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Earlier this summer, a group of Harpswell residents spent a morning at the Harpswell Heritage Land Trust filling some 100 black fabric bags with potting soil and planting tomato and green pepper seedlings. Several weeks later, after the plants had matured, volunteers from Harpswell Aging at Home distributed the seedling containers to residents throughout Harpswell.
According to the Land Trust’s program director, Brandon Hall, and the chair of HAH’s Health and Wellness Committee, Gayle Hays, the container garden program allows recipients who still enjoy nurturing plants and eating fresh vegetables right off the vine to continue gardening on a porch or patio when a traditional garden is no longer practical.
The program, which began during the COVID-19 pandemic, is being managed this year by Harpswell Aging at Home’s Martha Israel, who said the container gardens are offered first to previous recipients, then to HAH’s Meals in a Pinch recipients, and finally to the community via HAH’s newsletter.
The program is one of several ways Harpswell organizations, such as HAH and the Land Trust, partner to provide fresh vegetables to neighbors who may not have access to them because of food insecurity or the physical challenges of gardening.
Harpswell Aging at Home’s Sharing Tables program makes free, fresh vegetables available to residents on Wednesdays from 1-4 p.m., or until the produce runs out, from June to October at three locations in Harpswell: Elijah Kellogg Church, Orr’s Island Library, and the Cundy’s Harbor Community Church of the Nazarene.
According to Julie Moulton, manager of the Sharing Tables program, fresh vegetables come from several suppliers. The Mid Coast Hunger Prevention Program’s Merrymeeting Gleaners collect surplus produce from farms, grocery stores and farmers markets, then distribute it to food-sharing programs, such as Sharing Tables, throughout the region.
Additional produce comes from a special section of the Harpswell Community Garden at Mitchell Field, known as the Common Good Garden. While most of the garden’s plots are available for residents to rent, this area is managed by volunteers who harvest vegetables on Wednesday mornings for donation and distribution to Sharing Tables later that day.
According to Lexi Helming, who helps manage the Common Good Garden, the vegetables it provides include tomatoes, onions, carrots, beets, cucumbers, summer squash, beans, kale, chard and lettuce. Kids ages 6-12 in the Land Trust’s camp program help with the harvest on two Wednesdays during the summer.
If, like most of us who have a vegetable garden, yours is overrun by zucchini, squash, tomatoes or any other vegetable, and you cannot use them all yourself, you are encouraged to offer your surplus harvest to your nearest Sharing Tables location. You can be sure your contribution will be used and appreciated.
Finally, the Mid Coast Hunger Prevention Program offers another way for Harpswell residents to obtain free groceries, including fresh produce, staples, meat and dairy products, at the Harpswell Town Office satellite pantry, which is open Monday-Wednesday and Friday from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. and Thursday from 12:15 to 6 p.m.
