Community Gardens and Lions!

A community garden is a dedicated land space where people come together to build either a unified result or work on individual ‘plots’ designated within the whole garden area. The idea of participating in community gardens for Lions SD10 is about helping a community with a community garden or helping with an existing garden. Lions, through the Let’s Seed U.P. program are provided ‘seed bundles’ that offer a wide variety of crop types that have a focus on short season, cool climate growing. Lions can help build, till, haul and generally assist community members (remember, this is service!) working in community gardens.

For Lions, it's not about expertise in designing, managing, growing or maintaining community gardens. It’s about being able to (1) offer some spectacular seed choices for growers at a garden. And, (2) it is working with those growers to secure seeds at harvest to return to the Let’s Seed U.P. program to SUSTAIN the growth of a seed bank! The seed bank is the ONLY way we will be able to grow and extend the opportunity to give more ‘seed bundles’ to more gardens!

Community gardens can be located at schools, hospitals, neighborhoods, even downtown on boulevard islands!

(From Wikipedia) - Community gardens have experienced three waves of major development in North America. The earliest wave of community gardens development coincided with the industrial revolution and rapid urbanization process in Europe and North America; they were then called 'Jardin d'ouvrier' (or workers' garden). The second wave of community garden development happened during the WWI and WWII; they were part of "Liberty Gardens" and "Victory Gardens" respectively. The most recent wave of community garden development happened in the 1970s during the OPEC crisis, results of grassroots movement in quest for available land to combat against food insecurity.

More recently, community gardens have seen a global resurgence. This may be related to several issues faced by the global population in the 21st century, such as ecological crisis and climate change. Community gardens contribute to the urban agriculture movement and the requests from citizens for more community gardens has been surging in recent years.

Schools are the perfect target for the Backpack program - they are the gathered location for children in need. Our backpack program provides children with food that can go home with them for the evening and weekend. We do not want to see any child go without. Lasting impact is made by nourishing lives, empowering communities & emergency relief.

Let's Seed U.P.! An SD10 Lions Project

Let's Seed U.P.! is a project funded through a District grant that supports ALL SD10 Lions Clubs. The project provides FREE 'seed bundles" consisting of 25 varieties of seed and over 1500 or more seeds to plant in a community garden supported by a Lions club.

U.P. Smart™ seeds are short season, cool climate seeds proven to be more capable of growing in our unique U.P. climate. Seeds have been and continue to be trialed in Gwinn, Mi., site of the Gwinn Seed Library and now Gwinn Seed Bank. The Library is a distribution network putting seed envelopes of U.P. Smart™ seeds into the hands of area residents - FREE OF CHARGE! And now, with the most recent seed harvest, the capability of working with new seed libraries to provide up to 25 varieties and thousands of seeds to get going

The Gwinn Seed Bank will house and maintain in the next few years, a consistent 500,000 seeds for distribution in the U.P.! The GSL is working on growing over 130 unique varieties at 7 sites in Gwinn for 2024! Imagine being able to offer to communities throughout the U.P., a vast offering of fruit and vegetables varieties that aren't currently available!

It all begins with a Lions Club commitment to get involved with starting or growing a community garden and then at harvest - and this is singularly important - to return seeds to the Gwinn Seed Bank to continue helping us grow future generations of seed availability!

U.P. Smart™ seeds are more hearty, grown in organic operations in Gwinn. We WANT to see you and your community succeed at growing! Will you say YES to participating in the Let's Seed U.P.! Project and address food insecurity, food scarcity, fresh produce access, nutrition and childhood health in your community!

Let's Seed U.P.! will provide (minimally) access to free online information and videos to help you with a variety of 'tools' to assist with building, growing and maintaining nutritious food gardens in your community.