GET DIRTY IN THE GARDEN THIS MONTH!

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Gene Rosow

GET DIRTY IN THE GARDEN THIS MONTH!

 GET DIRTY IN THE GARDEN THIS MONTH!

 

Dirt salutes National Garden Month which the National Gardening Association (NGA) sponsors  every April.  This April let's garden to improve our health and community well being.  As the NGA puts it: gardening will make "America a greener, healthier, more livable place."  Same for the whole planet! Healthy gardens, healthy people and healthy communities begin with healthy dirt.  Your faithful Dirt Road Warrior has also been spending time in the garden. 

In my case the Santa Monica Community Garden (Main Street).  I’ve added compost, planted the first crop of tomatoes (including a cool new Italian heirloom variety!), Daikon radishes, the arugula is as good as you can get at Chez Panisse (in my humble opinion)…. And other edibles.    Staying organic I’ve used some garlic pepper spray and a gang of biker ladybugs to urge some aphids to leave my Brussels sprouts and Artichokes alone.  In addition to everything else, gardening just makes you feel good!  So feel good this April and get down and dirty in your garden.  Here are a few suggestions for celebrating National Garden Month that could be a spread like compost throughout the year! 

 

A dirty thought for National Garden Month:  If you feed the dirt, the dirt will feed you!  Dig it!

 

Plant a Row for the Hungry

An estimated 33 million people, including 13 million children rely on emergency food supplies.  They can’t afford to buy food.  Hard to imagine in this “Land of Plenty”.. Plant a Row for the Hungry with Garden Writers Association.

www.gardenwriters.org.

 

Support Community gardening where you live

 

Check out the American Community Garden Association at www.communitygarden.org

 

Share gardening fun:  This month make a special effort to garden with a friend,  family member, or neighbor.  You can even start a neighborhood garden club.   You can share information and organize compositing and buy in bulk.  Teach someone about your heirloom calypso beans, and learn from them about success with fruit trees.

Share seeds and plants.

Share cuttings and seeds and plants with friends, families, and fellow gardeners.  You will help promote biodiversity and build green and dirty networks.

 

Bring back the victory garden

During World War I and World War II millions of Americans planted gardens to supplement food supplies.  Victory gardens popped up everywhere in backyards, vacant yards – everywhere.  Given our current economic times and concerns with food security it’s time to revive this wonderful program.  Maybe even the government will once again support this excellent program.  Back then it was about victory in a war.  Today we can plant gardens for victory over hunger, poor nutrition, toxic foods, and even climate change!

 

The National Gardening Association also suggests the following excellent possibilities:

 

“Organize a Garden Poetry Circle

Gardeners grow more than plants - every one of us has stories to share. For a change, why not share them in the form of poems? Like gardening, writing and reading poetry helps us explore and share our individual style. Poetry is meant to be a liberating medium for expression, yet it also encourages precise use of words as we home in on what we wish to communicate.

Other ideas for celebrating in your community:

  • Organize or take part in a town beautification day.
  • Visit your local farmers' market.
  • Compliment a neighbor on his or her garden.
  • Get together with neighbors to purchase compost and mulch in bulk quantities. To calculate how much you need, click here.
  • Volunteer to plant and maintain a garden at your town library.
  • Submit a gardening article or essay to your local paper.
  • Interview an elder to learn what foods his or her family grew when he or she was a child.
  • Seek out neighbors from various ethnic groups to learn about their native cuisine and gardening techniques.
  • Green up your street or a local park by picking up trash.
  • Share a cutting of one of your favorite landscape or houseplants with a neighbor.
  • Inventory your gardening gear (e.g., pots, seeds, stakes) and donate the excess to a community gardening program or school garden.
  • Celebrate other important "green" holidays: Earth Day (April 22) and National Arbor Day (April 26).
  • Volunteer at your local school's garden.
  • Start a neighborhood garden club.
  • Share your garden's bounty with a neighbor.
  • Have fun doing a gardening project with a child. Click here for some ideas.
  • Deliver houseplants or flowers to a nursing home or children's hospital.
  • Donate past issues of gardening magazines to your library, or buy the library a gift subscription. “

National Garden Month 

Soilfully yours,

Gene "Dirt Road Warrior" Rosow

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