jargon2.html

Harvest Fair
The annual harvest fair is scheduled for Saturday, August 31, 2002 at the new community garden shelter. See the Harvest Fair page for more details!

Community Garden Shelter

The shelter is built! After many hours of volunteer time and effort, the shelter is up and running. The grand opening was Saturday, August 3, and was celebrated by a chili feed!

Pets

Garden rules require that you keep your pets on a leash while they are out of your vehicle at the garden. We will be setting mousetraps hat are baited with cheese or peanut butter to trap voles in the garden. If you wish for your dog to have a good run safely, please use the grassy area away from the gardens. Do be considerate of your neighbors who do not have pets or keep them on a leash in the garden.

Orchid

Lena Garden Update

Ed Buyarski has been working over the winter on the Lena Garden project, which may be available for gardening late this spring. The site is located above the rock cut on the new section of road above Auke Rec. Initially the garden will be between the chain link fence and the access road, in a long, narrow strip. Later this spring, the Alaska Department of Transportation will dump loads of sand which the Master Gardeners plan to have spread over the muskeg with the help of an excavator. No water is available at the site, but alternatives are being considered. Call Ed at 789-2299 if you are interested in a plot.

Juneau Community Garden Association

The Juneau Community Garden Association is in it's tenth season of operation. Under guidance of the Juneau City and Borough Parks and Recreation Department, the garden has become a community-wide park used to promote outdoor recreation, agricultural experimentation, plant research, and education growth and development of local gardeners.

The garden is proud to support the non-profit activities of ORCA, the Girl Scouts, Healthy Families of Juneau, the Boys and Girls Club, the Juneau Master Gardeners, parent projects for elementary school children, and the National Association for the Education of Young Children. Several plots have been planted to provide food to the local food banks, and rhubarb has been donated to Helping Hands and a Harborview School project.

Many garden members still have not performed their required community service hours. Be sure to put your time in by helping out.

Cooperative Extension's Easy Rhubarb Jam

5 cups rhubarb (1.2 L.)
3 cups sugar (720 ml)
3 oz. strawberry flavored gelatin (85 g)

Combine rhubarb and sugar and let stand one hour. Boil until tender, three to five minutes. Add the strawberry flavored gelatin and stir until dissolved. Let cool. Pour into freezer containers for storing in freezer or jars for storing in refrigerator. Jam should not be stored in the refrigerator for more than two weeks. Leave ½ inch (12 mm) headspace. Yields 2 pints.

Rhubarb Meringue Dessert

2 ¼ cups flour
2 ¼ + 1 Tbsp. sugar
¾ cup butter
7 eggs, separated
pinch salt
5 cups chopped rhubarb
2 tsp. vanilla
1 Tbsp. chopped candied ginger, optional

Whirl the 2 cups flour, 2 Tbsp. sugar and the butter in a food processor until coarse crumbs are formed. Pat into 9"x13" pan. Bake at 350º for 10 minutes.
Beat egg yolks with wire whisk, slowly add 2 cups sugar, ¼ cup flour, pinch of salt, 1 tsp. vanilla and optional chopped candied ginger. Stir in rhubarb. Pour over crust. Bake 45 minutes.
Beat egg whites until soft peaks form. Gradually add ¼ cup sugar and 1 tsp. vanilla. Beat until stiff. Spread over cooked custard so that meringue touches pan edges. Bake 10 minutes.

The junkyard where the Community Gardens are today. Photo courtesy of Jim Douglas.

Todays beautiful Community Garden! Photo courtesy of Michael Angelo.

Pests in the Garden
Recently garden members have seen voles in the garden. These are little animals that look a lot like mice or rats. They live in dark places like under the black plastic over the unused gardens and in the compost bins. One of the things that they eat is potatoes. Eagles are one of their natural enemies, although they don't always do the job of controlling the voles in the garden. Mousetraps will be set to help control this animal. Please keep your pets leashed and a close eye on your children. It is our hope that we trap the voles and don't have a dog with a very sore tongue or a child with a sore finger. Thanks for your help.

Green Manure Plots
This year several plots may be planted in green manure. Some sample plants are peas and Egyptian wheat, oats, nitrous alfalfa and buckwheat. This is an effort to help control weed growth and to put some nitrogen back in the soil. Several unused climbing beds may be planted with bush peas. The edible peas will be contributed to various food banks and the plants will also put nitrogen in the soil and make it more workable for the following year.

Charity Food Plots
We have many plots that are unused. The operating Rules require that the Community Garden Association maintain 10% of the plots for donation to nonprofit organizations wishing to have a garden spot. The empty plots will be planted as charity food gardens. Last year, with the help of Brian Cahill, Becky Fitzpatrick, Alan Davis, Shelly Brady, Jeanne Rataj and her gardening partner, Emily Walker, Fred Chu, Art and Sue Arnold, Bonnie Herbold, Lynn Wilburn and others who came to help whose names I didn't get, charity food gardens were planted. Potatoes, celery, bok choy and zucchini were planted in a variety of food crops and nasturtiums. Other plots were planted with berry plants and other fruits, such as rhubarb, from plots that have been abandoned and gone to noxious weeds in an effort to provide the plants to members who may wish them in later seasons. The unused climbing beds plots were planted in bush peas. Rhubarb was harvested in the unused beds last year and contributed to Helping Hands, as well as a project at Harborview School.

Garden Care Issues
Individual plot care also includes making sure that the path around your plot is kept up. It can be done with chips and layers of newspaper several layers thick, black plastic or landscape cloth and chips (or whatever), or simply with a weed eater. Community service hours can be earned by helping keep the common areas mowed and the weeds knocked down.

Unused plots this year need to have the weeds knocked down with a weed eater and the plots covered with black plastic. A current plot map showing the plots that have not been purchased will be posted in the shed later this season. Note: There is a link to the most recent plot map at the bottom of this web page. This is another good way to earn community service hours. Black plastic should be available in the shed soon. Members who aren't using their plots this year need to cover them with black plastic for weed control.

Noxious Weeds
The Orange Hawkweed will be blooming soon. The areas around the ornamental beds in the front of the garden, particularly the little decorative knoll, needs to be worked on so that the weeds are controlled. Continued vigilance is needed to keep it from taking over the garden.

Bugs, Bugs, Bugs and Other Garden Problems
While there is not much that we can do about mosquitoes, white socks, and no-see-ums, there are other garden pests and problems that can be addressed. Liz Cuadra, the IPM for Cooperative Extension and garden member, has agreed to work with community garden members individually on their garden problems when they arrive on a weekly basis. She has placed a clipboard in the shed for membership use. Liz can also be reached by dialing 465-8749.