The Grunthal Community Gardens for Caring Hands Food Bank had a successful inaugural year.

Liz Heese is a board member of Grunthal Caring Hands Food Bank. She says the community gardens are generously provided by local farmer Doug Wiens and the Grunthal Lions Club. She notes Wiens approached the food bank is 2015 and asked if they would like a garden plot.

“As a food bank we liked the idea but all of us had other commitments with the food bank and otherwise that we couldn't manage a garden at the same time, then Francoise Demers came along and he was interested in doing a food bank garden for us. He didn't have any gardening experience, but he wanted to give it a go, he really appreciated what the food bank is doing.”

Heese says the harvest in 2015 was very successful and Doug Wiens thought it would be a good idea to give others in the community an opportunity to garden for themselves. She notes he tilled a larger piece of land and Demers marked out more plots.

“This year Francoise was very busy talking to different people in the community, he has a lot of connections and he got them interested in doing their own garden plot. He again managed a food bank garden plot and other people came alongside him to grow their own gardens.”

Demers says it feels good to help out the community and give to the Caring Hands Food Bank.

“It is a great way to go because the vegetables are very expensive right now especially in winter. I haven't found a way to get vegetables all year but if I could get this all year around I would be a happy guy. It was fun for me to do that.”

Demers says now that the community gardens have run for a year and they have a big sign up for residents to see there will most likely be even more people gardening there next year.