As spring kicked off with an 85-degree bang earlier this week, San Antonio native wildlife wakes up after the winter freezes. The Gardening Club leads the Community Garden and has prepared for this moment by taking the opportunity to begin replanting once more. Cauliflower, broccoli, collard greens and brussels sprouts thrived in the winter weather, but now that spring is here, the garden will soon see tomatoes, strawberries, peppers and fruit trees.
Anyone on campus can take produce from the gardens, plant their own produce and engage in gardening. Faith Perry, senior psychology major, is the president of the Gardening Club. Perry sees a need on campus and hopes the garden fills it.
“I feel like everyone struggles with [getting] fresh food and healthy food, especially on a college campus. When you live in a dorm, it’s hard to prepare your own food, and I know the food here isn’t the healthiest, so I think it definitely meets that need,” Perry said. “And then it’s free of course, so students don’t have to go to the store and pay for it, and it’s right on campus so it’s super accessible.”
As a student in the gardening class, Audrey Germany, senior environmental studies and economics double-major and vice president of Eco Allies, works closely with the nonprofit Gardopia Gardens and its founder Stephen Lucke. Working in collaboration with Trinity’s community garden, Lucke brings many plants and seeds for the garden, and informs students about what to plant in different seasons and what plants are native to San Antonio.
“Recently, [Lucke] just brought a couple of fruit trees over. He brought plums, I think some orange trees and a peach tree, just because those were what he had access to from Gardopia. Next time you walk past, you might see the new skinny little trees. Some of them even have flowers,” Germany said. “Now that warmer weather is coming up, we planted crops that tend to do better in warmer weather.”
Eco Allies and Community Gardeners aren’t the only members of the Trinity community that have dreams for the impact of the garden. As part of the Environmental Studies Senior Seminar course, Germany said some seniors are planning on implementing a fresh produce farmers market event at Trinity, almost like the Art Market or Chocolate Fest. For students who want to get more involved in environmental issues on campus, Germany recommends reaching out to her or other officers to get added to the Eco Allies email list. For students who would enjoy gardening with Lucke, they can sign up to be in the 1-credit gardening class held every Friday.
Molly Ruby, first-year environmental studies and geoscience double-major, really enjoys her time in the Community Garden. She takes the gardening class to tend to the garden and learn about gardening in South Texas. Ruby has found meaning in gardening through this class, as well as her environmental classes from last semester. In Intro to Environmental Studies, one of the classes she took last semester, students read the book “Soil: The Story of a Black Mother’s Garden” by Camille T. Dungy. Ruby likened her goals for sustainability in her life to many of the lessons in that book.
“I just think gardening and being self-sustainable is so cool. Through this gardening class, we’ve learned how you would build a gardening bed and how you would care for it, just basics. It definitely encourages me, whenever I have my own house and my own yard, to have a garden of my own, and I feel better equipped now than I had before the class,” Ruby said. “In ‘Soil,’ Dungy talks about how she uses her at-home garden, and how the process of building that garden really connected her with nature and gave her almost a sense of control in this world. I just, again, think it’s super cool to have that ability to grow your own food, and maybe you can’t grow everything but growing as much as you can and being able to provide for yourself and other people, I just think that that’s a really great skill to have.”
Ruby is grateful for the time she has gotten to spend gardening this semester. While many environmental science and environmental studies majors take the class, anyone can enjoy gardening.
“It’s a really great class. It’s not just for environmental studies majors, so I would encourage anyone to take it. If you need extra hours, it’s great since it’s a very quick class, and you learn a lot. I would encourage anyone to take it,” Ruby said.