Urban Farmsteading 202

This followup to the very well-received Basics of Urban Farmsteading class zeros in to focus on five key aspects: Easily converting lawn areas into gardens, backyard poultry raising, dramatically reducing your household and landscape water use, perennial food crops and creating healthy soil. Any sunny yard can produce a surprising amount of home grown organic produce, and implementing these five principles will allow your household to enjoy a great degree of independence from corporate farming while saving you a lot of money. My jungly urban farm is the classroom, and you will see the final transition from the summer crops to the cool weather crops that thrive here in winter. You will get a class lesson handout plus 2 free packets of winter crops seeds, learn of local and mail order resources, plus taste some alternative crops. I am teaching this class once in January, on the 24th, from 11 AM until 1 PM with a 30 minute Q & A session afterwards. The cost is $25 per student, or $20 each in groups of 4 to encourage carpooling due to limited parking. Be sure to bring a notepad and pen and an eagerness to learn further about urban self sufficiency in these lean times and to boost future prosperity and security. Our demanding yards can instead be sources of abundance. My address is: 3212 West Paxton Avenue Tampa FL 33611 813 839 0881. RSVP is helpful but not necessary. Thanks and happy gardening! John Starnes