Berrigan Men’s Shed has donated multiple raised garden beds to encourage newfound gardening endeavours.
Berrigan MPS head of diversional therapy Julie Burns coordinated the project to “give the residents a bit of purpose”.
“It’s something that’s theirs, that they can look after,” she said.
“The plan is to get them involved in the whole process. I even took one of the residents to Cobram with me to pick what to plant.
“We’ve got snow peas, tomatoes, beetroot and lots of strawberries. We had pumpkins, but had two bad frosts which affected them.
“The residents like strawberries, especially their strawberry pancakes.
“Hopefully, they can pick them, find recipes, cook the produce that they’ve grown and eat it also.”
Mrs Burns said most of the residents have some sort of gardening background, and many find it quite enjoyable.
“We have gardens here, but most have ground covering, bushes and trees, so there was nothing we could do (in terms of garden maintenance).
“So I asked if we could get some vegetable gardens, in the space we had out the back.
“The plan was to get some raised garden beds because if they’re not raised we’d have to bend over and some of us might keep going over.
“So I approached the Berrigan Men’s Shed.
“I originally purchased one medium-sized bed with the funds we had, and they kindly donated another two.”
The two donated beds were larger than the one purchased, which makes for plenty of room for the produce to grow.
Mrs Burns also acknowledged Cobram Mitre 10 for providing stakes and seedlings to plant at a discounted rate.
Julie Burns, Shirley Milich, Jean Williams, John O’Dwyer Julie Nagle and Brian Good.
The garden beds at the start of the project.
Growing well.
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