, very inspiring and exciting. Alice Waters work has paid off )among others)!
Lee’s last blog post..Food4Thought.com: Bringing CSAs to Your Doorstep
20/03/2009 at 5:01 pm Permalink
Yee haw!! Now how about chickens for eggs and a cow for raw milk, lol.
22/03/2009 at 8:34 am Permalink
Rain today, so no transplanting for me. I can start my new seedlings though!
Princess Edamame’s last blog post..Annual Fourth of July Party is On its Way!!
22/03/2009 at 2:24 pm Permalink
Oh thats really fantastic! Well done to the Obama’s and to everyone who encouraged & supported this.
Hey…a little tip I got from some Biodynamic gardeners….always water your garden late in the evening rather than early morning. This is because your plants take in much more water in the evening than they do during the day.
09/07/2009 at 4:23 pm Permalink
Please don’t fall for the Judas Goat, Obama who works for Goldman Sachs and the banking elites. In fact, not only are the democrats infected with oligarchical collectivism, they are writing very aggressive bills to cut us off from our natural food supply.
So what I’m saying here is you better be writing to the state and federal house representation, your governor and Obama and complain about GM food and the like.
The recent horror show:
http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=h111-875
H.R. 875:
111th Congress
This is a bill in the U.S. Congress originating in the House of Representatives (“H.R.”). A bill must be passed by both the House and Senate and then be signed by the President before it becomes law.
Bill numbers restart from 1 every two years. Each two-year cycle is called a session of Congress. This bill was created in the 111th Congress, in 2009-2010.
The titles of bills are written by the bill’s sponsor and are a part of the legislation itself. GovTrack does not editorialize bill summaries.
2009-2010
Food Safety Modernization Act of 2009
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Primary Source
See H.R. 875 on THOMAS for the official source of information on this bill or resolution.
To establish the Food Safety Administration within the Department of Health and Human Services to protect the public health by preventing food-borne illness, ensuring the safety of food, improving research on contaminants leading to food-borne illness, and improving security of food from intentional contamination, and for other purposes.
This bill is going to kill small farms, raw milk, etc. Look who co-sponsored it.
Del. Eleanor Norton [D-DC]
Rep. Shelley Berkley [D-NV1]
Rep. Sanford Bishop [D-GA2]
Rep. Timothy Bishop [D-NY1]
Rep. André Carson [D-IN7]
Rep. Kathy Castor [D-FL11]
Rep. Joe Courtney [D-CT2]
Rep. Peter DeFazio [D-OR4]
Rep. Diana DeGette [D-CO1]
Rep. Eliot Engel [D-NY17]
Rep. Anna Eshoo [D-CA14]
Rep. Sam Farr [D-CA17]
Rep. Bob Filner [D-CA51]
Rep. Barney Frank [D-MA4]
Rep. Gabrielle Giffords [D-AZ8]
Rep. Raul Grijalva [D-AZ7]
Rep. John Hall [D-NY19]
Rep. Maurice Hinchey [D-NY22]
Rep. Mazie Hirono [D-HI2]
Rep. Eddie Johnson [D-TX30]
Rep. Marcy Kaptur [D-OH9]
Rep. Barbara Lee [D-CA9]
Rep. Nita Lowey [D-NY18]
Rep. Betty McCollum [D-MN4]
Rep. James McDermott [D-WA7]
Rep. James McGovern [D-MA3]
Rep. Gwen Moore [D-WI4]
Rep. Christopher Murphy [D-CT5]
Rep. Jerrold Nadler [D-NY8]
Rep. Chellie Pingree [D-ME1]
Rep. Dutch Ruppersberger [D-MD2]
Rep. Timothy Ryan [D-OH17]
Rep. Linda Sánchez [D-CA39]
Rep. Janice Schakowsky [D-IL9]
Rep. Mark Schauer [D-MI7]
Rep. Louise Slaughter [D-NY28]
Rep. Fortney Stark [D-CA13]
Rep. Betty Sutton [D-OH13]
Rep. John Tierney [D-MA6]
Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz [D-FL20]
Rep. Robert Wexler [D-FL19]
You better think twice before bringing political parties or thinking any politician is your friend with this issue.
Your guard is clearly down. These are the darkest times for liberty and our food supply issues.