Table of Contents

May/June 2007

Cover Story

Victory Gardens: Visiting the past to discover our potential. Lexie Stoia takes us back to a largely forgotten time in our American heritage, when home gardens produced 40 percent of the nations fruits and vegetables.

Feature Stories

California Dreamin’: Ben and Susan Gisin visit orange paradise in Tulare Country, California, after the devastating January 2007 frost. Meet one of America's most experienced orange growers. Discover what citrus farmers are facing and ways we can help.

Your Backyard Farmer: Susan W. Clark interviews two enterprising women who have taken local food to the next level. They create and farm the food garden of your choice in your yard or urban lot. Come home after work and find your produce harvested and waiting for your dinner plate.

Bombs Beans and Dirt (Part 1): Mike Amaranthus, Arden Andersen and Gerald Wiebe, three of North America's top sustainable scientists provide solutions on how we can end the war on beneficial soil organisms, repopulate the soils with them and save our farms and health in the process.

Farmer Meets Chef: If you like to eat out, the Farmer-Chef movement has something for you. Zachary D. Lyons writes an interesting article about a world where artisan chefs and artisan farmers get together to change the restaurant experience. You may even want to tell your favorite restaurant about it.

The Urban Farmyard: Susan L. Gisin visits Los Cerritos Elementary School, home to one of the nation's most progressive school gardens. The students are so excited about it that they jump right in to give you a tour. And of course you must eat everything they offer you.

More Features

Fresh Water: Fresh water, the elixir of life is slowly disappearing. Elizabeth Mygatt, a researcher for Earth Policy Institute, explains how the answer to this problem includes bringing population into balance with available water.

Freezing Summer’s Bounty: Elizabeth Andress describes practical steps to preserving summer harvests through freezing.

School Gardens: Benjamin Gisin explains how California is taking the lead in an explosive American grass-roots movement to enhance education, fight obesity and teach children about nutrition.

Intelligent Food Economics John Ikerd shows how to stretch your food dollar to buy good, local food. By understanding what goes into each food dollar, more intelligent choices are available.

Regular Features

Grass-Roots Viewpoint: Visiting and appreciating America’s artificial life-support systems.

Food Sleuth: Melinda Hemmelgarn describes loopholes that make food terms such as organic and natural difficult to define.

Global Food Outlook: The focus is on China. After joining the World Trade Organization in 2001, China started selling off its grain reserves. With reserves dwindling and world grain prices going up, China gets spooked.

Domestic Food Outlook: Field corn overtakes other food acres. As ethanol drives up the price of corn, farmers are dropping other food crops for corn. The car in your driveway is sitting at the dinner table and wants the resources that are going into your food.

Economics Outside the Box: With real estate as the preferred collateral, we are pushing to pave the land that produces food in order to have instruments of exchange (bank deposits) to buy food.

Peter Puffin and Freddie Frog: Inside back cover, Peter and Freddie discuss farm labor and work careers.