Garden for the Environment: Dig In! 2024: Six-Part Edible Gardening Series

Dig In! — GFE’s Six-Part Edible Gardening Series

Saturdays from 10am – 12pm on March 23rd and 30th, April 6th, 13th, 20th, and 27th. One registration enrolls you in all six sessions!

Do you want to get your hands dirty? Learn how to garden this spring!

This six-part workshop series is designed to teach you everything you need to start growing food in your backyard in a supportive, hands-on environment.

San Francisco provides a perfect climate for growing food year-round! Even a small backyard space can be enough to grow healthy vegetables. In this workshop series, you will learn about the types of beds and containers in which to grow your plants and how to build healthy soil, build a simple irrigation system, plant and care for veggies, and harvest your crops.

All materials and tools will be provided for the workshops at GFE. Please bring your gardening gloves.

WORKSHOP SCHEDULE

Part I: Site Assessment– March 23rd. Instructor: Jamie Wollum

Learn about the reasons you may want to grow your own food and choose how and where you want to plant. We’ll walk you through a site assessment exercise and cover different ways to grow crops, from in-ground to raised beds and containers, helping you choose what is appropriate for your space.

Part II: Growing Healthy Soil — March 30th. Instructor: Herman Yee

Learn about soil types and how to create and maintain healthy soil for vegetable growing, and then add and amend soil in a GFE raised vegetable bed.

Part III: DIY Drip Irrigation — April 6th. Instructor: Herman Yee

Learn about basic home drip irrigation systems, how to put drip irrigation parts together with hands-on practice, and see an assortment of irrigation configurations in use at GFE.

Part IV: Planting Calendars & Crop Rotation — April 13th. Instructor: Emilie Winfield

Learn about what vegetables you can grow at each time of year and how to alternate crops to prevent disease and keep your soil healthy, then make a planting plan for a GFE vegetable bed.

Part V: Planting Your Edible Garden — April 20th. Instructor: Carey Craddock

Learn tips and techniques for planting seeds and seedlings and then practice by planting out some GFE veggie beds.

Part VI: Care & Harvest of Your Backyard Garden — April 27th. Instructor: Emilie Winfield

Learn how to maintain your veggie plants as they grow, keep them healthy and free of pests, and when and how to harvest different types of vegetables. We will celebrate the end of the course by harvesting from the GFE veggie beds so you can test San Francisco-grown produce!

Instructor biographies:

Jamie Wollum: Originally from Denver, Jamie grew up exploring the beautiful state of Colorado and developed a deep connection with the natural world. She established the outdoor education program at Francis Scott Key Elementary School with Education Outside, teaching hands-on environmental science, gardening, and cooking to students in grades K-5 while transforming an unused corner of the schoolyard to a thriving garden classroom. After two years as a Program Manager for Youth + Outreach here at GFE, Jamie managed the elementary school garden program in S.F. public schools and surrounding Bay Area school districts with SEI.
Emilie Winfield: Emilie is an agroecologist whose work focuses on agricultural sustainability, soil health, and impactful collaboration. She currently serves as the Regional Coordinator for the North Coast Soil Hub, a network of farmers and ranchers, educators, researchers, and technical assistance providers who share the goal of stewarding agricultural lands for diversity and resilience. Previously Emilie managed diversified vegetable farms for restaurant partnerships, including Love Apple Farm and Fresh Run Farm. She has an M.S. in Environmental Policy and Management and a B.S. in Plant Sciences. Emilie joined GFE as an instructor in 2016 and loves connecting with the local community around gardening and sustainable food systems.
Herman Yee: Herman grew up in San Francisco in a mostly rural immigrant family that carried the love of horticulture with them. He remembers many family trips to orchid sales and the vegetables and herbs his aunt grew in the community garden. Herman has been growing food since he took a class in Urban Garden Ecosystems in college and started working in his school garden and farm sites. He has been hooked since then and has continued to be fascinated with learning about ecological horticulture and building communities in which we can learn and share the work together. He is the Director of Operations at Urban Sprouts.
Carey Craddock: Carey Craddock is a longtime gardener and lover of plants for both their beauty and their edible bounty. Carey began her horticultural career in San Francisco in 1997, as a Gardening and Composting Educator at the Garden for the Environment, where she worked for the next 5 years. She continues to teach at GFE, and currently runs her own business, Carey Craddock Gardens, in San Francisco.