LIIDLII KUE/FORT SIMPSON - An experiment in co-operation and agriculture is putting down roots in Fort Simpson

Jackie Milne, president of the Territorial Farmers Association, rakes a newly-created raised garden bed during a workshop in the Fort Simpson community garden on May 27. - Roxanna Thompson/NNSL photo

The village's papal site is now the location of a new community garden. Fort Simpson has had community gardens in the past but none quite one like this, said Larry Swartz, who is organizing the garden.

Previous gardens were communal. People helped to plant and tend for the vegetables and then shared in the harvest. In the new garden, interested residents can sign up for a small plot where they can grow their own vegetables in, said Swartz. A common area will be used for potatoes.

"There's a definite interest," he said.

Part of the interest was stirred up by Jackie Milne and Andrew Cassidy with the Territorial Farmers Association.

Milne and Cassidy led a gardening workshop in the village on May 27 and 28 sponsored by the Department of Industry, Tourism and Investment.

The workshop was a more hands-on follow-up to one that Milne led in March. Over two days Milne and Cassidy showed residents how to turn a patch of grass into a usable garden.

Participants learned how to make two different varieties of raised garden beds and how to plant them following square-foot gardening techniques. In square foot gardens each plant is given a portion of a square foot depending on its size and needs. One broccoli plant can go in a square foot while 16 carrots or four lettuce plants can go in the same amount of space.

"That's how I started," Milne said.

Square-foot gardens are good for new gardeners because they take away the mystery of spacing and create a full leaf canopy that chokes out weeds, she said. It also controls the temptation to have a big garden your first year so people don't get overwhelmed, said Milne.

Participants left the workshop with organic fertilizer and seedlings to help them start their gardens.

At the community garden, people will be free to plant in traditional rows or use raised beds and square-foot gardening, Swartz said.

The original area that Milne tilled has been increased to approximately one acre with assistance from the Growing Forward Initiative, a joint project between the territorial and federal governments.

Through the initiative, free seeds and tools will also be supplied to new gardeners and a fence and irrigation system is being set up for the garden. There is plenty of room in the garden and people have until the third or fourth week of June to plant their seeds, Swartz said.

Swartz said he would like to see as many people as possible involved in the garden.

"I think gardening builds a sense of community," he said.

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