GICD Newsletter
Don Lambert
EVER GROWING
June 2012
News from Your Community Gardens
Summertime Community Garden Social -- Potluck
Everyone who loves community gardening is invited to a garden party. Gardeners in Community Development and the gardeners at Our Saviour invite you to the Center for Growing People to share food (potluck), games, music, and to rub shoulders with community gardeners from across the region. Tomato tasting – taste the many varieties, mostly heirloom, grown in GICD gardens, and bring a tomato or two from you own garden for all to sample. Some folks are bringing music instruments and we will join in singing together. Let’s have some fun before the heat sets in.
Location: Center for Growing People
Church of Our Saviour
1616 N. Jim Miller Rd.
Date: Friday, June 22, 2012
Time: 7 PM
Download poster from GICD website --- www.gardendallas.org
Leaping Forward: Woodbridge by Robert Mondavi Gives Grant to GICD Live Oak Community Garden Project
Woodbridge by Robert Mondavi, in collaboration with the American Community Gardening Association, is providing funds for refurbishing and expanding the Live Oak Community Garden, at the corner of Live Oak and Fitzhugh in East Dallas, with a focus on food production for the needy. This is part of the Mondavi Giving Through Growing initiative.
The Live Oak project started last year when the International Rescue Committee (IRC) began working with GICD to get training and garden space for refugees interested in urban agriculture. Volunteer groups began by cleaning up abandoned plots for four families from Bhutan. Production in most of the garden was stymied by shade, but in early January an anonymous donor and Slow Foods Dallas stepped in to remove overgrowing trees. Another 7 refugee families joined the project, but without funds to build new beds, make soil additions, and other needs, progress was stalled. Now, thanks to Mondavi, work is proceeding rapidly to establish 16 new plots, including two that will be maintained and harvested for donation to a local food pantry. The goal is for this group of community gardeners to grow vegetables needed by their own families and to donate at least 2,000 pounds per year to alleviate hunger.
If we could just get access to a small tractor, like a Kubota with a bucket loader and tiller on the back, this garden could be ready for planting within a few days rather than in several weeks doing all the work by hand. Volunteers are welcome to come help rebuild this garden. We plan to work every Saturday in June starting at 9 am. Contact: gro...@flash.net.
Community Gardeners Wanted
Community gardens are not for people who take gardening casually. Take those folks who feel that having a plot is like renting an apartment, where you can come and go to please yourself, be tidy or not, and be a good neighbor only if it strikes you. You paid your money after all. No, no, no! That is not what works in community gardening. You signed an agreement. You are responsible, contrary to what is seen when visiting some gardener’s plots, for the planting, weeding and taking good care of your assigned plot. Yes, indeed, but that is not all. You are also responsible for joining with others on workdays to maintain common areas, for keeping the pathways, fence lines, and flower beds weeded, and for participating and helping with events that benefit the garden. If the garden has a special mission like growing and donating vegetables to the food pantry, then that is part of your job too. It is mostly about working together, with gardening thrown in. Without this spirit of taking good care of your own plot and doing what needs to be done together, things begin to unravel. Here and there the untended plot gone to weeds, pathways needing attention, abandoned trash and junk, tells the story. The hard working gardeners that do care and do more than their share of the work become stressed and overworked. Bad things may be muttered about people that never show up or have too little time to do their part. Sadly, a visit to some Dallas community gardens shows that both individual plots and communal spaces are not getting the attention needed.
As we go into summer many community gardens will have plots left untended since the pleasant days of spring. How about giving your plot up to someone else who can give it the love it needs, and who will be a team player joining others in making the overall garden great?
Are you the right person to be a team member, to join a community of gardeners? We are not talking experience here, as you can learn as you go and from other gardeners, but rather can you make and keep a commitment? If so, Our Saviour Community Garden has a place for 4 or 5 families or friends, just like you. As a bonus, there is no better place to learn how to garden as well. Call Becky, 214-564-5801. This time of year other area community gardens may also have space or need the help of committed volunteers.
Farmers Market at the East Dallas Community Garden
This is not your ordinary farmers market. This is a green market, produce only, and everything is grown on the premises, or in a nearby garden, and by the person selling it. It is rustic, an adventure. The main vegetables tend to be Asian and growers speak broken English. The preferred language is pointing and $1 bills. They offer good value and much better deals than generic grocery stores, so don’t insult them by haggling. Current offerings: water spinach, mustard greens, garlic chives, pumpkin vine tips, and various herbs. A few plants: Thai peppers and eggplant, and Asian basils.
Your best time to drop by is early on Saturday mornings. This market is a little bit of Southeast Asia right here in Dallas. All earnings go to support these hard working senior gardeners.
Calendar of Events . . . .
Youth Volunteer Groups. Now that summer is here, several youth groups are scheduled to assist with garden improvements and service related to growing and harvesting produce at our Center for Growing People and some will join in projects at other gardens. This makes our gardens look great, increases the pounds of vegetables that we can grow, and involves a new generation in learning about gardening and the community benefits thereof. As of this date the following groups have signed up:
Jun 11 Presbyterian Marvelous Mission -- Center gardens and Pleasant Grove Food Pantry
Jun 11-12 Prince of Peace Catholic School, Plano -- Center for Growing People gardens
Jun 13-14 Prince of Peace Catholic School, Plano --Live Oak Community Garden
Summer in the City mission trip and city immersion program for youth through Episcopal churches--community gardening and harvesting for food pantries at the Center for Growing People:
June 19 Grace of San Antonio
June 26 St Nicolas of Flower Mound
Jul 10 Good Shepard of Terrell and Holy Trinity of Garland
Jul 17 Other
Jul 24 Saint James’ of Texarkana
Jul 31 Saint John’s of Dallas
Public invitation days – a chance for all to participate:
Jun 22 Garden Social & Potluck at the Center (see story above)
Every Tuesday Harvest help at OS (1616 N Jim Miller)
Every Sat in June Garden building at Live Oak Community Garden (Fitzhugh at Live Oak)
Every Sun at 4pm Gardening and Harvest at Hope Community Garden (1108 Cristler)
Every Sat morning Farmers Market at East Dallas (1416 N Fitzhugh)
Aug 9-12 American Community Gardening Association Conference in San Francisco
“Community Gardening on the Cutting Edge”
For information: www.communitygarden.org
To be a real community gardener and to support wonderful food and community building projects across the U.S. and Canada, and maybe find support and help for your own community gardening project, please accept GICD’s invitation to become a supporter of local initiatives, as well as becoming a member of the American Community Gardening Association. Thank you.
GARDENERS IN COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT: FaceBook & online www.gardendallas.org
Don Lambert Executive Director Gardeners in Community Development 972-231-3565 www.gardendallas.org Gardeners in Community Development
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