Starting Your Own Community Garden

by Pamela Ravenwood

The concept of the community garden has been around for many years. And now the idea is growing once again. In the U.S. alone, there are an estimated 10,000 community gardens in operation. Why? It seems to be a perfect solution for those who want to grow their own food, organically or otherwise, yet don't have the land to do it.

How do community gardens work? The basic philosophy is that residents share the responsibility of the management and maintenance of one large garden. In cities where people typically don't have the land to garden, it gives them the opportunity to jointly work with others on a common piece of ground.

Sound intriguing? If so, there are many ways to start a community garden in your neighborhood.

First, call together a meeting and work on creating a plan before starting the actual 'gardening.' Laying out the foundation of why you are creating a community garden and the basic tenants to follow for all those involved. This helps make everything clear and clean up front. For example, there are many details to be dealt with in gardening such as who will tend to the costs, the work, the decisions themselves? Who will lead the group? How will money raised if needed? What is your purpose, long and short-term objectives?

Next, you will want to pick a piece of land or a site. Considerations in picking the site should include:

* Light - Six hours of sunlight is almost always necessary for most plants. If your site is receiving a lot of shade from nearby trees or buildings, you may want to search for another site that is getting direct sun. * Drainage - Observe your potential site after a rainstorm to make sure the water isn't standing and that it either drains or seeps into the ground. This is called drainage and there are sites that have terrible drainage due to location or even soil that has too much clay. Many plants cannot tolerate very wet soils for a prolonged amount of time. * Slope - Too much drainage, such as gardening on a steep slope isn't good either. Look for land that is as level as possible. If you have to build on a slope, design beds or terraces that run across the slope. * Surrounding Vegetation - Plants fight for water and sites with too many weeds nearby can cast their seeds constantly into your garden area. Ideally, and I say ideally as it is almost impossible to find a site without surrounding vegetation, you should look for a site without a lot of trees or heavy weeding - and most importantly, a site that may include the clearing of plants such as poison ivy, poison oak, or stinging nettles. Yikes! * Exposure - Okay, so I have told you to pick a site with at least six hours of sunlight and without surrounding trees - this often leaves one with a whole lot of wind and sun, which means, you are then in danger of over-exposure. If you are in an area that receives high winds, which can rob soil of moisture, erode topsoil, and damage delicate plants - just be aware of that and try to meet the conditions the best you can. Don't let your soil get too dried out, water more frequently with a slow deep watering that will penetrate the ground and hopefully this too will keep the dust down. * Water - Speaking of water, yes, you will need to plant near a water source, whether it be a spicket off of a well or some place that has irrigation. You are going to need a lot of water and you certainly don't want to be hauling it from somewhere else. * Wildlife - In Arizona we have javelina and deer that infest our gardens - every state has its wildlife that can present a problem for tasty vegetables. To protect your site from these hungry critters, you will need to build fence and yes that can be expensive. This is why you need to preorganize your community garden beforehand in order to predetermine how these details will be dealt with. * Ownership - No, you can't just plant your garden any ole place - somebody will have ownership of the land and determining whether your organization can buy the land or rent it is of course important. Small detail, but critical.

Don't be intimidated by the amount of work that goes into preplanning your community garden. Once much of the groundwork is laid, the everyday details will flow smoothly. In Part 2 of Starting Your Own Community Garden, I will discuss Preparing Your Garden Site and Organizing It. And finally, in Part 3, Assigning Work and Taking Care of Maintenance of your Community Garden.

About the Author

Pamela Ravenwood is a freelance writer, journalist, and writing coach who lives in the desert. In addition to spending her days writing, she also loves to tend to her organic garden where she grows as much of her own food as possible. In this, she counts on her cord reel to keep her hoses from drying out from the desert heat.

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