More on ‘More verge gardens for Unley’

Written by Russ Talbot

Following our very successful and enjoyable day installing verge gardens a fortnight ago, we were delighted to receive these letters and pics from Karen and Amanda, the hosts of the garden at Urrbrae Ave, Myrtle Bank.

Youth, elderly & those in between all dropped in to our garden gathering! Pets too of course!

Well we had our little street gathering for the christening of the garden bed yesterday, and it was wonderful success. It really was a wonderful opportunity to catch up and share some food and bubbles with neighbours and friends that we don’t always make the time to do. It was brilliant! We had 3 lots of people wander down from the war veterans home, which I was really pleased about as I see them walking a lot but don’t necessarily get to talk to them, so it was good to share stories and get to know each other a little better.

Lovely getting to know our neighbours from the War Veteran’s Home!

We also sold some produce to raise money for fertilisers and seedlings which everyone seemed to love. (I think I now have regular customers for my marmalade). Amanda provided the most gorgeous selection of herbs and silverbeet for people to purchase, but as my husband said, we are not very good business women as we gave more away than we sold. 
We have also encouraged people to use it like their own garden, so a few are providing the herbs that they want to eat, which is fabulous. All working as it should. People also put their hand up to look after the maintenance of the bed any time I’m away, which is a big relief.

We received donations (but mostly gave away) our fresh produce & preserves to raise funds for a worm tower & worms for our verge garden

So thank you for providing the opportunity to help make this little street a friendlier more connected community. I hope all the others are having the same success.

Bringing the community together

We will keep you updated with pics of the bounty.
Karen

Cheers to our edible community verge garden!

Following on from Karen’s update on Monday, sending you through a copy of the invitation and a few pictures from our garden gathering at Myrtle Bank on Sunday. Thanking you and the wonderful Sustainable Communities Group and Unley City Council for making our edible verge garden possible … now our community will make it grow and flourish!
Amanda

The Garden Gathering invitation: