Spring is such a beautiful time for good food. The wild—ramps, wild onions, fiddelheads, morels, dandelions, violet blossoms. The cultivated—radishes, pea shoots, asparagus, chives, rhubarb, garlic scapes, tender greens, scallions. That particular green of sunlight on leaves and the scent of fruit blossoms shake us out of hibernation. It’s a wonder that we all don’t succumb to spring fever and skip out of work each fine day to forage and tend and till.
Spring is a time when we can set ourselves up to eat well all year-round by grafting fruit trees, planting our gardens, signing up for a CSA, or using that tax refund for a food dehydrator or pressure canner. It’s gardening that’s on my mind this spring the most. With a freshly tilled new garden at home and an increasingly popular community garden program at work, I’ve been reflecting on the powerful positive impacts of gardens. Which is why, of course, they’re spreading like wildfires in Milwaukee and across the country—supported by community activists and public health officials alike.
People garden for many reasons—the pleasure of being outside, the remarkable taste of fresh food, the connections made with other gardeners, the security offered by a plot of food, the money saved by growing your own groceries, and so on. Intuitively, people feel that gardening is good. And there’s been some good scientific research into the benefits of community gardens to support those intuitions. A few of the benefits I like to remind people of if there’s even a whisper that they think its all just feel good fluff:
- Gardening is a promising practice for diabetes prevention and control through healthy activity and food.
- Children & adults who garden eat more fruits and vegetables.
- A garden program promotes healthy food security.
- Gardening reduces stress and calms the nerves.
- Gardening helps youth with self-esteem.
- Gardens strengthen communities.
- “Horticultural Therapy “can help with mental health issues, such as post traumatic stress disorder, depression; and anxiety and may help ex-convicts with rehabilitation
- Gardening can reduce food miles & support local economies & cultures
Gardening can also promote food biodiversity. The Slow Food Foundation for Biodiversity estimates that “300,000 vegetable varieties have become extinct over the last century.”
By growing heirloom and endangered foods in our gardens we can help save these foods from extinction. The vegetables that have been boarded onto Slow Food USA’s Ark of Taste are a good place to start if you’d like to grow endangered veggies—they are rare and delicious and storied. Some Ark of Taste vegetables (seeds may be sourced through Seed Savers Exchange for most of these) that may be well suited for growing in Wisconsin include:
- Amish Deer Tongue lettuce
- Grandpa Admire's lettuce
- Speckled lettuce
- Tennis Ball lettuce (black seeded)
- Early Blood Turnip-rooted beet
- Beaver Dam pepper
- Bull Nose Large Bell pepper
- Fish pepper
- Hinkelhatz Hot pepper
- Jimmy Nardello's Sweet Italian Frying pepper
- Sheepnose pimiento
- Amish Paste Tomato
- German Pink Tomato
- Sheboygan Tomato
- Red Fig Tomato
- Aunt Molly’s Husk Tomato (ground Cherry)
- Valencia Tomato
- Lina Cisco’s Bird Egg Bean
- True Red Cranberry bean
- Hidatsa Shield Figure bean
- Yellow Indian Woman Bean
- Hutterite Soup bean
- Mayflower Bean
- Turkey’ Hard Red Winter Wheat
- Roy’s Calais flint corn
If you want to learn more about growing food and/or want to be a part of an organized initiative to install home and community gardens in Milwaukee, consider being a part of the 4th Annual Great Milwaukee Victory Garden Blitz. Their motto at VGI: “Move Grass. Grow Food.” My thoughts exactly…
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