• E-Mail
• Print
• Larger
• Smaller

Published: Tuesday, Mar. 05, 2013 / Updated: Monday, Mar. 04, 2013 05:19 PM

Cabin fever: I have it, so I’m vegging out

I have a major case of cabin fever, but I do have a plan to get out of that mind set. I am looking through vegetable seed catalogs and have decided I am going to have my own vegetable garden for the first time.

Studies have confirmed that people who eat more fruits and vegetables particularly, the more deeply colored varieties, have fewer cases of heart disease, cancer, diabetes, osteoporosis and age-related neurological decline. I thought, “Count me in!”

I have no experience growing vegetables and laugh every time I think about the men I worked with playing a joke on me by telling me that pinto beans grow on trees. They even brought a plant to put on my desk. I fertilized and watered that plant, but never did see any resemblance of anything that looked like a bean.

They confessed after several weeks. I thought to myself, how “dumb could I be?”

I realized that I needed someone with the greenest thumb in South Carolina. I went to see Elaine McKinney, agribusiness coordinator at the Agribusiness Development Center, 3758 Charlotte Hwy. in Lancaster. It is 22,000 square foot incubator for culinary, producing and farming entrepreneurs. The facility offers kitchen, dry, cold and freezer storage and office space rentals. Various types of equipment are also available to assist client businesses with getting their products from farm to garden or to the market. You also can rent the kitchen to do your canning, freezing, and drying.

The purpose of this organization is to provide local farmers and local produce gardeners an avenue to sell their products across the region. It also allows local farmers to network with each other.

Behind the building are spaces for a community garden. To get a space for this you must apply at the Lancaster Office of the United Way. If you have no experience in gardening they will pair you with someone that has a lot of experience.

Napoleon Hill wrote, “Patience, persistence and perspiration make an unbeatable combination for success.”

For more information call 547-0197 or visit lcadc.com.