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Building Healthy Soil in Urban Growing Areas
August 14, 2024 @ 10:00 am - 2:00 pm
FreeClick here for more information.
Calling all members of the Bay Street community, Springfield gardeners and community organizers, and housing or social service coordinators!
Come and visit the organic community garden at Tapley Court Apartment.
The Tapley Youth Agricultural Scientists invite you to experience the garden and learn how they built healthy soil and created an organic food source for community members on Bay street and the wider Springfield community.
They will share:
- How the garden came to be
- How to build healthy soil in small urban growing spaces
- How to develop an intensive growing garden
- How to grow culturally important crops in Springfield
- A cooking demonstration using crops from the garden
Growing in urban green spaces brings many challenges. The Tapley Youth will describe the simple soil health techniques they’ve used to rebuild soil health and make it possible to grow organic food, like mulching, soil ferments, cover cropping, and mulching. They’ll also demonstrate a few of the soil test methods they use to regularly monitor soil health.
They’ll describe how they designed and evolved this intensive garden over time, how they care for it so it grows lots of food, and how they’ve learned to grow culturally important crops in New England.
They’ll even demonstrate how they use harvests from the garden to make something delicious (with samples to taste!)
We hope you’ll walk away inspired to spearhead your own community garden, identify potential partners to get involved with, and leave motivated to create an organic food source in your community!
If you have questions, please reach out to Sister Anna Gilbert-Muhammad (anna@nofamass.org)