New Members Sought for Mount Kisco Community Garden
For five years the InterGenerate Community Garden at the Marsh Sanctuary in Mount Kisco has provided a place for local residents to grow healthy food for themselves and those in need.
With the sixth garden season set to kick off next month, new gardeners are being sought to participate in the program.
Katonah-based InterGenerate is the nonprofit organization that operates two other community gardens. Besides Mount Kisco, it also runs gardens in Chappaqua and at the John Jay Homestead in Katonah.
Marsh Sanctuary allowed InterGenerate to use part of its property for the garden if it agreed to work the fields without damaging the property, said Mount Kisco resident Mey Marple, a member of InterGenerate’s board of directors. Extensive volunteer work provided by InterGenerate members, including tilling of the soil, marking the garden plots and fencing, was needed before the garden could become operational, she said.
Marple said the community garden provides a place for people who want to raise some of their own fruits and vegetables but might not have the property to do so or face some other barrier.
The community garden’s growing season runs from mid April through early November. A wide variety of flowers, fruits and vegetables are grown at the Mount Kisco garden, Marple said.
“It really comes down to whatever the gardener wants to plant, as long as it’s done organically,” she said.
Growing in the community garden is also a way to create foods that aren’t commonly available.
“You can always get orange carrots at the supermarket, but you can’t get the purple ones,” she said.
Gardeners pay an annual $50 fee and a $25 deposit. The deposit would be used to maintain a person’s portion of the garden should they no longer be able to take care of their plot in the middle of a season, Marple said.
Chappaqua resident and InterGenerate Vice President Suzi Novak thanked Marsh Sanctuary for allowing the organization to use a portion of its property. The garden also helps those in need.
The main goal is to “make sure that people had better access to food that is good and clean and fair,” Novak said. “We have donated hundreds of pounds (of) foods to several different organizations in the northern Westchester area.”
A shed located on the property stores wheelbarrows and tools available to those who garden on the site, Novak said.
For the first time, InterGenerate will provide a schedule of eight classes during the upcoming growing season, she said. The classes will be open to the general public.
About 40 people gardened at the Marsh Sanctuary last year, Novak said.
Each of the growing spaces for individual gardeners are about 10 feet by 12 feet. The Giving Garden, used to grow food that will be donated, is 50 feet by 25 feet.
“We have a fabulous group of people who run the garden,” Novak said. “Some of my joy is just being able to meet with them and find out what they’re up to and make decisions with them.”
Marple said the community garden provided an opportunity for “meeting people in your community who think the same way you do, who value clean food, that understand that putting a heavy load on the earth is not going to pay off and is truly not good for your body.”
“I personally think it’s really important for people to grow some of their own foods so they can appreciate where food comes from and that the difference between supermarket food and homegrown food is really huge,” Novak said.
To become a gardener or to receive more information about the community garden, visit www.InterGenerate.net.
