A University of Memphis urban gardener will present a lecture for the For the Love of Gardening Spring gardening workshop at the Christian Brothers University campus from Feb. 5 to Feb. 22.
Art Johnson, the leader for the TigrUs garden, and volunteers from the TigrUs garden and other leaders from Grow Memphis will have a lecture-type and a bit of hands on discussion about how to start and maintain a garden.
“I will talk about how garden maintenance how to keep the bugs out, what you will need once you have it going and keep the garden natural and organic,” Johnson said.
The gardening workshop will promote coming togetherness within a community and addressing food desert issues.
Grow Memphis was founded by a project from the Mid-South Peace and Justice Center in 2007 from community gardens in Memphis. The gardens are to build a sustainable local food system and community. In 2012, Grow Memphis became a non-profit organization from demand for community gardens and spreading food policy iniatives.
In Memphis, there are 35 community gardens that are funded from Grow Memphis.
“Most gardens are at grade schools,” Garden Program manager Ashley Adkins said.
The purpose for the workshop is to have someone with experience to share what he or she knows about gardening, according to Adkins.
The event will last each Thursday for four weeks from 6:00 to 7:30 p.m. There will be various topics within each series.
“Each series will be a segway to a different event and will build on from the event before it,” Adkins said. “The first section is gardening basics, next is soil building and composition, then, it is maintaining your garden and lastly, it is sustaining your garden.”
Grow Memphis hopes that university students will come to the workshops to help promote urban gardening.
“Currently, we have most of our gardens at the grade schools,” Adkins said. “However, we love to have college students to develop regular student groups with our organization. We have alternate spring breaks that encourages and fosters more student groups.”
Johnson started in a community garden and the experience changed his perspective on urban gardening.
Urban gardening helps address issues in the community and helps people, according to Johnson.
“Urban gardening educated me more about food policies, community issues, about togetherness in a community and diversity,” Johnson said. “I will never forget what I learned at the garden. Everything can be learned at the garden.”
