Community Gardens

[Jonathan]

Livtobike's post on composting got me to thinking about something I had been thinking a year or so ago. My back yard is about an acre of now overgrown Orange Grove. We've done raised raised boxes for vegetable in the past but I'm thinking of opening up part of my back heard for a community garden. Is anyone a part of one? How do they work such as divide responsilities, agree to rules wrt to fertilizer and pesticides etc?

[liv2bike]

Sounds like a swell idea Jonathan. We would participate and I know the kids would love it. Community garden and chickens (for eggs). Eggs are so much better in that kind of setting. There would have to be rules wrt fertilizers and pesticides. Large plots shaped as squares work as they are easy to work on all sides. Raised plants using lattice/chicken wire also make it easier on the back and easier to harvest.

[j44ke]

In NYC, they are holy ground. From people I know who have participated, the Robert Frost poem makes a good guide - good walls make good neighbors. A clearly worded tablet of garden commandments (i.e. rules = walls) is key to preserving the peace. And the big expense is water. Unless it is run by the city, water has to come from someone's spigot and gardeners like to use a lot of it, especially for vegetables.

[ned]

Our local one is at wasatchgardens.org. I think they use raised beds at most of their sites, which seems to keep things more tidy and segregated. Biggest issue for us in the desert is irrigation. The ideal set up is to have a drip system installed, have it run on a timer, and know enough about the actual water usage to offset the charges accordingly. We had a space in a community garden last year and the irrigation kept getting screwed up so we had to water by hand. Turned into way more of a PIA than it was worth. I'd think y'all don't need much supplemental watering in FL, no? When we lived in AVL it was always a race to pick the tomatoes before they split open from too much rain.
(Now we're doing the urban garden thing.)


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[Jonathan]

Water? Yes we use a lot. There are two to three vegetable growing seasons in Fl and none of them include the summer when we get most of our rain. Nothing but our citrus seems to thrive across a summer. If I do this I will do a shallow well. The water table is so near the surface here you can get water within a length or so of PVC pipe. It's easy to do you own well with a WellPoint, pipe and garden hose.

[liv2bike]

If I do this I will do a shallow well. The water table is so near the surface here you can get water within a length or so of PVC pipe. It's easy to do you own well with a WellPoint, pipe and garden hose.

Heck, I have used a hand auger to install shallow temp wells on sites at the Space Center and CCAFS. Water table at +/- 3 ft bgs. Sands will cave beyond a certain point but you should be able to get it deep enough with just a few auger extensions.

Lemme know when you are ready...

[Moke]

Jonathan, My wife has been in the CG scene for about 15 of the last twenty years. We live in a Condo so her farming needs have to be a CG, She says if you ever get more than seven in a group, they will never agree on anything. There are a bunch of different people in the garden business, some great others, not so much. Ours are owned by the city so some rules are the hard ones from the city others are soft rules by the Garden Club. We pay per plot $25 a year for admin and city water. You probably need to have some sort of fee structure and with torts in America some sort of insurance structure. Sort of takes some of the fun out of it. Or maybe you could lease it $1 a year style to the City/County. You are being so generous. I appreciate it.
We are "organic" so they monitor bug killing and fertilizer usage. I didn't realize or even think that human feces could be thought of as organic. But in some countries they do that all the time, Why would you send that stuff to a facility when it works so well on the garden?
Great idea sir, and good luck.

[Jonathan]

Jonathan, My wife has been in the CG scene for about 15 of the last twenty years. We live in a Condo so her farming needs have to be a CG, She says if you ever get more than seven in a group, they will never agree on anything. There are a bunch of different people in the garden business, some great others, not so much. Ours are owned by the city so some rules are the hard ones from the city others are soft rules by the Garden Club. We pay per plot $25 a year for admin and city water. You probably need to have some sort of fee structure and with torts in America some sort of insurance structure. Sort of takes some of the fun out of it. Or maybe you could lease it $1 a year style to the City/County. You are being so generous. I appreciate it.
We are "organic" so they monitor bug killing and fertilizer usage. I didn't realize or even think that human feces could be thought of as organic. But in some countries they do that all the time, Why would you send that stuff to a facility when it works so well on the garden?
Great idea sir, and good luck.

Ill check with my attorney and see what he thinks, thanks. We home school our oldest and know lots of homeschool families and many seem to be open to this kind of thing but having a small number makes sense. We enjoy homegrown vegetables more for the taste than anything else but growing one's own food is the ultimate in energy independence. We are only a few months from starting seeds and putting plants in the ground. I need to get to work.