Living Car Free - Any gardeners here?

Hi car free friends--

It will probably sound like a lame excuse to many of you, but one of the main things that keeps me from going permanently car free is the fact that in the winter I go around in my father's old truck and collect bags of leaves to use for compost. I love the fact that I can get them free and there is nothing better for adding humus to the black clay where I live, Austin, TX.

Last year I finally got to the point where I could bike both to and from work. It wasn’t an easy habit to acquire. Previously I had been taking my bike on the bus in the morning and biking all the way home. It's about a 1.25 hour ride which is an accomplishment for an out of shape 49 year old if I do say so myself. Well being as February is usually our coldest month I thought I'd take just the month of February off. Well guess what? It turned out to be a relatively warm February and it's now the middle of June and I'm still driving to work. Today was the last day of driving for a while. I’m hoping to go 6 months. I have been biking after work and on weekends to ramp up for it.

What caused me to want to start this car free period today? Several reasons: I need to take off some weight; also the cost: I just can’t afford to drive this truck any more. My insurance has expired, I need a few repairs, relatively minor ones, hopefully. My registration is due at the end of July, and my inspection sticker has been expired for more than a year. My domestic partner of many years died a little over a year ago and, among other things, the loss of income has been a big adjustment.
I am in school now, hopefully to become a cpa; it will take another 2--3 years. This semester will be easy to bike commute, especially since one of my classes is on line, so the logistics are simple.
Anyway, I’m trying to concentrate on the positive side of all this. My life needs simplified right now, big time. If I can just get through the next 2 or 3 years everything should get easier. I guess I'm just looking for ideas and moral support. Regarding the leaf issue, I know that you can plant what is known as "green manure" or cover crops to substitute for mulch and if I did that I could just order seeds and then not have to worry about the leaves I won't be able to collect. If I’m ready to drive in 6 months that will be just in time for leaf-collecting season . If there are other gardeners here I’d like to know about some of your practices.

Hey... lots of gardeners around here!

I like to use leaves to layer my compost bins, but I don't travel anywhere to get the leaves. Let's say I have them delivered to my lawn from about 40 feet up. All I could ever want and more.

I don't think they make super compost, but there are OK mixed in with vegetable leftovers.

If you don't have any trees handy, you could easily move leaves by bike, either in a trailer. You could put the leaves in bundles weighing less than 20 pounds and hang them off your rear rack. Leaves are light!

Anyway, good luck with you new plan. Sounds like you need to get some extra stresses removed from your life. Whatever you decide, just take things one at a time. Multi-tasking is probably not what you need right now.

Well, all my neighbors think that when they mow their lawns they need to bag up the clippings and put them out with the trash. That's just fine with me, whenever I need mulch for my garden or more organic material for compost I just grab those bags. I guess I should explain to them that they are wasting time and money, but I am benefiting off of it so...:innocent:

I haven't tried the green manure thing yet, but I hear it's best if you use nitrogen fixing plants (clover or other legume).

My partner & I do vegetable gardening in Austin. We're in the black clay zone too, near Wm Cannon & Mopac. One of the miracle crops for Austin is blackeye peas. They fix their own nitrogen, they like the heat, they do just fine in clay, no serious pest problems I've encountered, and they are green manure A bag of dried blackeye peas from the grocery store costs about a dollar, gives maybe 90% germination.

I'm expecting the oak leaves in our compost to finish breaking down sometime later this century.

Click on my user name and send an email if you'd like to try a car free meet up. We've got about 450 square feet of veggies this year, lots of different kinds.

http://www.bikeforums.net/showthread.php?t=542500
Tomatoes (3 different varieties), Peppers (Bell, Jalepeno, Banana, and Habenero), Brocoli, Beans (Green, black, and lima), watermelon, zuchini, onion, potatoes, and okra.

So, yeah, there are gardeners here.

That's just fine with me, whenever I need mulch for my garden or more organic material for compost I just grab those bags.

Before I'd grab their bags, I'd like to know what they are spraying on their lawns. Maybe Roundup will break down quick, but I try to avoid it... One thing I did grab last year, though, was a pile of mulch. The city cut down the neighbour's tree and later brought a machine to shed the stump. Luckily, it left a big mound of mulch.

Any gardeners here?

Sort of, I lease 65 acres to a soy farmer, and 35 for feed corn. So I guess you could say indirectly I produce a lot more food than I eat.

http://www.bikeforums.net/showthread.php?t=542500
Tomatoes (3 different varieties), Peppers (Bell, Jalepeno, Banana, and Habenero), Brocoli, Beans (Green, black, and lima), watermelon, zuchini, onion, potatoes, and okra.

So, yeah, there are gardeners here.

I've enjoyed gardening since I was still in my teens. Just turned 52, and I'm still learning so much about gardening ... Somebody told me that I could break off stems from our geraniums and stick them in the ground to grow new geraniums! I thought they were kidding, but they insisted that somebody they know had good success rates.

So, I tried it, and guess what? Now I have lots of new geranium plants! I transplanted two of the new cuttings (they just started growing roots). Will see how they take to their new home.

My vegetable garden is coming along pretty good -- watermelon, canteloupe, lemon cucumbers, zucchini squash, green peppers, hot peppers (three different varieties), and lots of mint (three different kinds). I'm looking forward to mint tea!

I'm still waiting for the nursery to get their lemon grass. I will plant lots of lemon grass, which grows very nicely here. Oh yes, I also have one sage plant, and tons of greens (beets, turnips, mustard, kale, Chinese cabbage, Swiss chard, collards).

I also have lots of cacti and succulents outside and inside. Some of my favorite cacti are Joseph's Coat and Bunny Ears. During a wind and heavy rain storm, many of my outside plants kept falling over and breaking up. So I just took the broken pieces and stuck them in dirt. Now I have lots of new starts.

Also rooted lots of Velvet plants in water, and just transplanted into two new pots. Had to put all my Jades inside. The sun and heat burns the leaves. Have several varieties of ferns, both inside and outside.

Tons of marigolds, garlic, onions, lots of other flowers and ground cover, several varieties of aloes, spider plants both inside and outside.

I still need to dig up at least four more flower beds .... I already have several raised beds ready for fall and winter planting.