In March, 2014, the Friends of Silverwood Park was the grateful recipient of a Community Partners
grant that allowed us to purchase a wide range of hand tools to help establish and care for our
initial 8-acre garden plot at Silverwood Park.
Silverwood Park is the newest Dane County park and is a park with a unique mission to
support and promote sustainable agriculture education. As the park develops, the Friends of Silverwood
Park is responsible for coordinating gardening efforts among various partner groups. For the 2014
growing season, 8 acres of land was divided up among the following partners:
- Edgerton School District summer school students
- Edgerton School District FFA
- Renegades 4-H
- Freedom Inc.
- Operation Fresh Start
- Friends of Silverwood Park
- UW-Extension
While the primary work was done by these groups, we also saw many other volunteers from the
school district staff and the general community.
The purchase of hand tools allowed us to involve many people in the gardening work. We set up
an area in one of the sheds where the shared tools are stored. Over the course of the growing
season, the tools were well used and well taken care of. The Friends of Silverwood Park will be
able to offer this tool collection for use by partner groups again during the next growing season.
One of our goals for this growing season was to give us a chance to develop these partnerships,
grow food, and teach others. We feel that we were very successful with these goals, and having
the proper equipment to work with was a big help.
Crew members from Operation Fresh Start have been involved in growing produce to use in their
program kitchens to help feed the crews for lunch.
Freedom Inc. worked with three generations of Hmong families, growing food in traditional ways.
Over 140 families were fed using produce from their garden plot.
The Edgerton School District had over 20 students attend a 3-week
summer school program where they helped plant many vegetables and do some initial weeding.
The FFA students and volunteers worked over the summer to continue to plant and harvest. By the end
of the growing season, over 800 pounds of produce had been shared with the community food bank, many students were able
to share fresh produce with their families, and the school district food service began to incorporate
some of the produce in the school lunch program. The FFA also hosted a “pumpkin field day” with
the district 4th graders, sharing the history of the farm with the students and letting them pick
pumpkins.
The Renegades 4-H
group learned about heirloom seeds and had the chance to start tomatoes
from seed, grow the plants, sample over 30 varieties, and learn to save the seed so they can share
with others and start plants for next season.
This has been a very successful growing season. All the partners that were involved during the
2014 season plan to be back in 2015. We will be expanding the area of cultivation from 8acres
to 16-acres.
We hosted tours all summer long and shared the park with the general public. We also hosted a
“Harvest Festival” in August that was open to the general public. We are continuing to find ways to
improve our communication between groups and to find ways to involve and educate the
community.
Thank you very much to the Dane County Environmental Council for supporting us!
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