Salt Spring Island is often pictured as a green paradise of farm stands, orchards, and artisan food. But behind the picturesque postcards is a hard truth: like most Gulf Islands, Saltspring still imports the vast majority of what people eat, and that leaves the community vulnerable. As climate change brings hotter, drier summers and more frequent supply-chain disruptions, building real food security on the island is no longer a “nice to have” – it’s essential.
A new generation of climate-smart systems, like Feed An Island Crop Circle farm & garden technologies, can help Salt Spring and neighboring islands grow more food on very small parcels of land, using virtually no synthetic inputs and surprisingly little water. It’s exactly what these drought-prone, bedroom community islands need to build food security and resilience.
Salt Spring has a strong agricultural culture, but most calories still come in by ferry. The island’s Climate Action Plan notes that in 2024, over 90% of the food consumed by islanders was grown elsewhere, and that expanding local production is central to both climate action and resilience. The plan also highlights how dependent the island remains on the global industrial food system, with its long supply chains, high emissions, and vulnerability to shocks.
At the same time, Salt Spring has made impressive gains: expanded farmers’ markets, a community farmland trust, allotment gardens, school food gardens on every campus, and infrastructure like The Root local food storage and processing facility. Yet land prices, farmer housing, and the economics of small-scale farming still limit how much food can actually be grown and sold locally.
Layered on top of this are summer droughts. The province has increasingly warned residents across B.C. – including island communities – to conserve water as drought risk climbs during late spring, summer and early fall. When surface and groundwater supplies run low, irrigation gets restricted just when crops need it most.
On an island where water is finite, every farming system needs to treat water as a precious resource, not an unlimited input.
Because most food has to cross at least one stretch of water, fresh produce on Salt Spring and other Gulf Islands is typically more expensive and less predictable than in mainland urban centers. One cancelled ferry, one storm, or one supply-chain hiccup can leave grocery shelves thinly stocked – especially for perishable fruits and vegetables.
This is particularly true for heat-loving, long-season crops such as:
These crops need:
Salt Spring’s climate can provide the warmth for a month or two, but drought and shallow island soils make it hard to keep these crops watered using conventional row gardening or pasture-style plots. Without Root Tube irrigation, peppers and melons may abort fruit, turn bitter, or simply fail to size up.
That means island residents often depend on imported peppers and melons - grown with heavy irrigation and fertilizers elsewhere; typically, the lower mainland - shipped in at high financial and ecological cost.
Salt Spring isn’t alone. Across the Gulf Islands, communities are wrestling with the same combination of limited arable land, aging farmer populations, high land costs, and growing climate risk. Regional plans for the Southern Gulf Islands (Galiano, Mayne, Pender, Saturna) describe shared goals: increasing local food production, protecting farmland, and adapting to hotter, drier summers.
For a Feed An Island–style initiative, we might imagine a priority ranking of five other islands (illustrative rather than official) based on remoteness, ferry dependence, arable land and existing food infrastructure:
Across all of these islands, improving yields on small parcels and using less water isn’t just desirable – it’s the difference between fragile dependence and genuine food security.
Fortunately, there is a growing ecosystem of programs and partnerships that a Salt Spring / Gulf Islands food security strategy can plug into.
On Salt Spring itself, the Climate Action Plan points to a rich network of “soft” and “hard” infrastructure:
Regionally, the Gulf Islands Food Co-op connects producers and eaters on Pender, Mayne, Saturna and Galiano, with the explicit mission of increasing island food production, food security and resilience. On Salt Spring, the NFN SaltSpring initiative focuses on emergency food security education and related events, helping residents prepare for disruptions before they happen.
At the provincial and federal levels:
For an initiative like Feed An Island, these programs can help finance irrigation upgrades, pack sheds, storage, shade houses, and training that make Crop Circle systems viable and replicable.
Feed An Island Crop Circle Plant technologies are designed precisely for places like Saltspring and the Gulf Islands: small, drought-stressed, land-constrained communities that still want fresh, organic food grown close to home.
Key features of Crop Circle systems that make sense for Salt Spring:
1. High yields on tiny footprints
Circular, multi-row planting patterns use geometry to maximize planting density and sunlight capture. A single Crop Circle can produce the equivalent of much larger rowed plots, which is perfect for small lots, co-housing sites, school grounds, church yards and marginal corners of existing farms.
2. Very low water use
Root Tube irrigation, mulching, and closely spaced plants create a living shade canopy that keeps soil cool and moist. Compared with conventional row crops, these systems can cut irrigation needs dramatically – a major advantage for an island dealing with summer drought and water restrictions.
3. No man-made chemical inputs
Crop Circles can be designed around pre-fertilized, bio-degradable Root Tubes, rather than synthetic fertilizers and pesticides. This aligns with regenerative practices highlighted in regional climate adaptation strategies and reduces runoff into already stressed island watersheds.
4. Ideal for heat-loving, long-season crops
Hot peppers, melons and Mediterranean herbs love warm, sheltered microclimates. Crop Circles naturally create them: a natural heat sink that can extend the season my several weeks and the circular form shelters crops from wind. That means the potential for locally grown peppers, melons and oregano – the very crops that are currently imported.
5. Modular and community-friendly
A Crop Circle is visually striking and easy to understand. That makes it perfect for school programs, community gardens, neighborhood hubs and farm-in-a-box models. A single demonstration site on Salt Spring can inspire other gulf islands to adopt the technology.
Imagine a network of Crop Circles across Salt Spring: one at every school, several at Burgoyne Valley Community Farm, clusters on co-ops and church lands, and micro-circles in backyards and strata greenspace. Tie that network into the Gulf Islands Food Co-op’s distribution system and local farmers’ markets, and you start to see a different picture of island food: less imported, more resilient, more affordable, and more delicious.
Creating food security on Salt Spring Island isn’t about replacing every imported product. It’s about making sure that, when ferries are delayed or global prices spike, islanders can still access fresh, healthy food grown in their own community.
By:
Salt Spring and the wider Gulf Islands can move from vulnerability to resilience.
On a planet of long supply chains and rising climate risk, there’s something quietly revolutionary about a ring of hot pepper plants, a circle of melons, and a spiral of oregano – all thriving on a dry summer island feeding the community wherever they grow.