Hello and welcome to my site!
My name is Barry Szczucki and for those of you who don't know me I thought I should give you a little background info. I have been married for 23 years and I am a father of four. Most of my career has been as a professional truck driver with some background in the pest control industry as well.
Currently we are living in a subdivision and producing 100% of our vegetables from our yard and have also managed to reduce our electric consumption by over 20% while we were at it. I have a passion for growing world class food organically and I am helping others to do the same.
The website will be updating on a weekly basis with the addition of an energy section as time goes on so stop by often. If you have any questions you can contact me at: Barry@relyonyourself.com or give me a shout at my talk radio show: Self reliance Radio
Grow Your Own Superfoods
There are many reasons why a person might want to grow their own food. Financial, health, and quality are the three primary reasons. Health concerns are becoming a much bigger issue and a primary motivation for people to start growing their own foods these days..
If you do things a certain way you can grow your own "Superfoods". Superfoods are a class of the most potent nutrient-rich foods on the planet. Extremely tasty and satisfying, superfoods have the ability to tremendously increase the vital force and energy of one's body, and are the optimum choice for improving overall health. Superfoods immediately help nourish the brain, bones, muscles, skin, hair, nails, heart, liver, kidneys, pancreas, and immune system. They can also over the long-term, correct imbalances and help guide us toward a more natural and original diet. Eating healthy is easy if your dinner is growing in your back yard.
There are different types of superfoods. The "exotic" superfoods such as gogi berries and raw cacoa and what I call "normal" superfoods. These are more common foods such as tomatoes and broccoli that have been grown in conditions which jack the vitamin and mineral content and nutritional value up to superfoods status. And best of all anyone can accomplish this by adding the proper supplements to their soil and not using any chemicals.
A lot has to do with soil preparation. Feed the soil, the soil feeds the plants and the plants feed you. If you make a point of putting every nutrient in the soil that the plant needs you will also get the nutrients that you need.What you are creating is a complete ecosystem within the boundaries of your garden. The ecosystem you are creating will cause the microbes and earthworms in your soil to flourish and will add greatly to the quality of the food.
Earthworms excrete their weight in castings on a daily basis. Earthworm castings contain 5 times more nitrogen, 7 times more phosphorus, and 11 times more potassium than the soil the worms are living in. Also there is a gland at the top of the earthworm that treats the incoming soil with with lime carbonate so the castings are PH neutral. Once you have established your superfoods ecosystem a lot of the fertilization is done by nature and leaves you primarily planting and eating.
According to the USDA the average amount of worm castings on US farmland is 5 tons per acre per year. That sounds like a lot but the highest number ever recorded was in the Nile delta region in 1949. It was an amazing 120 tons per acre per year. My goal is to duplicate those circumstances and teach others to do the same.
Decades of farming the same ground every year and only replacing the elements required to make the plants grow fast have left the food barren of the minerals and vitamins it used to contain. The human body needs these things to run properly and we no longer get many of them from the food we eat. The cattle are also fed this chemical laden, de-mineralized menu so even people who eat plenty of meat aren’t necessarily getting what they need.
This is no secret. There is a vitamin store on every corner these days as more people become conscious of the realities of the modern diet, but the vitamin pills aren’t the same as the nutrients that come directly from the food grown in first class “mineralized” soil.
By using organic gardening methods with the supplementation of a few key ingredients anyone can create fully mineralized, enzyme and vitamin rich food in their own back yard.
Give growing your own a try. The food tastes great and you may find that you like a lot of vegetables you never did before. With a full complement of nutrients and zero chemical pesticides you won’t believe the difference it will make in how it tastes and how you feel!! Check out the "How To Grow Your Own Superfoods"pages and you can be up and running in no time!!
Virtual Food
Have you ever gone to the store and bought a bright red, blemish free, nutritious looking tomato only to get home and find it has no more taste than newspaper? That is the result of the demineralization of the soil caused by modern farming methods.
The tomato you bought in the store probably only had only a dozen or so minerals in it instead of the 56 minerals that tomatoes are genetically disposed to pick up from the soil. They are almost a form of “Virtual Food”. It is only an imitation of what food used to be. Nobody did it on purpose. Farmers are hard working honorable people. The minerals in the soil are contained in very small particles that dissolve very slowly and over time the plants use them all up and they are no longer replaced. The only thing that is replaced on a yearly basis is nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium. That is enough to keep the plant alive but leaves the food barren of the nutrients that the human body has run on for thousands of years.
The entire food chain has been affected by it and the demineralized animal feed is causing less nutritional meat as well. Many experts believe that our demineralized diet is costing us greatly in terms of long term health. The human body can manufacture some vitamins but it can’t manufacture a single mineral that the body requires for both mental and physical health.
We are born with 90 minerals in our body and they need to be replaced as we use them up. Over the last 30 years mineral and vitamin content of vegetables has dropped by between 25% and 50% and according to the UN over 2 billion people world wide are currently suffering from micronutrient malnutrition. According to the UN the deficiencies are leading to a lowering of the IQ in many people and reduced mental capacity in millions of children. This is something a lot of people are aware of and is evidenced by the many vitamin stores you see.
Unfortunately the minerals contained in vitamin pills are frequently not absorbed by the body. To be readily absorbed by the body minerals need to be processed by plants which transform inorganic minerals found in the soil into organic minerals that our body can put to use.
The solution is to grow your own food in soil that has been prepared with as many minerals in it a possible. Feed the soil and the soil will feed the plant and the plant will feed you. The health and well-being of all of us ultimately depends on a highly mineralized, alive and vibrant soil. It isn’t hard and is well worth the effort. Here’s how to Grow Your Own Superfoods
For a list of the elements which occur in completely mineralized soil and the health benefits they offer Click Here
