Promising garlic plants in one of City Farm Boy's local gardens.

How interesting to be a part of a time and place, a movement, whose heroes are those humble local gardeners, the sweet spirited urban farmer, splitting time between family and radishes and that special wasabi root patch that will hopefully take this season.

One such hero is Ward Teulon of City Farm Boy in Vancouver, British Columbia. I paid Ward a visit this week at his garden and home so he could show me the ropes of urban farming. Since 2006 Ward has acquired about 8000 square feet of local garden space alongside walkways and in backyards where he plants a yearly crop that gets divided up between his shareholders. Ward’s access to land is worked through a combination of agreements where he sometimes rents and sometimes gardens the space for a small cut of the harvest. There are some arrangements where he is given access to the plot for free, because the owner is just that supportive of his initiative.

Each season Ward’s duty is to his shareholders to whom he supplies a batch of fresh and organic vegetables each week for 20 weeks throughout the harvest ready summer months. Already, in early April, he is busy transferring his newly germinated seedlings into waiting garden plots, most of which are within five kilometres of his Vancouver home.

Ward's shade loving wasabi plants

Once harvest begins, shareholders collect from batches of potatoes, onions, beets, radishes, kale, carrots, lettuces, fava beans, snap peas, chives and oregano to name a few, not to mention the experimental crops of shade grown wasabi which Ward describes as hot with a distinct sweet aftertaste. Real wasabi, Ward insists, is not what you get at your favourite sushi joint: that is an imposter wasabi made from horseradish. But, he says, you really must try the real thing. Ward is also growing real varieties of garlic, thick, juicy, giant garlic, a far cry from what we have come to expect from the grocery store. And did I mention the shitake mushrooms that he is trying to grown on an old stump? Well, we’ll see how those turn out too.

A Kenyan style beehive by City Farm Boy

Also new to garden plots this year are Ward’s Kenyan style top bar beehives, fully of still slumbering bees. We talked about potential yields as we watched a brave scout test out the spring air. These humble boxes, some of which Wade constructed out of scrap wood from his deck repairs, could produce up to 100lbs of honey in a year. But, he says, he isn’t concerned with any yields this year: just as long as the bees are comfortable enough to stick around. It is amazing what you can get from a swarm of flies, he adds with a grin.

And I suppose that is the beauty of how Ward sees it, and he is right. It is amazing. It is also amazing what you can get from a few seedlings, planted alongside your property fence, or from a community of like minded people who realize just how easy it can be to grow your own organic food.

Ward has run up against some criticism and discouragement in neighbourhoods where local residents are unfamiliar with the hues of straw bale and beetroot. Its not always pretty, Ward will tell you. And he laughs, once it does look pretty, I’ll be by to hack it all down.

Despite this Ward enjoys the healthy support of his shareholders, many of whom are his neighbours. Gardeners are on the rise in that area, with much of the city block bearing food throughout the summer months.  Hardly a wasted spot can be seen on Ward’s block with even the city space between the sidewalk and street sporting snap pea seedlings.

Emerging city styles for the urban farmer

Ward makes it all look so incredibly easy and accessible. If you wish you had a little garden space producing these crops in your own backyard, well, Ward does that too. A major part of his business is building backyard gardens for people all across Vancouver. He will turn your weed patch lawn into a fully functioning vegetable garden and to your specifications.

And you just might want to, especially if you consider the benefits. Have you ever calculated your salad’s carbon footprint? This may have been a perplexing concept at one point, but now it is a difficult question to avoid. Do any of us really buy a package of giant strawberries in January without at least considering where they have come from? Or place a bag of spinach in our carts without considering, even if just to ignore the fact, that those crisp, out-of-season leaves have just travelled a gazillion miles in a refrigerated truck?

Eating is a complicated endeavour these days and is becoming increasingly so. Issues of food security, food safety, food transport, agriculture subsidies and transportation are fast becoming a part of the growing public debate on sustainability. If your interest is in local economies, health care, climate change or fresh kale, then you are probably cued into the current agricultural industry in some way. At no time before has your dinner plate been so heavily politicized.

And at no time before has there been such a surge of ready alternatives. Between farmer’s markets and community gardens our options for fresh, local and organic produce are increasing. Even large-scale grocers are responding to consumer interest in local products and are in turn supporting neighbourhood farms.

There is an element of heroism in these local, organic farmers and deservedly so. They represent a sort of victory over the heavily corporatized and industrialized system that has done a shoddy job as of late at providing shoppers with products that are healthy for the body, the community, the economy and the environment. An integral part of the movement towards a sustainable future is local food autonomy. The individuals working to make this sustainable future a present reality are becoming increasingly respected and celebrated figures.

Wade Teulon of City Farm Boy

So if you are feeling inspired and would like to know more about Ward Teulon, City Farm Boy and urban farming, you can check out his website at www.cityfarmboy.com or if you are not in the Vancouver area, look up local gardening collectives in your city to get connected.

If you are interested, after all, in calculating your salad’s carbon footprint, you may want to check out the carbon calculator at www.eatlowcarbon.org or google ‘carbon calculator’ to see what you can find.