New Yorker pushes limits of the "locavore" life

By Timothy Gardner

NEW YORK (Reuters) - One of Manny Howard's discoveries during the month this summer he ate only the plants he grew and the animals he raised and slaughtered was that his tough-talking plumber was too squeamish to watch chickens be killed for supper.

"We've all lost touch with the sources of our food, but it really underscored the gap for me when a guy like that made me warn his dispatcher before I did the work," Howard said in an interview at his farm -- the 800-square-foot (74-square-meter) backyard and garage to his Brooklyn, New York, house.

Freelance food writer Howard knew about "locavores" -- people who try to eat only locally produced food. But seeing one locavore at a market squint at a map while asking a pig farmer where exactly he lived in New York state, gave Howard the idea to try out life as an extreme locavore -- in the biggest U.S. city.

The locavore movement is growing from San Francisco to New York. Green-leaning consumers seek ways to cut down on the oil and chemicals used in the growing and transporting of food and preserve small farm methods. Barbara Kingsolver's memoir "Animal, Vegetable, Miracle," and Michael Pollan's book "The Omnivore's Dilemma," about modern food production, have fertilized the trend.

Howard figured his farm could provide him enough food for a month late in the summer and began preparing in March. He built a chicken coop, dug a drainage system to water his crops, spent thousands of dollars on topsoil to cover his yard's lead-rich, nutrient-poor clay and bought rabbits, ducks and 25 chicks.

He soon learned it was hard work -- seven days a week, six to 16 hours a day, tending his farm nearly every day until the experiment of eating his food began in mid-August.

LUCKY DUCKS

Howard wanted to use duck fat for cooking, but ran into a problem. "You can kill chickens, but don't kill any ducks," his 4-year-old daughter told him. He compromised on olive oil.