Our Families Grow Healthy Project
Our 2023-2024 free home garden mentoring project has already made great strides. It was designed to inspire and empower individuals to grow their own food while building stronger community connections through the shared experience of gardening. We are pleased to highlight some of our successes.
The Community Gardens
The Pacific Grove Community Garden and the Monterey Adult School’s Community Garden in Seaside were enhanced with new and repaired raised beds that increased the food-growing capacity of the gardens.
At the Pacific Grove Community Garden, old structures were cleared, (including the old “barn”), to make room for more growing beds and a larger outdoor education area. Materials from Home Depot were used to build 15 new or replacement planting beds, with 6 more beds under construction.
The Seaside and Pacific Grove community gardens served as demonstration and instruction sites for the 12 home gardeners who participated in the program.
Pacific Grove Community Garden Coordinator, Bonnie Adams
A pollinator-friendly habitat supports a diverse selection of native plants that provide blooming flowers throughout the year.
Improvements at the Monterey Adult School Community Garden in Seaside involved the installation of 8 new growing beds. That required 6 cubic yards of growing mix and 8 cubic yards of wood mulch, all purchased locally, from Hana Gardens and Keith Day Company.
The above image is the “before” state of the Community Garden in Seaside.
In the above “after” image, overgrown weeds have been cleared, and the deteriorating beds removed. Installation of the new, durable metal raised beds resulted in an expanded number of beds available for planting.
In the Class Room
A series of five Garden Workshops were developed and offered at the Monterey Adult School in Seaside during the Spring 2024 session. Ten Garden Workshops were offered at the Pacific Grove Adult School.
Laura Murphy, Soil Scientist for the Resource Conservation District of Monterey County, teaching a course, “Incorporating Native Pollinator Plants into Home Gardens”
In all, 60 attendees participated in the Spring 2024 Garden Workshops. 10 students participated in the Pacific series, and 50 students participated in the Seaside workshops.
Program mentor, Cathy Rivera, teaching the “Seed Germination & Transplanting” class at the Monterey Adult School in Seaside
Gardening at Home
12 households participated in the “garden-to-go” and home mentoring program. Of those, 11 reside in Seaside and one in Del Rey Oaks. The home garden sites included one apartment, three small-lot single family homes, and the rest, larger-lot single family homes.
Raised bed kits, a variety of pots, and in one case, wine barrels, were utilized. Even in very small spaces, the home gardeners learned that a little creativity goes a long way.
The 12 participating families have been outfitted with garden bed kits, organic planting mix, vegetable, herb, and pollinator plant starts, and seeds.
Harvesting the Bounty
At mid-season, participants were excited to harvest and share the fruits of their labor. The satisfaction of cultivating our own garden and taking control of our health and well-being is just one of the many benefits of home gardening.
LOOKING AHEAD
There is still room for Seaside residents to enroll in the Fall 2024 Home Garden Program.
A new series of Saturday Garden Workshops will start in Seaside on August 31, 2024.
To sign up for workshops, contact the Monterey Adult School in Salinas at (831) 392-3565 or
