Curious about the Lucas Community Garden? Keen to get involved? Come along to our open day/working bee event on September 10th and say hello or lend a hand!

If you have not yet discovered it, the Lucas Community Garden is tucked away behind the community centre on the corner of Eleanor Dr and Coltman Plaza, near the Lucas kindergarten. It was officially opened in January 2020, but it has been a wild couple of years and you may not have noticed it! If you venture down there today you’ll find a shipping container shed, that houses the gardening gear, a series of planter boxes waiting for a Spring spruce up, a community swap box, and a brand new table and chairs set up.

You might also notice a big blank sign, and a couple of blue boxes. These are current projects in the works- a kids play box and a community composting bay. As the Wintery weather eases and the sun shines again we hope to get these painted up and completed for everyone to enjoy!

The Lucas Community Garden is a small share garden, for anyone in Lucas, Alfredton and surrounds to come and enjoy, under the #foodisfree philosophy. Food grown there can be picked by all, and any excess produce grown by locals in their own gardens (a Summer zucchini overload perhaps?!) can be shared via the green swap box.

The aim of the garden is to offer a safe and enjoyable space where keen gardeners can share their knowledge, beginner gardeners can learn some skills, children (and adults!) can learn more about how food is grown, community members can connect and get to know each other and everyone can share in the fun of reconnecting with nature and the joy of free, homegrown food.

It would be wonderful to see the garden continue on, however it is run by a very small group of volunteers and it needs your help! With some recent shifts in the volunteer team and the current president and treasurer needing to step back from their roles for 2023, it’s the perfect time to shake things up and get some new hands and minds in the mix. And you don’t have to be a gardener to get involved!

Maybe you do like to get your hands in the dirt, and you’d like to run a working shift once a week or fortnight, where people can come along and lend a hand. Or perhaps you are just great with people, enjoy making community connections and organising get togethers.

Perhaps you’re good with numbers and finances and you’d be keen to help with the books whilst learning a little about food growing. Or you’re a whiz at grant applications and fundraisers and you’re keen to help the garden grow in more ways than one! The garden team needs a range of talents, so have a think about how you could help and get in touch to jump on board!

Come along to the garden September 10that 10am and say hello, learn more about getting involved and/or lend a hand with some jobs! We’ll be running a barbecue thanks to Alfredton Rotary, there will be a few games and activities for the kids (weather permitting), and we’ll have a list of jobs to get into for Spring including an informal wicking bed workshop as we begin getting our first wicking bed/s ready to go, some early Spring planting and getting our compost bay set up ready to go.