Sowing the Seeds of Self-Reliance
A View from The Ark
.....ongoing musings....
by Geri Guidetti, Director, The Ark Institute
Copyright 2010 by Geri Guidetti. All rights reserved.
See our new "Big Food From Small Spaces" Package, below, or click on our Non Hybrid & Non GMO Seed button, above.
A few years ago I was contacted by a group of compassionate supporters of missionaries who worked with orphans in Haiti. Would it be possible, they asked, for The Ark Institute to provide non-hybrid seed to an orphanage to help them feed their growing population of homeless children? One of the supporters knew that, unlike hybrid or patented, genetically modified (GM) seeds, the seeds of our non-hybrid vegetables could be planted and food harvested, year after year, and their seeds saved for planting in future seasons. He correctly reasoned that this meant the missionaries and children would have the potential to feed themselves indefinitely. It would be a gift that would keep on giving.A year later, one of the supporters emailed me some photographs of the orphanage's thriving garden. There were "our" green beans, summer squashes, lettuces, tomatoes and so much more growing on that hilltop in Haiti. It meant so much for us to see it then, but in view of the human suffering that continues to unfold in Haiti this week, it means even more now. Was this the orphanage, reported by CNN, that so many hungry people fled to this week because locals knew it was "that" one that always had food? I don't know, but I can tell you that it had the potential to do just that if those non-hybrids were raised well, their seed saved, shared and multiplied over these several seasons past. You see, in addition to the food a non-hybrid vegetable provides, each single seed can be multiplied by thousands inside the vegetables on that one plant. On a practical, economics level, there is no CD, no bank, no investment that will yield thousands of percent return in 3-4 months time. The earthquake that struck Haiti is but the latest in the chain of human tragedies caused by natural disasters throughout our history, yet there are now so many of us humans on the planet that each disaster has the potential to cause suffering on a previously unimaginable scale. To one degree or another, we all are or will be linked by that chain.It is time for us to seriously consider growing and storing more renewable food and seed where people live, not depending on advanced technology, infrastructure and fossil fuels to get it to each of us on a daily basis. As we painfully learn from these continuing mega-disasters, one event can render the modern food production and distribution "miracle" useless. To move forward, we sometimes need to take a step or two backwards. We all need to know how to grow and preserve some food right where we live, even if it is inside an apartment. If you don't think you will want to do it in a big way, then do it in a small way, "just in case". You will find all the help you need right here. Together we can all make a difference today and for an unpredicatable future. God Bless.......Geri Guidetti (Also see Geri's blog at www.arkinstitute.blogspot.com)
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If you are among the tens of thousands of customers, many now long-time friends whom we have helped become more self-reliant and more food self-sufficient with our unique non hybrid seeds and non GMO seeds over the years, welcome back. If your garden of our healthy, non GM vegetables is now helping you survive these leaner times, or to restore your good health, congratulations on your foresight and good eating!If you are new to our growing community of friends intent on building greater food security and greater independence from dwindling global food supplies, from genetically modified (GM) seeds and foods, from foods alarmingly laced with melamine from China, or tainted with E. coli bacteria from contaminated water and fields, welcome to a saner, smarter, greener way to eat and stay healthy. Through the resources you will find on this site, by email or by phone, we will do all we can to help you build your Ark, an "ark" full of fresh, healthy, toxin-free, self-preserved foods to carry you and your loved ones through good times and bad. You will even find an excellent, yet economical, water purifier. British Berkefeld Water Filters are the best way to ensure safe drinking water.We have heard from thousands of you over the past thirteen years, many letters and emails sent in response to articles and newsletters I have written (see Food Supply Updates archived and linked in the left column). You are right to be concerned about the growing threats to global, and even our own, national food supply. Most people are unaware of how vulnerable commercial agriculture really is in this age of unpredictable climate extremes; epidemic Ug99 wheat and barley rust that now threatens to wipe out 80% of global wheat and barley crops; depleted, even disappearing aquifers used to water essential crops; epic, expanding droughts of biblical proportions around the world; the nearly total reliance of commercial agriculture on expensive, patented, legally restricted GM seeds and the fossil fuel-dependent toxic chemicals needed to grow them. Then there is the current or future influenza pandemic that will infect 30 to 50 percent of the global population, gravely interrupting the production and distribution of food here and abroad. The list is endless, the threat is real. Recently, my email has contained a different food supply and human survival concern — how to survive 2012. Beliefs exists that the simultaneous occurrence of the end of the Mayan calendar in December of 2012, the alignment of the Earth with the center of our Milky Way Galaxy (with scientifically unknown and unpredictable effects), and Native American, biblical and others prophesies thought to point to this time, are all leading to a tumultuous, even cataclysmic, end of times. (Google "2012") In fact, on November 13th of this year, a movie entitled 2012 will be released in the U.S. and then around the world. Directed by Roland Emmerich (director of Independence Day), a 2012 global cataclysm will explode onto the big screen in movie theaters throughout the United States. Interestingly, the movie's characters, hoping to survive catastrophic floods during the cataclysm, build arks, according to press releases of Emmerich's interviews. I'll bet they not only stock them with food and water filters, but with non hybrid seeds to replant the post-cataclysm world. We will have to wait and see! The ark concept has always made sense to me. The more complex our systems for food and water production and delivery, the more dependent we are on others to bring these essentials of life to us. The less control we have over our personal food production and processing, the more vulnerable we are to losing our food to unforeseen disruptions, natural or manmade. Heaven knows the probability of unforeseen disruptions seems to increase every day in this dangerous world.One last comment: The current national and global economy has brought hard times for millions. Many people have lost their homes or are living in much smaller ones, in apartments, even in garages of friends and family. We understand that building an ark of self-sufficiency is tough under many of these circumstances so, among our offerings at this site, you will find money saving packages and even a new one called Big Food From Small Spaces. (scroll down for more.) Now you can grow food indoors, outdoors in small patches, in containers and on kitchen counters, winter, spring, summer or fall. We have the resources that will show you how. Click on our Non hybrid Seed button, our Helpers and How-to and Ark Store buttons (great money saving packages here!), above. There's also lots more information, below. Let us know by email or phone how we can help…….Geri Guidetti, Founder and Director, The Ark Institute Geri's Email: arkinstitute@charter.net Phone: 1-800-255-1912
For product information or order questions, email arkinstitute@ aol.com
For Telephone orders or questions: 1-800-255-1912
Mailing address: The Ark Institute, PO Box 293, Westlake, OR 97493
New Money-Saving Package from The Ark Institute
Containers, Patios, Decks, RVs, Community Gardens,
Micro-plots, Countertops
Now you can raise and preserve lots of fresh food, even if you live in an apartment! The Ark Institute is pleased to introduce this new, much-needed, food self-reliance and preparedness package for folks who live on small lots, in RVs and in apartments . A collection of three excellent, easy-to-read and follow books will show you how to raise food wherever you are, and 20 generous packets of The Ark Institute’s famous non hybrid, non GMO, heirloom vegetable garden seeds, will get you started on the road to robust health and greater food security the very day you receive it! You don’t even need to wait for summer to get started! And, as always, The Ark Institute’s seed can be saved from your own vegetables to grow next year’s crops, year after year. No need to buy new seed ever! Now that’s real food security! What’s more, you can store your seed for long term survival with the instructions included in every package.
Each Big Food from Small Spaces Gardening Package contains:
All Non Hybrid, Non GMO, container appropriate Carrots, Beets, Broccoli, Cabbage, Basil, Tender Butterhead Lettuce, Kale, Mesclun Mix (eight heirloom varieties of lettuce and endive), Ruby Red Lettuce, Eggplant, Italian Flat Leaf Parsley, Anaheim Chili Pepper, Green/Red Bell Pepper, Bush Zucchini, Green Bush Bean, Yellow Bush Bean, Container Tomato, Roma Tomato, Green Onions and Snap Peas.
Your 20 seed packets will contain a total of 28 varieties of outstanding vegetables and herbs (8 varieties in the Mesclun Mix alone) that are well suited to container and small space gardens in your gardening area. There are literally thousands of seeds in each Big Food from Small Spaces Package and, if well grown and their seed harvested, they could provide you and your family with fresh food for many years to come. Collect seed from all 28 varieties and you could have free seed and food for sharing, even selling!
What’s more, three books will tell you how to grow them and how to preserve your food without freezing or canning! Has there ever been a time when it was more important to learn these simple skills that could mean the difference in surviving—or not?
You’ll also receive three of the best how-to resources available:
Fresh Foods From Small SpacesThe Square Inch Gardener’s Guide to Year Round Growing, Fermenting and Sprouting, by RJ Ruppenthal. 178 pages.
Preserving Food Without Freezing or Canning Traditional Techniques Using Salt, Oil, Sugar, Alcohol, Vinegar, Drying, Cold Storage, and Lactic Fermentation by The Gardeners and Farmers of Terre Vivante, with Forewords by Eliot Coleman and Deborah Madison. 197 pages.
Bountiful Container Create Container Gardens of Vegetables, Herbs, Fruits, and Edible Flowers by Rose Marie Nichols McGee (Author), Maggie Stuckey. Excerpt from the front cover: “Discover a world far beyond the expected cherry tomato in a flowerpot. A world with virtually no weeds, no soil-born diseases….With few exceptions, everything edible that’s grown in the traditional garden can be successfully raised in a container….”452 pages. This is an excellent, fun, how-to book you will use over and over and over again as you raise your own delicious food.
All of this for $129 (delivered)!!
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The Food Supply Update© may be reprinted in its entirety, with all attributes, in any media offered free of charge to its readers. Permission to print edited versions of any of Geri Guidetti’s Food Supply Updates may be obtained by emailing: arkinstitute@charter.net
Copyright 2009 The Ark Institute: Non Hybrid Seeds. All Rights Reserved.
