One of the coolest things about living in East San Diego is that we are near the City Farmers Nursery. Since 1972 Bill Tall (in the picture next our son Colin) and his amazing nursery have been one of the greatest resources for urban agriculture in town. In addition to offering great products and services, the nursery offers loads of free classes and other events. One event is an annual pumpkin growing contest for kids. Our son Colin jumped at the chance. We collected the five Big Mac pumpkin seeds in July and, with the help of an article in volume 13 of Make, grew a 52 pounder. Growing it in the front yard attracted a lot of attention. It broke the ice with a lot of neighbors who finally understand why we aren't concerned about the state of our "lawn."The contest this year had the highest participation to date. First place was taken by the daughter of an old friend of ours. They have worked on their urban garden for about five years and have built up thick layers of heavily composted soil. Her entry came in at 67 pounds.
Considering that was our first year and we have only started reclaiming our soil we are well pleased with second place. On the whole we have done very well with our first year of gardening. We've produced three varieties of tomato, squash, corn, potatoes, letuce and our avacado tree is thriving. We haven't had much luck with legumes which I suspect is the lack of nitrogen fixing bacteria in the soil. We hope to address this with inoculated seed and cover crops this winter.
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