Rethinking the Front Yard: Cities Make Room For Urban Farms
Rather than growing a lawn, this homeowner's front yard is being prepared to farm, as part of the Sellwood Garden Club.
(GH: Here’s an interesting radio story from Northwest News Network and Northwest Public Radio):
Portland, OR – Michelle Obama isn’t the only one turning her family’s front yard into a garden. Throughout the Northwest, people are looking at ways to farm inside city limits. These small-scale operations aren’t likely to put grocery stores out of business. But they are bringing neighbors together, and changing the way we think about urban agriculture. Deena Prichep reports.
Click for the full story and audio
We’re seeing more signs of front yard gardens in our SE Boise neighborhood. We actually stumbled into this ourselves this year. We expanded our backyard garden by reclaiming front yard lawn and moving the fence forward to allow for two more planter boxes. We also took out some of the grass in our front yard and put in a dry creek bed. In amending the soil for some plants, I mixed in compost that I’d started last year, and unbeknownst to us, it included some cantaloupe seeds. We now have a lovely and fruitful cantaloupe plant as part of our front yard landscaping. Beats the heck out of mowing grass.