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The Grow System: True Health, Wealth, and Happiness Come from the Ground
Grow your own food and medicine with a step-by-step guide from the founder of The Grow Network
Imagine cultivating enough food to slash your grocery shopping in half--all in less than an hour a day in your own backyard. Sounds impossible, right? Marjory Wildcraft says it's She's been homesteading for almost twenty years and founded The Grow Network to teach hundreds of thousands of others--some with very little space or time, some city dwellers with rooftop gardens--how to do the same, from gardening, to raising chickens, to composting, to medicine-making.
Wildcraft started her homesteading journey in search of a more sustainable and financially secure way of life. As she says, self-sufficiency offers practical rewards, but the real payoff is "true wealth": health, family, community, meaningful work, and living a life with purpose. This empowering way of life is possible for anyone who has a patch of dirt, small or large. The Grow System
• Essential advice for creating a balanced ecosystem in your backyard, with a basic recipe for homemade fertilizer
• Step-by-step instructions for setting up a chicken coop and information on choosing the right breed
• Home remedies for 12 common ailments, with 8 must-know medicine preparations.
The Grow System provides a comprehensive strategy for producing healthy food and herbal medicine at home, and reclaiming the skills our ancestors used every day. It helps connect us to the environment and empowers us to lead healthier lives, without relying on big systems that are out of our control and insecure. It offers a path to a rich, reliable, and deeply satisfying life.
Imagine cultivating enough food to slash your grocery shopping in half--all in less than an hour a day in your own backyard. Sounds impossible, right? Marjory Wildcraft says it's She's been homesteading for almost twenty years and founded The Grow Network to teach hundreds of thousands of others--some with very little space or time, some city dwellers with rooftop gardens--how to do the same, from gardening, to raising chickens, to composting, to medicine-making.
Wildcraft started her homesteading journey in search of a more sustainable and financially secure way of life. As she says, self-sufficiency offers practical rewards, but the real payoff is "true wealth": health, family, community, meaningful work, and living a life with purpose. This empowering way of life is possible for anyone who has a patch of dirt, small or large. The Grow System
• Essential advice for creating a balanced ecosystem in your backyard, with a basic recipe for homemade fertilizer
• Step-by-step instructions for setting up a chicken coop and information on choosing the right breed
• Home remedies for 12 common ailments, with 8 must-know medicine preparations.
The Grow System provides a comprehensive strategy for producing healthy food and herbal medicine at home, and reclaiming the skills our ancestors used every day. It helps connect us to the environment and empowers us to lead healthier lives, without relying on big systems that are out of our control and insecure. It offers a path to a rich, reliable, and deeply satisfying life.
- GenresNonfictionGardening
288 pages, Paperback
Published May 11, 2021
43 people are currently reading
137 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
August 9, 2021
About growing food, chicken eggs, and rabbit meat; composting, foraging, herbal remedies, making pills, poultices, teas, infusions, tinctures, liniments, lotions, salves, syrups, and gelatins.
Interesting things I learned:
One risk to investing your money in properties that you rent out is if there is an economic crash, then you are stuck paying the mortgage on all those properties because the renters can’t pay them (ix).
“It turns out from the scientific research Wohlleben brings forward that a tree knows when it’s being eaten, and it quickly changes the tastes of its leaves to be unpalatable to the deer. The even more amazing aspect of his research is that the tree also communicates to its nearby ‘friends and family’ about the intruder, and they all change the taste of their leaves. The deer seem to know the distance and move to the next tree that is out of range of the local communication network. And that is why deer and other browsers continually move” (37).
The Tarahumara people of Mexico’s Copper Canyon are the world’s fastest long-distance runners (62). 70-80 year old men still running races that start at night and last until noon the next day! So never use age as an excuse for why you can’t do anything physical! All it takes is practice!
13 common weeds you can eat: amaranth (greens, seeds), chickweed (greens), clover (greens), dandelion (leaves, root), dock, grass, knotweed, lambsquarter, mallow, mustard, plantain, purslane, thistle (125-126).
“If you harvested in the late autumn, the potency of your roots is stronger than in roots harvested in summer” (168).
Infusions need to be consumed the day you brew them (243).
Native Americans knew to soak their corn in an alkali solution (made from lime) which released the nutrients, especially B3 or niacin. But corn can cause a nutritional deficiency if central to a diet and hasn’t been processed correctly. “Interestingly, instead of adopting the traditional processing of the grain to release the vitamins in corn, they ended up adding brewer’s yeast to people’s diets because it is high in B vitamins, especially niacin” (222).
“Numerous studies have shown that the tiny 5 mg of vitamin C in a fresh, medium-sized apple have more antioxidant activity in the human body than 1,500 mg of ascorbic acid contained in a pill” (157).
“A team of scientists looked at the nutrient content of 43 fruits and vegetables grown in 1950, everything from rutabaga to honeydew, and compared them to the identical fruits and veggies grow in 1999. Their findings were disturbing—all the nutrient levels went down” because of soil depletion from pesticide and herbicide use (223).
Marjorie’s friend Leslie had the problem of squash vine borers eating her squash plants. Instead of resorting to chemicals, she researched different varieties of squashes that were resistant to the vine borers. She experimented and found one that thrived in her yard: tatume (Cucurbita pepo) (253).
“You should not take calcium carbonate because it has a hard time being absorbed in older bodies. Instead of going into a person’s bones, calcium carbonate may get absorbed in artery walls, leading to the hardening of the arteries, heart disease, and stroke. On the other hand, calcium *citrate* can be absorbed by the body, but only if you are taking it with the proper amount of magnesium” and vitamin D to help with absorption (226). “Calcium supplementation has been shown to actually increase the risk of hip fracture. And people taking calcium supplements are at a higher risk of death from cardiovascular disease. Calcium supplements can also inhibit the uptake of iron, some studies showing by as much as 62%” (227).
“The animals being used in large-scale commercial agriculture have been so specially bred for eating industrially produced grain hat the animals are not viable in what should be their natural environment. For example, commercial breeds of cattle cannot fatten up on pasture grass, and many would die if they were to only graze on the grasses their ancestors thrived on. The Cornish rock cross chicken, which is he darling of commercial meat production, is specifically developed to put on weight with incredible speed. And they don’t stop growing. Fi not processed within a very short time of maturity, they will gain so much more weight that they will die because they can no longer walk” (250). And we humans eat that chicken meat. No wonder so many humans are obese.
“Nitrogen is one of the most essential elements for plants, and it just so happens that the form of nitrogen in animal waste is precisely the form plants want the most” (63).
Rabbits are a good choice for meat because they eat “the kind of stuff most people would put out with the trash, like landscape trimmings, grass clippings, tree bark, and weeds” (66). Their poop has little odor, is small, and it’s “cold” so it can be put directly at the base of plants right away.
Interesting things I learned:
One risk to investing your money in properties that you rent out is if there is an economic crash, then you are stuck paying the mortgage on all those properties because the renters can’t pay them (ix).
“It turns out from the scientific research Wohlleben brings forward that a tree knows when it’s being eaten, and it quickly changes the tastes of its leaves to be unpalatable to the deer. The even more amazing aspect of his research is that the tree also communicates to its nearby ‘friends and family’ about the intruder, and they all change the taste of their leaves. The deer seem to know the distance and move to the next tree that is out of range of the local communication network. And that is why deer and other browsers continually move” (37).
The Tarahumara people of Mexico’s Copper Canyon are the world’s fastest long-distance runners (62). 70-80 year old men still running races that start at night and last until noon the next day! So never use age as an excuse for why you can’t do anything physical! All it takes is practice!
13 common weeds you can eat: amaranth (greens, seeds), chickweed (greens), clover (greens), dandelion (leaves, root), dock, grass, knotweed, lambsquarter, mallow, mustard, plantain, purslane, thistle (125-126).
“If you harvested in the late autumn, the potency of your roots is stronger than in roots harvested in summer” (168).
Infusions need to be consumed the day you brew them (243).
Native Americans knew to soak their corn in an alkali solution (made from lime) which released the nutrients, especially B3 or niacin. But corn can cause a nutritional deficiency if central to a diet and hasn’t been processed correctly. “Interestingly, instead of adopting the traditional processing of the grain to release the vitamins in corn, they ended up adding brewer’s yeast to people’s diets because it is high in B vitamins, especially niacin” (222).
“Numerous studies have shown that the tiny 5 mg of vitamin C in a fresh, medium-sized apple have more antioxidant activity in the human body than 1,500 mg of ascorbic acid contained in a pill” (157).
“A team of scientists looked at the nutrient content of 43 fruits and vegetables grown in 1950, everything from rutabaga to honeydew, and compared them to the identical fruits and veggies grow in 1999. Their findings were disturbing—all the nutrient levels went down” because of soil depletion from pesticide and herbicide use (223).
Marjorie’s friend Leslie had the problem of squash vine borers eating her squash plants. Instead of resorting to chemicals, she researched different varieties of squashes that were resistant to the vine borers. She experimented and found one that thrived in her yard: tatume (Cucurbita pepo) (253).
“You should not take calcium carbonate because it has a hard time being absorbed in older bodies. Instead of going into a person’s bones, calcium carbonate may get absorbed in artery walls, leading to the hardening of the arteries, heart disease, and stroke. On the other hand, calcium *citrate* can be absorbed by the body, but only if you are taking it with the proper amount of magnesium” and vitamin D to help with absorption (226). “Calcium supplementation has been shown to actually increase the risk of hip fracture. And people taking calcium supplements are at a higher risk of death from cardiovascular disease. Calcium supplements can also inhibit the uptake of iron, some studies showing by as much as 62%” (227).
“The animals being used in large-scale commercial agriculture have been so specially bred for eating industrially produced grain hat the animals are not viable in what should be their natural environment. For example, commercial breeds of cattle cannot fatten up on pasture grass, and many would die if they were to only graze on the grasses their ancestors thrived on. The Cornish rock cross chicken, which is he darling of commercial meat production, is specifically developed to put on weight with incredible speed. And they don’t stop growing. Fi not processed within a very short time of maturity, they will gain so much more weight that they will die because they can no longer walk” (250). And we humans eat that chicken meat. No wonder so many humans are obese.
“Nitrogen is one of the most essential elements for plants, and it just so happens that the form of nitrogen in animal waste is precisely the form plants want the most” (63).
Rabbits are a good choice for meat because they eat “the kind of stuff most people would put out with the trash, like landscape trimmings, grass clippings, tree bark, and weeds” (66). Their poop has little odor, is small, and it’s “cold” so it can be put directly at the base of plants right away.
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November 28, 2023Her book is just fine and what she presents in videos, on brighteon.com , YouTube, rumble. However, beware ordering any products from her company. Her order(s) arrived to me in Montana:
haphazard! One box arrived without any labeling or directions to use activate the various vials potions - one ingredient in one package was bentonite clay . No idea what other liquids are in various vials- or how to use - mix - combine -apply… endless reaching out to her company to no avail - finally getting a response by positing on Mike Adams’ show store, HealthRanger.com by some customer service person quoting that of course they help and that public statement the end of their help. Recently she offers an address and phone number .
What ever she is selling, it’s wise to buy elsewhere , but definitely take her advice on how to grow. 775.772.0025 Susie
haphazard! One box arrived without any labeling or directions to use activate the various vials potions - one ingredient in one package was bentonite clay . No idea what other liquids are in various vials- or how to use - mix - combine -apply… endless reaching out to her company to no avail - finally getting a response by positing on Mike Adams’ show store, HealthRanger.com by some customer service person quoting that of course they help and that public statement the end of their help. Recently she offers an address and phone number .
What ever she is selling, it’s wise to buy elsewhere , but definitely take her advice on how to grow. 775.772.0025 Susie
August 7, 2021
1st time I've seen Goodreads not get the title right. It's "The Grow System-The Essential Guide to Modern Self-Sufficient Living-from Growing Food to Making Medicine". This author is growing "all" her own food. Explains raising chickens & rabbits for your table in detail plus how to get a garden going, growing and thriving. Interesting parts about making your own infusions and home remedies.
June 9, 2021
Great read! Lots of interesting information and great for beginners.
September 28, 2021
Inspiring. Everyone should read this book.
June 3, 2021
Massive inspiration! Great for building the confidence of WHY and practical advice on HOW to build self-reliance into your life. I love how it reads like a story, but really give you in-depth, actionable info to start building on whatever size land you have (even if you can only start in pots on a balcony, like me).
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews