If you’re down First Street near the skate park in Elmira at the right time on a Wednesday evening, you might see about a dozen kids laughing and giggling as they work together to build trellises, weed garden patches, or plant some carrots – even in the rain.
The junior garden club is running again this year. The club was on hiatus during the pandemic and is once again up and running, and completely booked this year. This time it’s being run by Andria Fromanger of St. Jacobs Country Gardens, her first year at the task. So far, she’s loving it.
Fromanger is teaching the kids about how to grow food including lessons on worms, structures of soil, companion planting, pollinator planting, sweet pea teepees, strawberries in eavestroughs, pollinator houses and natural controls for pests and diseases, among others.
And so far, the kids seem to love it too.
Reagan Melles, 9, is a little sad the sun scorched her cauliflower and Lyla Osborne, 11, is excited about her peas and carrots.
The junior community garden is located next to the skateboard park on First street in Elmira.
“My passion is food gardening,” said Fromanger. “I am very passionate about getting kids involved in food and food security.”
“I love talking to kids because they want to get involved. They’re not in school,” she said.
Fromanger said she would love to invite more kids to learn about gardening, or even to offer garden classes for adults, but at this point, the space is too small.
Fromanger said she was concerned about how the club would go at first.
“I was worried because I’m not a teacher or anything, and I was thinking, ‘Oh, 13 kids. How am I going to keep them under control?’”
But it turned out she didn’t need to worry.
“They were so into it. The only thing I had a hard time keeping up with was showing them what they wanted me to show them. They were so excited in the first week and yeah, it’ll be really fun.”
The Junior Garden Club is run by the Elmira and District Horticultural Society, also known as the Woolwich Gardeners, which has been active since 1900.
