Lexington Interfaith Garden

by Janet Lane

Despite pouring rain and loud thunderstorms at 7:30,  Carla was in the garden by 8:00 and by 8:30 all of us had straggled in to harvest the abundance. Once all was picked,  the peas sorted,  and greens washed,  by 9:00 some 24 pounds of produce were delivered to the food pantry (peas,  beets,  lettuce,  cauliflower,  herbs —  I can’t remember what else). Meanwhile,  tomatoes were weeded and tucked in with newspaper and hay to deter new weeds.

Bunnies attacked the broccoli in the smaller garden,  and continued to brazenly munch while we were there,  slipping through the wire fencing with ease. We put up new chicken wire fencing to try to deter the cute little hungry buggers.

The sun shone,  the chickens clucked and all was right with the garden.

by Amy Swanson

About 18 pounds of produce was delivered this morning to the pantry:  herbs (dill,  parsley,  mint,  thyme),  chard,  bok choy,  beets,  radishes,  edible pods,  oriental peapods,  shelled peas,  lettuce heads,  looseleaf lettuce,  and scallions.  Carla also contributed 13 freshly laid eggs!

It was fortunate that Omar came early to help Carla get ahead in harvesting this morning. With the garden starting to produce more,  it is a race to get everything picked,  cleaned and weighed and over to the Lexington Food Pantry before 9 am. So starting in July,  we will officially roll back Saturday start times to 8 a.m. from 8:30 am.

As noted above,  there were lots of crops to harvest this morning. As we’ve come to expect from this garden,  the plants are thriving now and laden with their fruit. This morning,  the most time consuming crop to harvest was the peas and beans. Originally the rows were planted with single varieties. But bunnies and Mother Nature took a toll and so over time,  the empty spots were replanted with whichever seeds were available so now all the rows are mixed. It takes a very discerning eye to know one peapod variety from another. Was it a snow pea pod or an immature peapod to be shelled? We did our best and Carla gave us a tutorial as we sorted all the pods at the end and shelled the appropriate variety.

As you might imagine,  anything growing close to the dirt needs some cleaning before bringing over to the pantry. So produce like the lettuce,  beets,  radishes,  and chard get rinsed off.

Then all produce gets brought to the barn to be weighed and packed for delivery. Don’t know about you,  but many of us are keen to know how much these gardens are producing. So it all gets weighed and recorded with the date noted. Last year’s records proved very helpful for us when we were setting up this year’s volunteer schedule and anticipating when to start and how many people might be needed.

Here’s the result of this mornings’ efforts… loaded and ready to be wheeled to the Pantry.

Eli & Peter

Watering the garden

Pilgrim, First Baptist and Redeemer sent volunteers to work this beautiful morning.  In addition, we had extra hands from Hancock and St. Brigid’s, as well as Eli, a Boy Scout who has been working on a community service badge and regularly helping out.

Carla is visiting family but she left us good notes on what needed to get done this morning.  Mark delivered about 9 pounds in total of produce that was picked this morning, including asparagus, bok choy, lettuce, radishes, green onions and dill.

Radishes, Strawberries & Dill

2 foot high asparagus

Interestingly, he got an inquiry about what kind of bok choy we were growing—it didn’t look like the Shanghai variety seen at the store.  This curious person really knew their bok choy…in contrast to my familiarity which was zilch before working at the garden.

In addition to the picking, we hilled potatoes and onions, dusted the broccoli and cabbage with Dipel.  And of course there is always watering and weeding.

Tidbits from this morning

– A rabbit was waiting for us right at the gate of the main garden.  Even if he weren’t shooed away, this bunny would have been disappointed if he had gotten in.  There are a number of bunny-deterrent fences and netting around many of the beds.

– The first task of the morning was tackling the asparagus and cutting what we thought were likely the last spears of the beds for delivery.   As we were cleaning up at the end of the morning, Mark excitedly drew our attention to a corner of the bed by the compost bin.  He swore that there were now two 4 inch high spears that were not there earlier this morning when he and Theresa were cutting the asparagus.

2 new asparagus shoots

– How can you not be impressed by the fecundity of the soil when you work there?  Today, I was weeding in the small garden and the biggest earthworm I ever saw eased out of the soil.

15 inch ground worm

Honestly, this worm kept coming and coming and I bet it would have measured at least 15 inches if I’d had a ruler.

by Amy Swanson

On May 24th seven people signed up to work in the interfaith garden.  We continued hilling up the potatoes, weeding the small garden, and finished the spinach harvest.  The spinach bed was then re-manured and fertilized and dug and raked over to prepare it to receive a second crop rotation.  The kids were busy tying up the netting on the inner fence to keep the bunnies confused.  Around the garden’s edges we planted zinnia, cleome, nasturtiums, cosmos and marigolds.  These flowers attract beneficial pollinators, and will also be harvested and given to the Food Pantry — food for the soul.

Workers, besides Carla Fortmann, were Karen, Daniel and Adriana Garber, Eli Haber, John Dacey, Terry Zabik, and Karen Longeteig.

by Janet Kern

Weather – cold and wet ; enough said. Nevertheless we had six volunteers from Temple Emunah and Church of Our Redeemer. Carla gave a tour of the gardens for the new volunteers, who were amazed that the garden had already yielded spinach, rhubarb and chard for the Food Pantry. Using an old broom handle, holes were made a few inches deep and apart for the planting of two rows of leeks. I believe Carla said that the only things left to be planted are peppers and tomatoes!

The weather was perfect for laying down (wet) newspaper between the rows of peas and covering with hay to keep the weeds down and provide clear walking paths. With more rain in the forecast, we knew that the hay would become nice and wet and be matted down.( Dry and sunny would mean that all the hay and newspaper would blow away with one gust of wind). We also planted more chard to fill in one of the rows where some seeds had not germinated.

There was some evidence of critters – a big rabbit hole near the strawberries, and Susan actually watched the large, (and presumably very happy and well-fed) field mouse in the compost heap for a few minutes.

Having used up most of the hay and since most of us were feeling a bit chilled, Carla let us go early at 5:40!