Community Garden opens on Main Street
By Jonni Joyce
There’s a new opportunity for summer fun and learning on Main Street in Martin every Wednesday night at 5:30 p.m.
Area residents and business owners have begun to see a lot of activity at the Hope Garden this week.
It all started on Wednesday, May 17 when Community Champion Tauna Ireland introduced Lanna Trantham to a small group of citizens at Hope Garden location.
Trantham is the Community Garden Coordinator through the South Dakota State University (SDSU) Extension Service and lives here in the Martin area.
She moved here from the mountains of North Carolina with her family. Her husband, Daniel is the pastor of Higher Ground Baptist Church on Main Street across from Hope Garden.
Hope Garden will now serve as the new location for the community garden that was once located at Sunrise Housing and Wild Horse Butte.
Plans for the garden include raised beds, vegetables, herbs, potatoes, zucchini, a salsa garden, and a location to grow the “three sisters.”
Three sisters includes corn, green beans, and squash or zucchini.
“This will be a learning garden,” said Trantham.
Trantham and Ireland plan to have educational activities related to gardening, cooking, and crafting available to all ages available on Wednesday nights at 5:30 p.m.
If the weather doesn’t cooperate, they will move the activities across the street to the church.
Trantham graduated from Haywood Community College in North Carolina earning an Applied Plant Science degree in Horticulture.
“I’m excited about the salsa garden,” said Trantham.
The salsa garden will produce tomatoes, peppers, onions, cilantro, and other ingredients that go into salsa.
One of the activities will be making salsa from the garden ingredients.
The project is funded by SDSU and the city of Martin is providing the water.
The group sat around the blue picnic tables as the kids dug for treasure in the sand.
They are still brainstorming ideas for activities and events and are looking for volunteers as well as community members to come and enjoy the activities.
There is no charge and everyone is welcome to attend.
Anyone with questions can contact Tauna Ireland at 605-685-1373 or Lanna Trantham at 828-263-3759 or e-mail lannabtrantham@gmail.com.