USA Today ethanol commentary published today:

http://blogs.usatoday.com/oped/2008/07/our-view-on-ene.html

Hey DCMiller -- does the "DC" standard for "District of Columbia?" Just curious.
I too am the grandson of a farmer who epitomized the axiom that farmers live poor and die rich, except that he one-upped that with "died poor" too. Small farmers in northern NH in the 50s had a difficult row to hoe (couldn't resist), although I guess organic farmers are doing better now.

In my slightly-larger than 1/4 acre, over-wooded patch in D.C., I too have been trying to garden organically. I've managed to plant 3 kinds of berries, a dwarf pear tree, 2 super-dwarf peach trees and of course a fig tree. I compost and have a small worm bin in my garage, raised beds, rhubarb, starter-asparagus bed... a pretty unusual gardening effort for northern D.C. And yet I've been gardening for over 50 years and I've never had such poor luck. Partly I have the trees to blame (removed some before the D.C. ban), but 5 hrs/day is barely sufficient. But mostly it is a variety of other problems, everything from wildlife -- raccoons, squirrels, deer... (deer breached the 8' deer fence recently; I guess that's a compliment to the appeal of my back yard) to what I think is a noticeably warmer habitat in just 4 years. Plants that should grow well her are stressed. And in the past 3 years, there's been an invasion of the tiger mosquito (you can't hear her coming) and noseeums, from mid May to early November. The bugs make it difficult to work outside. The end result of all this is that my tomato yield last year could have been a poster child for the book "$64 Tomato."

All this rambling is to point out how difficult urban gardening --maybe any gardening-- has become, and I've been gardening for a long time. I wonder how newbies reacting either to high prices or simply the desire to "localize" will succeed.

Bob -- trying to live sustainably.