Fenton Friday: Sharing the Harvest

Photo by Mary Hanisco.

At this month's harvest collection, we collected 78 pounds of produce -- and when you are weighing greens like basil and Swiss chard that is a LOT of good stuff!

Our community garden does a harvest collection on the last Saturday of each month during the growing season. If plot gardeners are not present, they can opt-out from having their plots gleaned and can also pick theirs in advance and leave it for the collection. I usually opt out, preferring to pick my own.

This time I was able to donate tomatoes, peppers, zucchini, eggplant, and cucumbers. Pictured at right here is a partial selection. I was just glad to have something to give at the end of this month -- it has been such a hard summer this year.

If you are not already in a harvest donation program, I urge you to donate your excess produce to a local food bank or soup kitchen and to report your amounts to Plant a Row for the Hungry so the amounts can be tallied up and credited to what home gardeners contribute to those in need.

What are you growing in your edible garden this week?

About Fenton Friday: Every Friday during the growing season, I'll be giving you an update on my community garden plot at the Fenton Street Community Garden just across the street from my house in zone 7 Mid-Atlantic MD/DC border. I'm plot #16. It is a 10 ft x 20 ft space and this is our 13th year in the garden. (It opened in May 2011.) See past posts about our edible garden by putting "Fenton" into the Search box above (at the top, left on this blog).