Friday, April 15, 2011

Garden News from Karyn

April 15th: A very busy week with lots of interest around town about the garden. We have received some generous offers from area businesses, so far Skillin's in Cumberland, Plainview Farms in North Yarmouth, and Johnny's Seeds in Winslow have all come forward with enthusiasm for our project. 

We also heard from Dirk Strong Van Curran who is running an after school program through the Community Recreation Department in Cumberland. He is excited for the kids in his enrichment program to come join us in the garden this Spring as we prepare the soil and begin planting. We hope that the open garden times over the summer will bring back some younger helpers to oversee their work as the vegetables ripen and we harvest them for the local food pantries. 

We had a chance to mark out our perimeter for the garden in the far back of Twin Brooks. The water line is already there and about twenty feet away from the corner of the garden! Bill is hoping we can rally enough volunteers to make a large donation garden, so can everyone press hard to get the word out that we could really use some volunteers in the summer for labor? 
Earlier this week I called 211 to let them know we are seeking volunteers. One morning a week for an hour would be greatly appreciated, and hopefully we could build a force of about 20
people to keep the garden maintained. 

I was also contacted by Jean McPherson who will be donating her time each Thursday at the Cumberland Congregational Church in the morning between 9 and 12 for those who can come pick up vegetables as the Food Pantry itself is open one day a month, but the vegetables would be available more often. Please contact Jean Lamson at the Cumberland Food Pantry for more information.

Also, we had a wonderful time planting seeds at the Cumberland Congregational Church last Sunday. Karen Gallati and Lalla Carothers helped organize the seeds, pots, soil and water. Gene Weir offered to raise the seedlings and re-pot them as necessary in his greenhouse which would be a daunting task us to any of using our windowsills...We will have a gazoodle of seedlings available for the Memorial Day Sale during/ after the Parade, including heirloom tomatoes, peppers, leeks, morning glories, sweet pea, sunflowers, and zinnias. If you want to reserve ahead let us know. I also have Amish Paste tomatoes, multi-colored peppers, and a large variety of eggplants.

With all this buzz one of the big highlights for me this week was getting a great education down at the True Value in Yarmouth about Pickled Garden Scapes from Dave. His garlic is a Cumberland Fair prizewinner and he has built up his Music variety to the perfect size. He said that he puts the garlic around the edge of the garden and the grounhogs won't touch it. Bet they would scarf down those dilly scapes. Of course there were plenty of other solutions offered up, some on the shelf, and some, well, we know how those critters can really hit our nerves.
We would appreciate some help with web graphics and photos...this could be a fun creative blog for the right person(s)...we thought those tech savvy high school kids could really help in their free time this summer!

Thanks-
Karyn Marden
karynmarden@yahoo.com
781-8249

Happy Thawing Out! 


Tuesday, April 5, 2011

Getting Started!

On March 28th, 2011, the Cumberland Town Council approved a plan to create a Community Garden in the Twin Brook Recreation Area.  For the first year, the garden will be planted to serve area food pantries.  Going forward, we plan to lease plots to area residents interested in growing vegetables and flowers in an organic, community environment.