Urban Greenery & Food Infill, City Sustainability

Urban sustainability, Health food store parking lot garden, Ever'man, Pensacola

Even if all you have is just a tiny urban square foot garden, the act of planting veggies can offer so many benefits to you, your local community and the earth.

I always encourage people to plant natives, wildflowers and food in whatever free unpaved ground they can find.

Urban sustainability, US 90, Pensacola kale garden

Small ten foot wide gardens adjacent parking lots and roads can provide significant benefit to local ecosystems.  Tiny gardens offer communal and foraging habitat to both local and migratory critters and wildlife.  These critters and wildlife play an important part in natural pest control measures.  I've seen anoles consume bug after unwanted bug.  

Tiny plantings are especially important in urban concrete jungle settings.

Small plantings contribute to cleaner stormwater by filtering rain and trapping trash, keeping waterways free of debris.

Compact gardens do their part in moderating urban heat island effect, sequestering carbon, taking in CO2 and filling our urban air with fresh oxygen.

As these two plantings have caught my eye, tiny urban landscapes create a sense of place and beauty.

Not to mention education, awareness, biodiversity, seed harvest, pollinators and climate change, the above reasons are just a few of the many for planting wildflowers, food plants and natives in urban infill areas.

Permaculture Raised Beds and Some Of Our Favorite Veggies

Summer is half over and that means we are thinking about raised bed fall and winter plantings.  Ordering seeds for the next season's crop is so much fun!  We love going through the catalogues, admiring the photos, thinking about the upcoming seed starting and transplanting efforts.

Here are some of our tried and true, favorite cooler weather plants we like to have started by mid September.  The links will take you to either a description or catalogue page. 


Don't forget to download our Urban Farming book from Amazon with all the secrets about gardening, coop building, hens and more by clicking here!

Florida Permaculture Raised Bed Chives & Lettuces

Arugula

Also known as rocket, arugula with her bitter, earthy flavors is one of my favorite winter plants.  Excellent on sandwiches, in salads or by herself, arugula is easy to grow, hardy and a must for every Urban Farm garden.

Florida Permaculture Raised Bed Arugula

Mary Washington Asparagus

Famous heirloom varieties, both Mary and Martha Washington varieties were developed around at the beginning of the twentieth century for greater disease resistance. The 1930 Ferry catalog states that Mary Washington asparagus is  "A vigorous growing and productive asparagus bred to resist the disease known as asparagus rust". Mary is a Martha cultivar with oval tipped stalks and comes highly recommended by most asparagus growers.

Calabrese Broccoli 

Another well-known heirloom variety, use dating to just after the Civil War in the Americas but earlier in Europe, Calabrese broccoli is a dark green plant, twenty to thirty inches in height, producing fist-sized central heads, and many side shoots until frost. Noted for her texture and flavor.

Broccoli Mix - Hybrids

Use a variety of Broccolis, cultivars including Belstar, Premium Crop, Packman, Gypsy, Major, Nutribud and Waltham all produce large amounts of food.

Golden Beet

An 1820’s heirloom variety, the three inch, round, golden beet bulbs are known for their desirable sweetness. Golden beet’s unusual color adds to her versatility.  Very sweet beet.

Early Wonder Beet

The early 1900’s heirloom Early Wonder Beet produces well before the other full-sized beets, has medium to tall size tops that can be harvested and served as delicious greens. Early Wonder possesses a deep red color and rich, hearty flavor.

Red Cloud Beet

Deep crimson, dark red, vigorous growing beet producing ample greens. Red cloud beet is know for her resistance to bolting.  She can be harvested throughout most of the growing season.

St. Valery Carrot

St. Valery Carrot is an 1885 heirloom carrot and, according to James Vicks’ 1924 catalog, is the "best and most handsome main crop carrot. Enormously productive, very desirable for private gardens as well as for markets." St. Valery has ten inch roots and a strong sugar content (sweet).

New Kuroda Carrot 

The New Kuroda carrot is a strong preforming hybrid, exhibiting a deep reddish orange color. Kuroda may be used as the main carrot crop as it produces well on most small homesteads and growing operations.

Adelaide Carrot

Adelaide is a Dutch hybrid know by its more popular common name, Baby Carrot.  Easy to grow and a solid producer, Adelaide keeps its texture and fresh, sweet flavor longer than most carrots.  Very sweet carrot and great for salads.

Long Island Brussel Sprouts

Long Island Brussel Sprouts is an 1890 heirloom dwarf brussel sprout variety growing on average to approximately two to three feet depending upon climate. The Long Island Brussel variety can set up to one hundred sprouts per plant and was considered the primary commercial variety for years.

Early Jersey Wakefield Cabbage

Early Jersey Wakefield has been considered one of the best varieties of early producing cabbages for several hundred years of homestead agriculture.  Early Jersey is a 1840 heirloom variety growing to approximately three pound.  She exhibits a pale green leaf color and can be planted close together. According to DM Ferry in 1930, "this most excellent variety is the earliest and surest heading" and one that resists yellowing.

Quick Start Cabbage, Hybrid

Another cabbage variety highly resilient to yellowing and splitting, Quick Start hybrid is a strong grower, one that can be planted close together in raised beds and relied upon for steady production of three pound cabbage heads.

Danish Ballhead Cabbage

Danish Ballhead is an 1887 heirloom late fall, blue-green producer. Danish Ballhead was originally introduced by Burpee Seed and has been a popular variety for years.  This cabbage keeps well in storage.

Mammoth Red Rock Cabbage

Mills says that Mammoth Red Rock 1880 heirloom cabbage is the “largest of the red cabbages and the most sure heading, also the best for pickling". Mammoth Red had reddish purple leaves and produces a five pound plus cabbage head.  Strong producer and stores well.

Early Snowball Cabbage

This 1890 heirloom cabbage heirloom variety was introduced in the mid-1800's by P. Henderson, president of Henderson Seed Company.  Early snowball cabbage is a reliable early producer of firm texture.  Very popular variety among urban farmers.

Bright Lights Chard

Bright Lights Swiss Chard is a stunning plant, certainly desirable for garden appearance but most appreciably important because of her delicious taste and reliable food production.  Leaves are bright deep green, moderately savoyed with veins of stunning bright warm and hot colors, most commonly red, orange, or yellow.  Developed by Johnny's Selected Seeds, this variety is perfect for the smaller garden or those gardens looking to capitalize on visual effect.  Bright Lights is highly recommended by both judy and myself.

Fordhook Chard

Fordhook, while not as visually stunning as Bright Lights, is a reliable performer producing strong and plump white stalks with savory, bright green leaves.

Pink Lipstick Chard

As with Bright Lights Chard, Pink Lipstick offers amazing bright pink-red color. Use Pink Lipstick Chard in salad mixes for color and taste.

Early Snowball Cauliflower

This 1890 heirloom cauliflower heirloom variety was introduced in the mid-1800's by P. Henderson, president of Henderson Seed Company.  Early snowball cabbage is a reliable early producer of firm texture.  Another variety popular variety among urban farmers.

Starbor and Redbor Kale

Another great cooler weather plant, Starbor Kale is perfect for raised beds because of her beautiful blueish-green hue, firm leaves, great texture and compact growing characteristics. Greens can be eaten cooked or raw in salads.

Dinosaur Kale

An 1885 heirloom variety previously referred to as Tuscan Black Palm.  Dinosaur Kale offers large, rounded, succulent greens. Plants are hardy, exhibit vigorous growth habit and are popular among urban farmers as a crop that will feed the family.  We have grown Dinosaur Kale reliably for years.  Greens are good either as a salad component or cooked.

Ethiopian Kale

One of my favorite urban farm Kales, the Ethiopian variety will produce like none other.  Very tender and tasty and very drought tolerant.  Grows well in raised beds and seems to be root-knot nematode resistant.

Grand Duke Kohlrabi

Kohlrabi is also known as a ‘cabbage-turnip’ and the Grand Duke Variety produces a larger, non-woody edible part.  Very interesting plant for the garden and reliable producer.

Early Purple Vienna Kohlrabi

Excellent pre-Civil War heirloom Kohlrabi variety.  According to DM Ferry Early Purple Vienna Kohlrabi can be considered "early with small top, the leaf stems being tinged with purple. Bulbs of medium size, purple; flesh white. Desirable for forcing and early outdoor planting."  Another excellent vegetable for the urban farm homestead, preforming will in raised beds.

Lincoln Leek

Leeks are an important part of all urban farm gardens.  Lincoln leek is a long , succulent variety that can last for much of the year.  Used in salads, stir fry and other dishes.  Here in the south, established leeks offer good winter color and texture to the urban farm garden.

Garlic Chives

One of my favorites, this variety is evergreen, drought tolerant and produces well year around.  Offers brilliant white flower spikes.  This is probably one of the most hardiest of the urban farm plants, almost always reliable to out-preform any other crop.

Asian Red Lettuce

Beautiful red-green, crisp standard lettuce, this variety is a cornerstone of any winter garden in the urban core.  Asian red thrives when picked, producing more and more throughout the season. 

Year Round Lettuce

Another popular lettuce variety, especially in Europe, year-round lettuce is as what her name states, a reliable producer except in the hottest of climates where she does best grown in the shade.

Florida Permaculture Raised Bed Lettuces

Lettuce Mix

Ours favorite mix includes; Green Ice, Midnight Ruffles, Black Seeded Simpson, Simpson Elite, Matina Sweet, Buttercrunch, Red Velvet, and May Queen varieties.  Perfect for adding color and a variety of textures to salads.  The urban core farm animals love lettuces too.

Cherry Belle Radish

A 1949 heirloom, mild radish, Cherry Belle is a standard for urban core farming.  She will produce up to one inch in diameter radishes, perfect for salads and snacks.  Another reliable producer, Cherry Belle is a standard for urban core farms and gardens.

White Icicle Radish

A mid-1800’s heirloom, this white radish has her history in reliable production and ease of growth traits.  Wonderful, narrow, finger-like radishes they are perfect for salads.  Serve crisp and cold.

Giant Noble Spinach

A 1920’s heirloom and described by James Vick as a spinach that, "grows about ten inches high. Large deep green leaves, thick and tender, with rounded tips."  Giant noble spinach needs cooler weather but will faithfully give the urban farmer plenty of tasty greens for both salad and cooked dishes.  

Tyee Spinach

Tyee spinanch is a slow to bolt spinach growing well in raised beds and intense urban core farm settings.  Tyee spinach leaves are smaller than Giant Noble but heavy producers.  Good companion spinach plant to grow alongside with Giant Noble.

Florida Permaculture Raised Bed Lettuces

Herbs/Spices

Borage

Borago officinalis grows to approxiately two to three feet in height and loves the cooler weather.  I’ve grown this plant successfully on urban core green roofs and in urban farm homestead raised beds.  The bright blue and purple flowers are visually an eye-opener and are often used as garnish for vegetable and fruit salads.  Good urban farm plant selection.

Vulgare Dill

Standard pickling plant and herb, dill is an extremely drought tolerant urban farm plant with many culinary uses.  Our rabbits love the fresh picked leaves and the tall but tiny yellow flowers serve as an excellent attractant for pollinators.  Grows well in dry, neglected areas across the urban homestead.

Fernleaf Dill

An All America Winner in 1992 and introduced by W. Atlee Burpee Company, Fernleaf Dill exhibits a more compact growth habit than most of the other, sprawlingly large dill varieties.  Fernleaf dill is perfect for container growing or planting in heavily used raised beds.  As with the standard dill varieties, Fernleaf Dill provides good drought tolerant production as well as tasty culinary uses.

Vulgare Fennel

Fennel is popular for her licorice or anise-flavored seeds and bulbous base, both used in cooking.  Fennel is also a choice pollinator plant and brings a spray of light airy green to the urban core farmstead.  

Bronze Fennel

An awesome landscape perennial, Bronze Fennel brings visual and culinary benefits to any urban farm garden.  Highly sought after by several Lepidoptera species, this hardy fennel can be used in cooking or as a tea.  Bronze fennel will grow about three to four feet high depending on climate and soil conditions and adds beauty and flavor to the herb patch.

Marjoram

A relative of oregano, marjoram is slightly sweeter and enjoys the cold weather.  She is very drought tolerant and her smaller leaves can be used to flavor meat dishes.  Marjoram is also used ethnobotanically in the Caribbean as a tea plant for both stomach and respiratory issues as she possesses an strong aromatic quality.

Flat-Leaf Parsley

Standard flat-leafed parsley is a mainstay of urban core farms.  Used in Italian and Mediterrian cooking and for a variety of other uses (including keeping garlic fumes repressed in healthy diet breath), flat-leafed parsley is also sought after by many butterflies as larval food.

Curly-Leaf Parsley

Curly parsley is a very hardy cultivar of the parsleys, reliable and useful as garnish, in soups, salads or to flavor meat dishes.  As with flat-leaf parsley, curly parsley is commonly used in Mediterranean dishes such as tabouli, hummus and other dishes.

Permaculture & DIY City Farming - Patio, Backyard, Roof & Walls

Over the past thirty years we've accumulated much hands-on experience with growing food, flowers, fiber and medicinal plants in the Urban Core.

City Farmed Permaculture Eggplant

Many approaches we tried turned out to be les than optimal.  However we considered even the failures to be successes for we knowing what doesn't work is just as important as knowing what does work.

City Farmed Permaculture Bell Peppers

City farming can occur anywhere where sunlight is available.

Of course, rain or condensate helps.  But we've successfully grown plants and seen plants grow in the most harshest of places, without soil and without additional irrigation.

City Farmed Permaculture Oranges

Growing lightweight food gardens on roofs has taught that even without massive roofing supports and even in cyclone prone areas, beans, tomatoes, herbs and greens can be grown.

Living walls can shade windows, provide habitat for wildlife, produce food, gourds and sponges.

City Farmed Permaculture Cilabtro

Patio space may be utilized to create highly efficient food gardens in self-watering containers.

Hens, geese, ducks, turkeys and rabbits all have a place on the Urban Farm.

City Farmed Permaculture Chives

Learn about rooftop gardening, how to build a low cost, highly effective chicken coop or seed starting greenhouse.

Understand biodiversity principles of plant selection.

Urban Farming - our best dreams and worse nightmares.

Know what you are geting into before the adventure of your life!

You can read the details in our approximately two hundred page City Farming book available on Amazon Kindle!

City Farming, Lovely Urban Insanity is available exclusively through Kindle by clicking the link here!

Florida Urban Farm and Permaculture Plants - Tomatoes on the Roof, Walls and Patio!

Tomatoes are growing on the roof!

Rooftops, living walls and permaculture gardens can support a variety of vegetable plants but tomatoes are one of the most rewarding food plants to grow in the Urban Core.

Permaculture wild cherry tomatoes for the roof, patio or garden

Tomatoes in the kitchen can be easily turned into many delicious and nutritious dishes.  Salsa, salads, soups, sides for sandwiches are just a few of many tomato based culinary creations.

Unfortunately, organic tomatoes are expensive to buy in the market! 

Importantly, growing your own tomatoes can greatly reduce your exposure to pesticides.  Tomatoes are typically heavily sprayed in greenhouses and production fields.

Yet growing your own supply on the roof, across your living wall system, in your permaculture garden is easy!

I love growing  my 'monster-sized' tomato plants in containers.

All you really need is a small container for patio or windowsill, sunlight and water.  Add coir and a few seeds and you'll soon be on the way to a summer and fall full of juicy, sweet-tasting tomatoes!

Over the years we've tried many varieties of tomatoes here on our Urban Farm.  We've grown them on the roof, on the patio in containers, in rain gutters, across walls and anywhere else we could think of.

Wild cherry tomatoes always end up being the hardiest and most productive.

Urban Farm tomatoes we've found to be most productive are the wild cherry type

We harvested over one hundred gallons of wild cherry tomatoes last year off our living food roofs.

Wild cherry tomatoes will stand tall even in the driest, hottest rooftop afternoons, under conditions most other hybrid tomato plants quickly droop and wilt.

Hybrid tomatoes may suffer from desiccation under rooftop heat 

Cherry tomatoes will grow in the poorest of soil medium, thriving in-fact where other food plants suffer.

Importantly, we always add natural calcium sources.  Tomatoes must have calcium.

Without calcium in the soil many of the hybrid tomatoes will develop 'Blossom-End Rot'.

Blossom-End Rot results from a lack of calcium.  Seashells can correct this issue.

Ground up oyster shells, some limestone types and seashells all provide a significant source of calcium and other trace elements necessary for good growth.

Adding ground up seashells is one of my favorite approaches for supplying trace minerals to green roofs, living walls and Urban Core micro-gardens.

Next time you are walking through the market, admiring the bright red tomatoes, just think - you too could easily be growing more than you could ever use with just a few containers, a bag of washed coir, shells, organic fertilizer and wild cherry tomato seeds!

Got patio?  Think food garden!

Here is the link to my favorite wild cherry tomato seeds...  http://www.southernexposure.com/matt%C3%A2%C2%80%C2%99s-wild-cherry-tomato-cherry-008-g-p-981.html      

Florida Permaculture, Urban Farm Geese are Growing

Another geesey video clip.  Our geese, ducks and turkeys are growing!  They are so cute at this stage.  But be not fooled with the sweetness.

Animals are all about life. Though they appear fluffy and clucky be not deceived!  Even as juveniles, these critters are driven to feed and will snatch crumbs from other's beaks.

Cute, yes.  Now.

You see a goose can live well over twenty years old.  A duck and turkey easily into their 'teens'.

Urban Farming requires long term commitment.

Florida Permaculture, Life on the Urban Farm

Never name an animal that you plan to cook later and don’t be surprised if the critters jump and fly or run after you’ve removed their heads.

Animals are put on the earth here for food for us, plain and simple.  And the whole purpose of starting with twenty six chickens was to have enough to cook one every couple of weeks on top of all the eggs we’d get.

Kevin & Judy's Urban Farm Fowl (Turkeys)

Kevin & Judy's Urban Farm Fowl (Ducks & Geese)

Kevin & Judy's Urban Farm Fowl (Baby Goose)

Even Momma told me about her Mom, my Grandma, who’d clean a chicken each week in Miami and cook the very best fried chicken one ever tasted. 

Never mind the fact that it has taken ten to twenty weeks to raise up the fowl from the cute little fluffy balls of chirps, gobble and quack, fifty pounds of weekly scratch feed, countless thousands of gallons of fresh water and the emergence of a strange but strong love-hate relationship, the animals are meant to be eaten.

My friend Pascale, the green roof expert from France even recommended mustard with cooked rabbit on a stick.

Judy however has decided that raising an animal from babyhood commands too many feelings of love and protection to take the killing and eating of what have essentially become our pets lightly. She woke up breathless one night from a dream in which we were eating rabbit stew.   We were eating Jack, Ruby, Thumper, or Midnight. This was when we understood we'd probably not try to breed more rabbits for food, them being mammals and all. 

The chickens should have been easier, but Judy grew very attached to the hens also. Raising them from fluffy little day old chicks (what could be cuter?) to awkward but endearing pullets and on to beautiful hens with iridescent beauty and sweet natures has made it very hard to want to eat our cluckers. I think we are just not hungry enough perhaps. 

Then there is the question of “embodied energy” and not just the spiritual idea of sacred life force. Embodied energy is the issue of how much water and food it takes to raise a chicken, duck, turkey, goose, or rabbit to a mature eating size. 

Judy has come to the conclusion that it isn’t wrong to eat meat or to raise and kill your own animals for food. Animal food is nutrient dense in a way that our bodies can utilize well. Raising your own meat animals is kinder to the critters in the long run than buying factory raised animals. 

Killing and eating an animal is a momentous act and shouldn’t be taken lightly. Perhaps this is why there were so many laws concerning the killing and eating of animals in the Old Testament, such as a lamb not being cooked in it’s mother’s milk and other rituals concerning the slaughter of animals including offering them to God. Contrast these ancient ways with the modern practice of supermarket meat wrapped in plastic and styrofoam and the practice of basing our diets on meat, such as some of  the ill-advised “low- carb” diets. 

Moreover, I’d suppose many of us would stop eating meat if we had to kill the critters and dress them out, disposing of the innards and carcasses.  Importantly, most cities and municipalities who allow for Urban Farm animals prohibit the slaughter of said animals in residential areas.  However, there are many licensed butcher and slaughter houses across the country, one probably not too far away from your farm.

A sharp machete and well placed swing will quickly dispatch most of the Urban Farm animals.    Butcher block and butcher knife will also work.  The knife’s motion must be swift though, to minimize pain.  Don’t be alarmed if the hen, goose or turkey continues to cackle, hoot or gobble, even without their heads.  A large, twenty pound headless turkey can especially put on a show, flying across the Urban Farm backyard, slinging blood everywhere.   If you are going to clean your own meat, be prepared to handle the gore.

Our uncomfortable adversity to killing and dressing backyard farm critters is only a couple generations displaced.  Grandparents thought nothing of slaughtering, cleaning and cooking a backyard bird or rabbit.  Really, it was the early Baby Boomer generation first forsaking the raising and killing of hens for Sunday dinner.  My mother has spoken of watching her momma cutting the hen into fryable sections soon to become delicious fried chicken.

Keep your knives sharp.  A sharp knife makes the job so much easier.  Once you’ve mastered the art of beheading and cleaning a farm critter, it should take no more than ten minutes from picking up the critter slated for the kitchen to the final wash of the meat.

I recommend a heavy butcher knife, a large, long serrated knife and a small paring type knife.  The head should be removed first, with a swift blow from the heavy butcher or a swing from a machete.  Be sure you don’t cut off your fingers and be ready for the blood.  A handy hose helps with the mess.

Separation of the legs and wings using the serrated knife follows the head.  Place the head, legs and wings in a garbage bag and using the small paring knife, slit the outer layer of skin from the neck down the chest about four inches.  Set the knife on the butcher table and using both hands pull the skin and feathers away from the underlying meat.  The skin should easily come off, similar to a pair of pajamas pulled off in the morning.

The feathers and skin goes into the same garbage bag as the legs, wings and head.  Once the bird is de-skinned it is time to remove the entrails.  Open the birds chest with the small sharp knife and reach in, grasping all the internal organs and intestines, pulling them out and placing all the guts in the garbage bag.  Try not to puncture to intestines.  Be sure to remove all internal parts and wash the cleaned bird down with the pressurized water nozzle.  Wash the carcass even more thoroughly if the intestines are punctures during the cleaning process.

Cleaned critters can be cooked immediately or wrapped in plastic grocery bags and placed in the freezer.

Urban Farm critters that are allowed to free range grow tough and stringy very quickly.  If you choose to eat your animals, consider cleaning the young and tender.  Sinewy meat may smell good in the oven baking or on the range frying but once stuck tightly in between teeth, opinions quickly change.

Killing and dressing your Urban Farm fowl and rabbits is the most honorable way to eat meat if you choose to do so.  Taking full responsibility for the death of and cleaning the of a creature before enjoying his or her meat is an educational opportunity.  Understanding the full impact of meat’s life cycle creates sustainability, it creates an intimate awareness of our actions.  Though we may choose for a season to ignore how  grocery store meat arrived on the shelves or in the freezer, the ignorance will eventually catch us individually and as a nation.  Participatory meat preparation celebrates the gift of meat made by your critter and sheds light on the true value of life.

Even better, consider becoming a vegetarian.  This may be easier than you think, for once you experience killing and dressing out a bird or rabbit, your personal attitude concerning carnivorous habits may change.   

Judy may agree to eat some of the ducks, geese and turkey that are already put in the freezer, but meanwhile it is still summer and it is easier to have a vegetarian diet supplemented with our fresh eggs and organic yogurt right now.   Me; due to the spiritual complexity and cost effectiveness of killing and dressing out, I am pretty much done with the meat (though it is amazing just how quickly we soon sometimes forget).

Florida Urban Agriculture and Rabbits

Judy’s Maxim to Remember:  Best thing about the rabbits is their poo, because you can use the rich manure right on your garden without waiting. 

Kevin’s Maxim to Remember:  Our rabbits were intent on eating and mating, not necessarily in that order and irrespective of whether the other rabbit was a male or a female.

Rabbits can be a wonderful addition to the Urban Farm.  The hoppers are truly one of the easiest critters to provide care for.  Rabbit poo can be likened to steroids for plants, giving them the required nutrients for a rich and deeply vibrant color, encouraging the plants to grow fruits and vegetables  of monumental size.  Rabbit pellets and composted chicken poop combined are the only fertilizers your Urban Agriculture venture will ever really need.

And rabbits don’t take up much space.  Compared to the farm birds, rabbits can survive in a much smaller cage.  Therein lies a serious dilemma we came to struggle with.  Though many raise rabbits to feed their pythons (or sell to pet stores for python food) we raised rabbits first for their poo and second as a source of high quality meat.

Interestingly, we were very successful  with the use of poo, yet we quickly came to realize we could never kill our bunnies for a meal.

We fed our rabbits pelletized feed made for bunnies, packaged in fifty pound bags and bought from Standard Feed.  Of course the vitamin filled feed was supplemented with the better stuff, fresh greens from the garden and the occasional carrot from the kitchen.

Rabbits must have their water checked several times a day.  With heavy fur coats, they desperately need hydration during Florida’s long hot summers.  Be sure to give the water dispenser a good daily spray down, keeping it clean and free of algae or gunky growth.

As mammals, rabbits are different than the Urban Farm birds.  Looking you in the eye, sniffing and then cuddling up against your neck, a rabbit is more like a pet dog or cat than a hen or turkey.  


Culturally, most of us are used to eating chicken or turkey on a daily deli basis.  Though my green roof friend in France loves rabbit on a stick with mustard, we here in the U.S. have not developed that tradition to any extent.  And so for us the killing and dressing of a half year old rabbit for a five minute meal did not present itself as appetizing. 

Additionally, here in Florida where heat and humidity abound, our rabbits appeared to dread the summertime extremes even though we built their cages high above the ground with green roof shade and all the amenities we could think to include in a rabbit cage.

Not wanting to subject our rabbits to tiny, confined spaces, we tripled and quadrupled our bunny pen sizes.  Cruelty though still has a way of occupying even the largest of rabbit cages.  Rabbits were meant to be born into the wild.  Even the most spacious of outdoor cages creates a prison for the critters.  Our rabbits would stare at the veggie filled raised beds through their coop’s chicken wire sides and wonder what freedom would taste like.

Living cramped up in a four foot by four foot cage must be hard.  However many rabbit pens I’ve seen at the feed stores are much tinier.  I recommend at a minimum, rabbits be provided with twenty square feet be critter to allow for exercise room.

Bunnies enjoy running and hopping.  I suppose it is hard to do so in tiny cages and reminds me of being stuck in a way to tiny car for a very long trip.

Yes, rabbits can be very easy to take care of because they are not as vocal as the other farm critters.  The easiness is more of an out of sight, out of mind paradigm.

Before we gave Jack, our final rabbit away,  I let him out of the cage to run for a couple of days in the backyard.  Jack was our oldest rabbit too, solid black with a touch of oncoming gray. Of course he ran straight for the collards and arugula.  Jack had been staring at our practically unlimited array of leafy greens for the better part of a year.  He feasted like there was no tomorrow.

Jack was fine with running through our Urban Farm for the first day or two.  He’d leap, bounding across the rear three quarters of an acre as though he was a young bunny again.  Though he’d not allow us to come near him, he’d sleep up next to our house.  I suppose he felt some sense of security being near us at night.

But when my neighbor began to tell me he’d seen Jack in his garden I knew something had to be done.  Armed with a fishing net, the next morning I crept out and hid behind my neighbor’s tall tomato bushes and waited.  Before I knew it Jack had hopped through a hole in our fence and was headed straight for the neighbor’s turnip greens.

Though he had more organically grown greens than he could ever eat in our permaculture kingdom, Jack wanted what he could not have.

The fishing net swooshed through the air as Jack neared and before he knew it Jack was back in his cage, having experienced a brief but very happy few days of real life.

A note of caution here.  Always hold both rear legs of a rabbit very tightly when carrying as they pack a powerfully sharp punch, especially when the bunny knows they are headed back to the cage.

Though rabbits are some of the easiest of the Urban Farm critters to care for, I wouldn’t recommend starting off with bunnies.  Yes their poo is the perfect fertilizer.  Yes they are quiet and relative docile (Monty Python unfortunately gave them a bad name).  Yet subjecting the little mammals to a life in a cage seems more like cruel and unusual punishment.  Even if life behind the wire protected them from our neighborhood red tailed hawk.