Archive: Around Town

Last year deer and other wildlife decimated residents' gardens at Lansing's Woodsedge Apartments.  Much of the produce was nibbled down to the ground.  Last Saturday residents and volunteers fought back, installing raised beds in what will be a fenced garden space particularly suited to senior residents.  And residents are responding to the improved conditions.

"In the past few years only three residents were gardening because of the poor soil," says Kathleen Wadell, who is managing the new garden project.  "Now with the raised beds and the amended soil 11 people have signed up to do this.  It will help with their overall general health.  It gives them physical exercise to be out here, and a sense of being good stewards to the land."


The garden is on a mild slope on the south side of the facility.  With modest incomes and a difficult economy it helps residents with food costs, as well as providing exercise.  While many residents grow flowers, some grow produce to supplement their groceries.  Resident David Braid has been managing the garden, growing produce in unused parts.  He donates what he and his wife don't use to the other residents. 

That intention was to little avail last year when deer and other animals ate just about everything before it could ripen.  56 tomato plants, among other plants, were destroyed by wild animals last year.

"Deer, wood chucks, rabbits -- we're outnumbered!" Wadell says.

Residents have been raising money for the garden, including a hand made blue and white Irish chain design quilt that Wadell created, and gift certificates to A C Moore and Jo-Anne Fabrics.  Residents sold perennial plants from the old garden, and home made zucchini and corn relish.  That raffle yielded about $1500 for the project.

With additional donations of about $500 plus donations of time, tools, and materials the project was ready to go.  On the Thursday before the build day Wadell and her husband Lyle, Scott Grooms and Jeanne Talor built the beds.  Fifteen of the beds are two feet tall, three feet wide and 16 feet long.  Three shorter ones were also built.


"We made them taller than average," Wadell says.  "We made them two feet tall to make it more accessible for seniors.  They don't have to bend over.  They have physical limitations, so this was to their benefit to make them this tall.  We got it down to a science after a while.  We built 15 beds and got it down to five minutes for each box."

The beds were all installed Saturday.  Residents provided refreshments to volunteers, and signed them in on a poster that will be displayed at the facility.  Newell Fenner and George Gesslein filled them with a mixture of topsoil, peat moss, vermiculite, and compost.  Meanwhile KAN (Kids in Action Now) volunteers laid newspaper down in the rows, topping it with mulch.  A seven foot tall fence is being added, with a 6' tall chain link gate.

"We're trying to make this accessible, too, for residents who have walkers," Wadell says.  "We'll have a stone path at some point that they can still use to access the garden."

Wadell has donated a copy of the book 'Square Foot Gardening' to Woodsedge, and she says Braid also has a copy.  The book explains the concept of 'intensive gardening,' which yields more produce per raised bed.  While the concept was invented over a hundred years ago, it will be a new concept for Woodsedge gardeners who have spent a lifetime planting in rows.

"It's a new experience for them," Wadell says.  "You don't have to plant in rows, because you don't have to use a rototiller.  You never step on the soil, you never tap it down.  Things will grow so much easier.  You plant your vegetables closer together.  You can plant vegetables like carrots just inches apart.  Cabbage needs a whole square foot to itself as do tomatoes.  With the raised bed project we can eliminate two thirds of the (area of) the garden."

AES Cayuga, Alex Cole Paving, Bob Munson, Chuck Benson, Fred Arnold, Hardie Farm, Lyle and Kathleen Wadell, Ed LaVigne, KAN (Kids in Action Now), Newell Fenner, Home Depot, Ithaca Agway, Town of Lansing Highway Department, George Gesslein, Carolyn Baty, Betty Ellis, Bea Davis, Mary Benson, and Scott Grooms all contributed to the garden project.

Wadell said that residents would be able to start working in their new garden by the end of the day Saturday.

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