The average foreign-grown banana travels more than 6,000 miles to reach your hand. Along the way it is virtually embalmed with various chemicals designed to pass it through import regulations, and preserve it long enough to reach you in an edible state.Members of a new Greenrock initiative want Bermudians to start looking a little closer to home for their food, such as in their own backyard.Through a programme called ‘Healthy Harvest’, Greenrock hopes to revive Bermuda’s local food production and consumption by establishing plots for vegetable gardens and fruit orchards around the Island.Susan and Graham Pewter, owners of the beautiful and historic Huntley Manor on Tanglewood Road in Paget, are leading the way with the help of friends such as agricultural engineer Omari Dill.“If I can do it, anyone can,” said Mrs Pewter. “I never put my finger in the soil until a year ago. I was never a gardener.“I never had time, and I don’t know anything about it. This is all learned from my good friends, such as Omari, who have explained how things are done.”Huntley Manor is known for its unusual red roof, which stands out against Bermuda’s traditional white. On the northwest side of the property was a sharp slope. The Pewters established their garden there.To take full advantage of the slope, the family also built a beautiful treehouse patio made with wood untouched by preservatives or chemicals. The treehouse is built on the stumps of a Pride of India tree.“This was a huge hill with a lot of stuff on in it,” said Mrs Pewter. “There was so much debris that had to be gotten off the hill to turn it into what it is today. It is stunning when you are sitting here looking at the view.“I had a nice crew who helped me including Omari Dill, Christine Watlington, a well-known botanical illustrator and Chris Backeberg.“They did all the back work and my crew at Island Home Construction did all the construction. We had an incredible grade on this land. I had my crew build me walls to hold the soil in the garden up, so the garden is in five levels.”The garden is designed so that a gardener can walk along the walls without stepping in the soil. The Pewters are now growing a variety of fruits and vegetables including mesclun lettuce, spinach, leeks, fennel, mulberry, plums, nectarines, peaches and figs.“I love fennel,” said Mrs Pewter. “Fennel in salad is great and also I like grilled fennel.”Mr Dill said a large part of the Pewters’ agricultural success rested on the garden’s diversity.“It includes things that are good to eat, as well as plants that attract pollinators and deter pests,” he said. “There is not one chemical being used in this garden.”Mrs Pewter said so far, nothing has been particularly hard to grow. Rats have proven the biggest challenge.“I was putting my seedlings on benches and nothing was growing because the rats kept eating them,” said Mrs Pewter. “I put the seedlings on top of bamboo legs, and that stopped the problem because rats can’t climb up those.“I am an animal freak so I would never kill the rats. Sometimes it helps if you just put food down regularly in a different spot. Then the rats are distracted. I also have a huge Maine coon cat, and a crazy dog who keep watch. The cat often brings me [dead rats as] presents.”Mrs Pewter hopes that initiatives like Healthy Harvest will change the mindset of residents. “I would be so proud if we could change this Island in such a way that the world looks at Bermuda as having the utmost sustainability and growth,” she said. “I want to acknowledge the farmers in Bermuda big time.“I am in the promotional and construction business, which can be very stressful, but this garden is the hardest thing I have ever done. You are at the mercy of Mother Nature. You can’t make a phone call and rain comes. You can’t control the winds trashing everything.“But this is stressful in a good way. I have a tremendous amount of respect and appreciation for our farmers. I don’t think they get recognised.”It was immensely satisfying for them to go down into the garden and pick what they needed for dinner, Mrs Pewter said.“We only pick what we need,” she said. “It is just so rewarding to walk down some steps to go get your food. You can’t explain it, you have to experience it.”Mr Dill said when he was younger, he never liked working in an office, because it made him sleepy. He was turned on to farming by an uncle who was a Rastafarian.“We use to talk a lot and I loved his philosophy,” said Mr Dill. “He would say, ‘I have to work today, if you want to talk you have to pick some carrots with me’. One thing led to the next. After three years working with him, I found a school in Costa Rica called Earth University which is dedicated to sustainable agriculture. I studied agricultural engineering.”He said while almost everyone was negative about his choice of career because they didn’t see its potential, his own family was hugely supportive.“I talked to other people who I considered mentors and they told me not to bother,“My mother, Newvilla Dill, came from a Portuguese background and her father cultivated. She was excited that I was returning to our roots and continuing a family tradition.“It had been lost in three generations. She loves it and is waiting for me to get some work done around my house.”Mr Dill now runs a company called Utopia, a sustainable agriculture and edible landscape consultancy business. He said increasing the amount of agriculture in Bermuda, might be vital to Bermuda’s future.“In Bermuda, we are extremely isolated out here in the middle of the ocean,” he said. “We have to bring everything in.“Our ancestors who came here were self-sufficient. Agriculture technology has modernised now and everyone can grow, whether it is through methods such as grow-biointensive, or square foot gardening, or whatever.“We want to change the mindset of Bermudians that farming does not have to be stink and flies buzzing around and pigs running around everywhere. You can incorporate edible food into your existing gardens.”He hoped that the Healthy Harvest programme would help to spread awareness and education about agriculture.“With Greenrock, we are hoping to go around to vacant land and use it to grow food,” he said. “I think we will all feel revolutionised. We want to create a series of different co-operatives between communities, such as churches and schools.”The idea is to offer what is grown to schools and charities such as Daily Bread, which helps to feed people in need.“We would also like to sell some of what we grow back to stores to help finance our farming programmes. Everyone is getting a piece of it. That is what community is, everyone working together for a common cause, everyone eating healthy.”Useful website: www.greenrock.org. Contact Mr Dill on 334-7532 .