At top, members of Kearny Community Garden create anti-poaching signs; above, member Ruth Ann Becker, a second-year gardener, and David Mach display one of the signs.
KEARNY –
It’s not just the planters who’ve been hard at work at the Kearny Community Garden.
Some produce plunderers have also made their presence known, according to the garden’s overseers.
Strangers have boldly gone to the Passaic Ave. site during daylight hours and helped themselves to some of the fresh vegetables as they’ve ripened, said Jenny and David Mach, two of the garden co-founders and committee members.
One of the victims, new to the garden this season, discovered recently that a bunch of his tomatoes had been snatched and another grower lost some of her cucumbers, the Machs told The Observer.
“We had a report from one of our members that she had just parked in the nearby lot, seeing two women going up and down each row of [straw] bales with a shopping bag and taking anything that was ripe,” David Mach said last week.
“And, as soon as the member got out of her car, they bolted,” he added.
Mach said this incident happened within the past two weeks. A second incident, involving thefts of other produce, occurred in the past week, he said.
To help prevent future thefts, members have been advised to extract their plantings just before they ripen and take them home and place them on a window sill or in an area where there is sunlight until they’re ready for consumption, Mach said.
Because the garden was developed with the use of state Green Acres funding, its overseers cannot put it off limits to the public with perimeter fencing or gating, he noted.
The garden committee is trying to be protective of its members while, at the same time, trying not to overreact, he added.
To that end, he said, the garden committee has circulated an electronic message to members advising them that if they do happen to see intruders, they should refrain from aggressively confronting or fighting them.
“If they are blatantly taking things, explain nicely that people are welcome to walk and look at the garden, but not to take vegetables if they did not pay for a spot,” the message said. “There are 40,000 people living in Kearny at this time. It is pretty amazing that we are able to have a garden at all. If a few people are taking some things, that’s less than .01% of our population. Let’s stay focused on the rest of our wonderful community and be a positive example.”
Mach said the members used these incidents as a bonding experience by contributing wood and paint and volunteering time a week ago Saturday to create colorful signs in English and Spanish – another was to be scripted shortly in Portuguese – asking non-members to refrain from arbitrarily picking veggies from the garden.
About 60 groups – ranging from single individuals to families to clubs and/or organizations – are using 310 straw bales to plant this season, he said.
Members have visited Washington and Lincoln elementary schools to coach youngsters to be budding gardeners. “We tell them what plants to choose, how and where to plant them,” said Mach. “We want Kearny to be green.”
