The $40 Tomato

We awoke to another morning of temperatures hovering in the mid-30s.  Again I say...it is APRIL!!  Never mind though as I am happily daydreaming away with the help of my Gardener's Supply Company catalog.  This catalog contains very useful garden tools.  All manner of plant supports, trellises, comfy gardening boots and gloves, (and of course products that promise to increase your Fall harvest by 50%), are displayed in page after beautifully photographed page.  It's enough to make a cold-weary gardener giddy!

I've been looking at products designed to give you an earlier start in the garden.  These products promise to protect your plantings from frost, give them a continuous supply of water and fertilizer, and support them as they grow to enormous heights (given that they are being continuously feed and coddled...).  The lovely photos of these amazing products have me folding down page corners to mark the things that I must have.  Self-watering pots?  Check.  Stackable tomato cages? Check.  Pop-Up protection for your berries from birds?  Check.  My list includes these items and more.

So I added up my wish-list, just to see where I was at, and realized that if I purchase these many useful products, I will have a tomato that costs more than $40 at season's end!

I feel, in some sense, as though I would not be doing any justice to my farming roots (both of my grandparents were farmers), if I didn't at least make an attempt at thriftiness.  The true farmer is a very resourceful person--able to take ordinary items, things that might otherwise go into the garbage, and transform them into useful garden implements.  The products in the catalog look amazing, and I'm sure they do increase your vegetable harvest, but it also seems to me that the idea behind growing vegetables is to be self-sufficient, have fresh produce and possibly to save money.  Not grow $10 heads of lettuce.

I do love my tools though, and I've spent more money than I care to say over the years on some awesome garden products.  Sometimes I find a product I can't live without (like All-purpose garden fabric for row covers), and sometimes the products just don't pan out (like the upside-down tomato hangers that I thought would transform my garden space).

But at this point of the year I am still in the daydreaming phase of the vegetable garden.  Looking at photos of huge, healthy tomato plants, and beds brimming with fresh produce is an ideal way to pass a cold spring.