
Community Gardening
A community garden is an area used for growing plants or animals, which has been collaboratively created and is maintained by members of the public. A community garden can take place on public or private land and can involve a broad cross-section of the public, as in a neighborhood community garden. Or it can involve specific sectors of the population, such as a school garden that involves students, teachers, parents, and other community members who support the garden for education.
Community Garden Handbook
Looking for a place to have a garden? The following locations have plots available for the public to use. All of them are free of charge. Contact the volunteer garden leader to request a plot or get on a waiting list.
Downtown Community Garden
SE 6th & Scott
Christine Pardee, mailto:christine@pardeeassociates.com, Email Address, (515) 333-3015
45+ People on Waiting List
http://www.gardendowntowndsm.com/, http://www.gardendowntowndsm.com/
Drake Community Garden
27th Street just south of Universtiy Avenue
Rose Scott, mailto:rosescott66@yahoo.com, Email Address, (515) 255-1340
Edmunds-Oakridge-Sherman Hill Community Garden
On the school grounds of Edmunds School at 1601 Crocker Street
Marilyn Farr, mailto:farma@msn.com, Email Address, (515) 243-1174
http://edmundscommunitygarden.wordpress.com/, Edmunds Community Garden
Franklin Community Garden
55th & Franklin, just west of the Franklin Avenue Library
Contact Email Address, mailto:gardenfranklin@gmail.com, Email Address, (850) 826-1769
Waiting list exists - call contact number to be added to the list
Backyard Gardens
Digging Deeper will support a significant increase in gardening among low-income communities in Des Moines. The project will provide targeted communities with raised bed gardens with one perennial plant (such as a rhubarb plant, a raspberry bush, or a fruit tree) with follow-up assistance from experienced gardeners.
Two neighborhoods would be identified each year of the three-year project to help obtain raised bed gardens with an edible perennial in individual yards or in common areas of multiple family housing. A total of at least twenty beds would be built in each neighborhood each year, for a total of 120 gardens during the three years of the project. The Capitol East, Carpenter and Moulton/Urban Dreams neighborhood associations have already made commitments to partner with Digging Deeper to receive raised-bed gardens.
Digging Deeper has chosen to work on the neighborhood level with the goal of using urban gardening to build community among neighbors. PACE youth, Home Depot staff and neighborhood leaders will be trained in community organizing skills during the winter. In early spring, all three groups and Digging Deeper staff will pair up to canvass the selected neighborhoods to identify recipients of the raised-bed gardens. Each recipient of a raised bed garden and perennial edible must agree to attend one neighborhood based gardening demonstration class. Classes would focus on basic care and maintenance of gardens, including planning, intensive planting, site selection, and spacing. The project will continually look for opportunities to increase neighbor-to-neighbor interaction, as well as connecting people to neighborhood (such as associations) and other local resources.
In April and May of each year of the grant, PACE youth will assist Home Depot staff in building, delivering and filling the 4 foot by 8 foot raised-bed gardens. Home Depot will be responsible for most materials, construction, delivery and organization of the gardens. The City of Des Moines will be providing compost for the gardens. Each gardener receiving a bed would have access to a mentor visit during the growing season. The neighborhood/community organizations partnering to create the gardens in their neighborhoods agree to assist in outreach to find and coordinate potential individual backyard gardeners. They are committed to aid in designing the outreach strategy, include information about the project in any newsletters or fliers, and find six adults willing to work with the trained youth to canvass the neighborhood door to door. In addition, they are providing one person who will act as the central coordinator in the neighborhood to help coordination canvassing and communication with interested backyard gardeners.