September 15, 2007
NYC Farming
We love this week’s NY Mag article by “locavore” Manny Howard, who planted a farm in his 800 square foot Brooklyn backyard. He grew vegetables and raised both rabbits and chickens, with the goal of using what he raised from March through July as his sole subsistence for the month of August.
His wife? Not so happy about the smell, the mess, the fact that her husband cut off his finger with a table saw. The farm animals? “My farm broke one of the inviolable rules of nature—my rabbits didn’t fuck like rabbits.”
Howard’s farm nearly got wiped out by the tornado on August 8, but survived. And he achieved his goal, while losing some weight in the process. The cost? $11,000. The conclusion: “I did learn something about food: Unless you really know what you’re doing, raising it is miserable, soul-crushing work. Eating food fresh from the farm, on the other hand, is delightful.”
Do you have a backyard garden? If yes, what have you raised successfully?
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Weed.
I grew up in (no subway access) Brooklyn, and we used to grow tomatoes and horseradish successfully, and strawberries and eggplants not so successfully, in our backyard.
I think this douchebag already knew that it would be soulcrushing hardwork. He's a writer, he just needed some gimmicky shit to right about. He knew all these bad things would happen to him so him writing about it is pretty disingenuous.
It was a pretty ballsy to stick with it and risk divorce and lose 30 pounds and all, but it pretty much proves that you can't really grow your own food. In case any New Yorkers were wondering.
I've got basil growing on my windowsill...sadly, that's it.
BROOKLYN BEACON
Farmer Manny,
Digger of trench,
Planter of veggies,
A real mensch.