Comments for www.communitygarden.org.au

Comment on Alienation of land: objections increase by Steve

Steve — Sun, 20 May 2012 01:37:13 +0000

Hi Terri,
I’ve been a part of a community garden in Bellingen, NSW, ‘Northbank Community Garden’, which operates on ‘free for all’ priciples, and has done for the past four years. I was a part of establishing this garden, and from the beginning we took the approach that anyone was welcome to come and pick produce for free. We had a general guideline to make sure you left enough for everyone else, if there’s only a little of something, only take a little; and people were always encouraged to make a contribution, as a donation or work. But this genuinely wasn’t a requirement. Our logic behind doing this was that this was the best way to engage our community, and that the success of the garden really depended on the community taking it on, owning it.
We found that in some cases people took an unreasonable amount of produce and gave little or nothing; in other cases people gave far more than they took; and in general, that running the garden this way lead to a wide range of support from all different parts of the community – individuals, businesses, council, community groups, local media, Employment Service Providers, schools etc.
Running the garden this way helped smoothe over a lot of community resistance – not that there wasn’t any, there always is – but it’s hard to bitch too much at people who are basically offerring you fresh organic produce for free. It also made it a lot easier to administer in some ways, in that we weren’t required to deal with plot fees, contracts, and ensuring that plots are maintained to a standard and so on.
One thing that was probably crucial to being able to do things this way was space – in this case about 5 acres – we had plenty of room to grow enough food, and it’s in a town of only 3000 people, rather than a densely populated urban area.
I’ve moved to another area now, so am no longer involved with the garden, but they are going stronger than ever – if you wanted to talk to them about how it works running a garden this way, you could get in touch with them via their facebook site,
Steve

Comment on New garden in West Pymble by Steve Cooper

Steve Cooper — Wed, 09 May 2012 01:07:41 +0000

Nice work guys, look forward to stopping by on my travels.

Happy Gardening

Comment on Wollongong City Council adopts procedures to facilitate community gardening by ACFCGN

ACFCGN — Mon, 07 May 2012 13:23:50 +0000

Hi Maria, Council has changed their website, thanks for picking up the link that doesn’t work. I’ve gone to Council’s website and hopefully have linked to the same page.

Comment on Shara Community Gardens beginnings by Maria Pickles

Maria Pickles — Mon, 07 May 2012 11:13:16 +0000

thank you for recording this momentous event, this is so inspiring and the use of permaculture makes so much sense. We are just starting a small permaculture garden in a place with very poor soil for exotic veges and little water, so it is good to see the results of no dig gardens which we will be definitely using.

Maria Pickles
North Arm Cove

Comment on Wollongong City Council adopts procedures to facilitate community gardening by Maria Pickles

Maria Pickles — Mon, 07 May 2012 11:03:01 +0000

HI There,

I am interested in accessing this information the links on the fact sheets etc are not working at present.

I am involved in a small community of 300 people who would like to start a garden however we have not been given clear direction or steps from Council.

We seem to be working through barriers one by one.

If anyone can help who has knowledge of the local govt and planning act please make contact.

We propose to make the garden temporary that way we may not need a DA

regards

Maria Pickles
North Arm Cove

Comment on Management Plan template by Maree

Maree — Mon, 07 May 2012 09:56:37 +0000

Thanks, I have a vision of organic vegetables herbs fruit and flowers all growing in our little neck of the world. Having people come and help, enjoy digging eating talking and sharing, I was overwhelmed where do i start, so thanks i have a start when its up and running i will post photos
I love the speech I have a dream. Butterfly’s and bees birds singing thanks you may make it a reality Maree

Comment on Fast fruits by Garry Clubley

Garry Clubley — Sat, 05 May 2012 12:22:58 +0000

Dear Martin, the descriptions on this web site are more or less correct, in that in Australia, red papaya and yellow pawpaw are the same species (Carica papaya) but with two varieties that related to flesh colour only. The reference to “yellow colouration” is for the fruit typically called pawpaw here. The possible error is that the photo showing the cut fruit appears to be red and would therefore more commonly go be the name of red papaya. But its still Carica papaya as stated on the web page. The problem with using common names is that they often get used around the world to describe different species or even genera. The “pawpaw” that you describe is the large fruited common pawpaw from North American – Asimina triloba. This is more closely related to the Magnolia genus. I hope this clears things up for researching students in both Australia and North America. BTW the sole species Carica papaya is native to the tropical parts of Central and South America.

Comment on SA Community Garden Gathering — 22nd April 2012 by ACFCGN

ACFCGN — Sun, 29 Apr 2012 02:09:33 +0000

Hi Trish

You can request to go on the SA community garden email discussion list to find out any events that are in SA or to the national email discussion list.

Cheers
Fiona
ACFCGN website support

Comment on SA Community Garden Gathering — 22nd April 2012 by Trinsia

Trinsia — Sun, 29 Apr 2012 00:01:27 +0000

Hi, what a pity, that I have missed this event. I would really appreciate if you could sent me the future ones. Cheers!

Comment on New book helps to start, nurture community gardens by ACFCGN

ACFCGN — Tue, 24 Apr 2012 06:53:48 +0000

Thanks Adam, all updated now. Sorry for the broken link.