In a neighborhood known for its industrial roots, a cottage industry is literally putting down roots of another kind.

On most days, you'll find the Flores family tending the garden behind their home in the St. Johns neighborhood of North Portland.

Working the soil with her three children, Andrea Flores talked about what's growing this year.

"Lettuce, beets, all sorts of vegetables," she said. "We just eat everything that's in the garden, and the kids love it."

And while the kids love it, so does the family check book.

"We buy organic and local stuff. Sometimes it's really expensive," said Flores. "Suddenly it's got more and more expensive over the last year or so."

File

A healthy garden.

Food prices pinned to fuel costs are driving a phenomenon that goes well beyond the Flores' back yard patch.

At Portland Nursery, manager Ken Whitten said garden sales are a bright spot in an otherwise cold, wet spring. "It's kind of telling that the areas where we're seeing increasing sales this year are vegetables, food stuff and the fruit trees."

For the Flores family, the garden means big savings, about $100 a month during the growing season according to Andrea. "So when we don't have to buy it four or five months out of the year it adds up fast."

Last season "savings" turned to "profit" when a local market purchased a bumper crop of the Flores' cucumbers.

"So it's put the idea in our head that we could get bigger space," she said with a laugh. "There's a lot of ways that you could make a little business out of it."