Do how does a guy that has no use for organized sports end up driving 4 hours just to spend three days watching a team he doesn’t like play against another team he doesn’t like?
The same way he ends up staying in a state he didn’t care much for, only to start a self sufficiency blog, and learn to start loving where he lives – he loves his wife enough to do whatever it takes to make her happy.
We spent three days with SB and his family in Gainesville, Florida, watching the University of Florida Gators play against the University of Georgia Bulldogs in softball. Like my family, SB has a teenage daughter that plays competitive softball, and we decided it would be fun to watch the “big girls” play a three game series over the weekend.
What does this have to do with what I normally write about? Not much, other than while we were there we took a short tour of a tiny piece of the UF campus were shown a couple bat houses, a GREAT local asset, in my opinion. The informative signage stated that the bats from the two structures consumed over 3000 pounds of insects each night. That is a LOT of mosquitoes, and a good start.
And more importantly, I saw a community garden. Since I’m always on the lookout for writing material, this struck a cord in me as a good thing to expand on.
Since the majority of the human population lives in urban and suburban locations, having the space needed for growing your own food is a luxury. The typical house in town has 1/4 acre of property, with a house taking up a large portion of it. This leaves very little for growing food.
Throw in the dreaded Home Owners Associations preventing you from planting sweet potatoes that provide ground cover AND food, but make sure that you waste precious resources in watering your grass, and then mowing it when it grows….and having the space required AND being able to use it as you wish, are a combination of problems fewer of us are able to overcome.
Enter the Community Garden. Locally organized, these can be a great asset, depending on how well organized they are, and how they are designed. A community garden is normally organized by someone that loves to garden. This tends to bring in a level of knowledge that is very handy for the new gardener. Most Community Gardens offer various levels of help, from classes to labor.
More importantly, they offer space and camaraderie. For anyone living in an urban or suburban environment, space is at a premium. I put myself to sleep many nights trying to figure out how I can squeeze one more fruit tree, or another raised bed into my 1/4 acre lot. And even though I only have a 1/4 acre, I consider myself blessed to have that much. I have readers telling me about how they would love to grow something, but cannot due to living in an apartment, or on a zero lot line with houses within reach of each other.
Community Gardens provide space for you to grow things, if only in limited amounts. Isn’t it better to use a Community Garden to determine if you actually want to grow all of your own food before you sell everything and move to the country? Try a a small piece of a Community Garden and see if you like it. And with a minimal commitment, if you don’t you can simply move on.
And if you do find that you enjoy gardening and raising your own food, you can always expand within their boundaries, start your own Community Garden, or do as I mentioned before, sell everything and buy 100 acres in the country and do it on a grand scale.
The other half of Community Gardens is the community. Others involved in Community Gardens will be liked-minded people, those that want to raise some of their own food. While the reasons may vary from economic to liberty to health, everyone involved is looking to produce food. And like most endeavors, many hands make light work.
In my yard, I tend to be the only person working in my five raised beds. I do the construction, the planting, the watering (though it is now automated), the weeding, and the harvesting. If I have a problem, or a question, I don’t have anyone in the next space available to bounce ideas off of.
In a Community Garden, there is almost always someone there to discuss eastern lubbers, watering times, or future vegetables to grow. And much like an online resource, you have a collection of knowledge at your fingertips, only this is all local knowledge. Many of you have never heard of a pickle worm, let alone had to deal with them, since they tend to be a sub-tropical nuisance. But if you are having problems with them in a Community Garden, you can bet that someone else is too, and may have some answers that work for your area.
I’ve stressed the importance of community many times. Working in a Community Gardens will develop relationships with others that grow in your area. With the common ground of gardening to build on, you’ll find yourself becoming emotionally invested in your gardening neighbors’ lives, and they will become invested in yours.These bonds can only strengthen a community.
In my area, the only Community Garden I’ve looked into is the Friendly Hearts Community Garden located in Jensen Beach on County Line Rd. I’ve spoken with several of the organizers there, and much like the Community Gardens I saw at the University of Florida, am impressed with their efforts.
This kind of endeavor is becoming more and more common, thankfully.
So if you are limited by space, location, or HOA rules, look into a Community Garden. A good place to start is your local Extension Agent. They can usually point you in the right direction.
Either way, go find a Community Garden. You can grow a lot more than just food in one.
Peace,
db
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Notes:
UF Student Garden Facebook page