Last year, our partners at the Alpharetta Community Agricultural Program helped us build and plant a raised garden in an unused space on our property, right outside the food pantry. The goal was to provide our food pantry clients with fresh, homegrown produce – our most requested items at the pantry.
To keep the garden healthy and growing, a group of NFCC volunteers assembled and created NFCC’s own Garden Club. The Garden Club has around 15 members – a mix of experienced gardeners and those willing to get their hands dirty and learn. The volunteers keep in touch via WhatsApp, planning their schedule for maintaining the garden, watering, planting, mulching and other garden tasks.
Bob Popp, also a pantry volunteer, leads the Garden Club. He and his wife Rosey have a large garden at home. Gardening has been a hobby of theirs for close to 30 years. When he was approached about leading the Garden Club he gladly accepted. When deciding what to plant, Bob says they consider what will bring the most value to the pantry and the pantry users, as well as what grows easily.
So far this year, the Garden Club has harvested 22.5 libs of collards, 18.5 lbs of lettuces and 3 lbs of kale. Currently, in the garden, peas, lettuce, kale and collards are growing. Last week, members planted new tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, eggplant and bush bean plants provided by the Alpharetta Community Agricultural Program.
Introducing Technology
This month, a drip irrigation system designed and created by Georgia Tech students will be installed, making watering duties a breeze. Students from Tech’s College of Engineering devised the system as a part of a project on water conservation for the university’s Grand Challenges Living Learning Community. The students were interested in helping an urban garden improve its watering efficiency and reached out to NFCC. We are excited about our new watering system and can’t wait to see how our plants will thrive!
Thank you to our Garden Club volunteers, the Alpharetta Community Agricultural Program, especially Kirsten Orr, who guides and helps us with all aspects of the garden and to the Georgia Tech students and Jeff Davis, Associate Professor at Georgia Tech and Faculty Co-Director of the Grand Challenges Living Community.
