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Female-scale gardening

I am a woman market gardener. Most information on greenhouse construction, row width, etc., is scaled to men. Women are shorter and have less body strength (for the most part) than men. I would like some references on how other women have done things. For example, have other women figured out how greenhouses can be set up and maintained by one woman alone? I have conquered the bed-width dilemma by using 3-foot-wide beds and making them longer. I am a no-till gardener and am buying a piece of land that is fallow. Is there a tool that can be rocked back and forth to loosen the soil that is only 3 feet wide, and that a woman of reasonable strength can maneuver?

Jackie Smith
Bloomingdale, Michigan

Lynn Byczynski, editor of Growing for Market, a monthly journal for direct-market farmers, replies:

I do know several farms run entirely by women, and from them I have learned a couple of things that everyone, male and female, might appreciate as they get older.

In our hoophouses, we use the broadfork for loosening the soil, rather than tilling it with every crop. If you aren’t familiar with this tool, Johnny’s Selected Seeds offers three sizes. I was in a greenhouse in Pennsylvania recently that consisted of 8-inch-deep raised beds erected on top of greenhouse benches. It was used for salad greens and microgreens, which are labor-intensive, and this system eliminated bending during harvest. As for breaking out fallow soil at your new place, get a neighbor to plow and till the field, then seed grass paths wide enough for a riding mower. Mulch the beds once they are plowed and tilled, and the grass paths will make life wonderful. We switched to this system for all our field crops a couple of years ago, and I can’t tell you how much easier it is now to plant and harvest.

Free Heat from Scrap Wood

A few issues ago, we read an article about heating with scrap wood. We use natural gas in our farmhouse, which was good until the gas cost was predicted to rise 70 percent this year. We just built a barn, and we saved all our scrap wood. A friend stopped using his wood/coal stove and let us have it, so we were in the heating business. We found a door company that would deliver a dump-truck load of scrap oak, about 8 tons, for the hauling bill of $25. We have it in the wood shed for this winter. The temperature already has gotten down to 10 degrees, but we are warm as can be, and so far the heating for this winter has cost us just the $25. Thanks for this information, a very good idea that works with little or no effort.

Freddie and Jane Wilkinson
Bristol, Virginia

A Car-free Combination

I was disappointed that you did not mention bicycles as an alternative means of transportation (“Green Means Go,” October/ November 2005). Also missing was public transportation. Bicycle and train combined allow me to get to work without stopping at a gas station. I also save on car payments, registration and insurance.

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