Gardening in Ruby with Evelyn Sarten – In the Alaska Garden with Heidi Rader

In this video, long-time gardener Evelyn Sarten talks about gardening in Ruby, Alaska, for almost a quarter of a century, much of it with her late husband Ed (Dwight) Sarten.

Evelyn was raised on the land on a Native American reservation in Taos, New Mexico. She was taught to live with the land, and she's always grown her own food. The Sartens' garden in Ruby is characterized by innovation and making do with what is available. For instance, their chicken coop fence was constructed from an old couch frame, old bed frames, and leftover fencing from the school. Now her one remaining chicken lives in her Arctic entryway.

She has grown a wide variety of crops, including carrots, lettuce, tomatoes, turnips, peas, pole beans, onions, garlic, a variety of herbs, and really "anything that grows." She grows zucchini, corn, tomatoes, pumpkins, cabbage, herbs, and spaghetti squash in a high tunnel.

One of the biggest challenges is watering her garden. She has to carry water either from the river or the watering station, then often waters the garden by hand. She has a sizable hill to carry her water up as well.

Evelyn says, “A seed is like a baby you just take care of it and watch it grow and give it water when it needs and give it sunlight and aeration when it needs it. And it’ll pretty much tell you how it wants to be taken care of. That’s how I do it.”

You can view a blog post on It Grows in Alaska here: https://itgrowsinalaska.community.uaf...

To learn more about growing your own food and gardening in Alaska, sign up for Heidi's classes:
Grow your own food: https://www.edx.org/learn/food-nutrit... (free on edX)

Growing a Productive, Sustainable Garden in Alaska: https://itgrowsinalaska.community.uaf... (a 3 credit class at the University of Alaska Fairbanks)

For more information on gardening in various regions of Alaska, go to: www.uaf.edu/ces/