ive started growing tomatoes at home with a mixture of soil and compost… is that organic?

This is not the best, but it is a GOOD laymen definition of OG:

"ORGANIC GARDENING – the science and art of gardening by incorporating the entire landscape design and environment to improve and maximize the garden soil's health, structure, texture, as well as maximize the production and health of developing plants without using synthethic commercial fertilizers, pesticides, or fungicides."
http://faq.gardenweb.com/faq/lists/organic/2002083353003940.html

Leave it to Simple to make a shoe from recycled soda bottles and car tires, and a comfortable one at that! Supple suede leather uppers are durable and smooth wearing; vulcanized rubber rands protect uppers and feet. Organic cotton canvas linings are soft and breathe well to keep your feet comfortable. Toxic pesticides are eliminated in every step of the growing process of organic cotton, resulting in less impact on the environment. Shoe laces and footbeds are made from recycled PET polyester; footbeds provide cushioning underfoot. Use of recycled PET polyester, sourced from old soda bottles, saves millions of barrels of oil consumption and tons of air emissions yearly. EVA midsole shanks provide shock absorption and additional cushion. Durable rubber outsoles are made from recycled car tires and thus grip the road as they should!

[Read more…]

I really want to grow my own organic berries, but I dont know where to get seeds or plants for it. any help? thankx! 🙂
rose… what store? they dont sell organic berrie plants/seeds at walmart, so "the store" dosn't really help.
hey amber 😀

it is almost impossible to find certified organic berry plants. I sources some cert organic strawberry plants last year but they cost $10 ea (compared to 250 plants for $65 of conventionally raised plants). These straewberry plants were in california and limited in supply as well.

I make my living growing organically but buying perennial fruit is place where I have had no luck finding certified plants. So i use conventional and figure by the time most produce after 1 or 2 years they are quite organic from the years or organic management they get on my farm.

I would try the following
http://www.localharvest.org
http://www.johnnysseeds.com
http://www.rareseeds.com

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You will not find such plants at a box store like Lowe's or Wal-mart.

You don't say what kind of berries but most grow from cuttings, runners, etc and NOT from seed. if they do grow from seed it will be 3 to 5 years before they will fruit.

You might try asking the local organic/sustainable farms in your area if they have any extra plants they have dug up to thin out their berry patches. I know we could have dug up thousands of raspberry plants and in the past have had tens of thousands of strawberry plants to sell from having to thin out an out of control patch.

Organic food is food that has been grown without the use of toxic chemicals, pesticides or fertilizers. The food is as natural as can be, safer for the environment and usually tastes better too. Most importantly though, eating this food is healthier for you and may provide many health benefits, which is what this article is all about.

Even though further research needs to be done to gain a better understanding of the benefits of organic food, there is still much valuable information to share with you.

Before we discuss the actual health benefits of eating whole food, lets take a look at the advantages it has over non-organic food.

It’s a fact that this food is highly nutritious and contains higher levels of vitamins and minerals. Vitamin C and minerals like magnesium, calcium and iron are just some of the nutrients organic food contains higher amounts of.

Whole foods also contain higher amounts of antioxidants, which help reduce the risk of developing cancers.

You may be surprised to know, but the vegetables we eat today are nowhere near as nutritious as they were 50 or even 15 years ago. Farmers tend to take shortcuts when growing food, and the fastest way is generally not the best way to do something. This trend is expected to continue, so if eating highly nutritious food is important to you, looking into organic foods is something worth considering.

If you were wondering why organic food hasn’t exactly taken the world by storm, it’s mainly due to the extra cost associated with organic growing. Demand is greater than supply and as a result, you can expect to pay about 20% extra for this kind of food..

Numerous studies have been conducted to find out the benefits whole foods can provide us humans. Many results are still fairly inconclusive however there have been many reported cases of benefits when animals are fed organic food.

The reason for the vagueness in health benefits is due to many reasons such as: incorrect method of testing and the lengthy time it takes to determine results of this nature. However several studies have shown benefits such as:

Decline in colds and other conditions
Improves dental health
Improves flow of your overall system
Greater chance of sprains and fractures
Reduces chance of injury
Better over health

As mentioned, the subject of organic food vs non organic food is very iffy and many researches believe that this food provides little to no health benefits.

Thinking about it logically, surely food that has been grown as it was intended to and that contains no added toxic chemicals has to be considerably healthier for us.

Whether the extra cost associated with organic food is worth the money is entirely up to the person. There is insufficient evidence to say something like “eating whole foods will reduce the likelihood of getting heart disease”.

Even though it’s likely that eating organic food will produce significant healthier benefits long term, as of now it comes more down to ones opinion than solid fact.