Preparing your garden for the growing season is often a daunting task. But when that garden is more than two acres and home to dozens of different plots, that’s a task for a whole team.
Alice’s Garden Urban Farm on Milwaukee’s Northside is a place where families and organizations rent out plots of land where they tend to a wide variety of plants. The garden is representative of a vast swath of cultures and culinary traditions.
This past Tuesday on Earth Day, school groups, folks from local businesses and others gathered to help tend and clean the farm in preparation for the coming year. Ahead of the event, Lake Effect’s Joy Powers met up with Alice’s Garden Executive Director and Dig In! contributor Venice Williams, along with new assistant farm manager Abdul Qadir Hasan.
"As people come in today, we'll be getting rid of the dead branches and twigs and inviting new life, and that's what spring is about, but it's also a metaphor for our lives this time of year," Williams says. "We always talk about the spring cleaning of our homes, but we do spiritual spring cleaning as well."
As the growing season begins, Williams says she can't help but think about her ancestors — in particular, her great-grandparents and grandmothers who passed down their love of farming and land stewardship to her. But she's thinking of future generations as well.
"We're always excited to invite the community in here at Alice's Garden Urban Farm — not just to help us get ready for the growing season, but to invite people in who may never otherwise touch the soil or understand the transitioning of the plants and perennials," Williams says.
Abdul Qadir Hasan is a case in point of Williams' mission. Before joining the team, he had no farming experience whatsoever. As Alice's Garden's new assistant farm manager, he's looking forward to a season of growth.
"I'm looking forward to learn more about what the Earth can give to us," he says. "When I came here, I knew not not much of anything, and so as as time passed, I learned how how much more the Earth can give to me as I cater to it — the vegetables the the fruits, anything. Anything you put into the soil, it gives back."
_
