Will Cannady, Michael Shapiro and Bill Maynard Photo by Aniko Kiezel
Garden Grows POCKET COMMUNITY HARVEST DELIVERS FRESHNESS
H
ave you ever eaten fresh corn or a tomato straight from the vine? They’re amazing. Pocket resident Jane Hing shares her produce with me as she tends her plot at Sojourner Truth Park Garden. “I grew up on a vegetable farm in Cleveland, Mississippi,” she says. “In Texas, I grew Chinese vegetables in my front yard and along the driveway.”
CM By Corky Mau Pocket Life
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Like her fellow Pocket gardeners, Hing loves to play in the dirt. Gardening can be therapeutic. There’s satisfaction in growing your own food and sharing your bounty. Community gardens come in all shapes and sizes. They provide a low-cost and nutritious way to help feed a community. They bring people together—longtime residents and newcomers. Sacramento offers 17 community gardens within city limits, and around 50 throughout Sacramento County. Bill Maynard is a Master Gardener and heads the city’s community garden program. He tells me in upcoming months, two more gardens will open, one at Mirasol Village in the River
District and another at The Mill at Broadway. Establishing Pocket’s garden was a five-year effort led by Will Cannady, a teacher at the School of Engineering and Sciences. In August 2019, the community garden, adjacent to campus, finally opened. “Our family has been here since day one,” Cannady says. “We pay $50 a year for our plot. That’s a small price to pay for the joy of sharing our family’s produce.” His joy extends to the school’s two student garden clubs. “Our students have learned a lot about what grows best in our microclimate,” he says. “Right now, they’re growing zucchini, pumpkins, eggplant, beets, melons and
a variety of greens. A huge thanks goes to gardener Michael Shapiro.” Shapiro spends countless hours working with students on the garden. He says, “My wife, Rosella, is a Master Gardener and I’ve learned a lot from her. I use my small garden plot to demonstrate gardening activities to the students. Many don’t have gardens at home or no gardening experience. They work very hard. I love seeing their excitement when they harvest their crops.“ Maintaining the community garden is a yearlong effort. Lance Roberts provided extra manpower this summer. He spruced up and mulched the entire garden as part of his Eagle Scout project. TO page 13
