After a long hibernation, this morning was my first opportunity to return to work in the Common Roots Garden since the final fall harvest. Danny Schwartzman, owner of Common Roots, was up early to help me and fellow volunteer Elise (pictured below) to get some of the early seeds into the ground.

As you can see in the images here, some of the plants from last year (garlic and lettuces) are already coming back on their own. Other pieces of last year’s harvest also remain. A few frozen beets with their bright flesh stuck out from the now-thawed earth, leftover dried bean-pods spilled their contents, and turnips littered the freshly turned soil.

Today’s work went toward planting peas, spinach, arugula, and radishes and re-stringing the twine surrounding the planted beds both to help us know where we’d already planted seeds and to prevent others from walking over the beds. Danny took care of spreading fertilizer over the planted areas, using a liquid sourced naturally from worms fed on coffee grounds.

In its second year, the Common Roots Garden is still in need of volunteers for mulching, planting, and weeding throughout the season. If you lent a hand last year and would like to return again or if you’re looking for a new volunteer opportunity, contact the café at info (at) commonrootscafe (dot) com.

As I’ll be stuck at work this afternoon, I decided to volunteer on my own this morning to get started on what Common Roots is calling the final harvest. Details below.

It’s been a great season for the Common Roots garden. The garden has already provided 1300 pounds of produce! Frost is predicted soon, so TODAY between 2:30 and 5:30 Common Roots will be harvesting most of what’s left, planting the boulevard strip on Aldrich Ave, and doing some weeding.

Danny would be happy to have as many hands as possible. If you’re interested in helping out, follow Common Roots on Twitter and give a tweet that you’d like to lend a hand, or email info (at) commonrootscafe (dot) com.

Common Roots Cafe
2558 Lyndale Ave S
Minneapolis, MN 55405
(612) 871-2360

Update: “today” above refers to Thursday, October 8, 2009. If you are interested in volunteering in the future, feel free to contact the address mentioned.

If you live in the Minneapolis area, you may have noticed Common Roots Café is starting a garden behind (and around) two houses just behind the café. Much work has already been done: the two homes are undergoing major renovations, plenty of asphalt and contaminated soil were removed, and new topsoil and compost were brought in. A pile of wood chips meant for pathways awaits. But how to get it all in place?

Volunteers! The first volunteer day was this Tuesday. We enjoyed great weather for hoeing, raking, and shoveling: cloudy, grey, and cool. Even though it wasn’t an official volunteer day, I was back on Wednesday, this time in bright sun, to help some more. The forecast for Saturday morning looks promising; planting time is from 9 am–2 pm and a late-afternoon rain is predicted. Since our friend Peter is coming to town, we’ll be heading first thing to the Midtown Farmers’ Market and then back home with plenty of time to do some gardening. The plans for the garden, masterminded by Cathy (from Nature’s Nest Farm), include fruit trees, vegetables, herbs, and flowering plants—all to be used in the café.

I feel very lucky to have had a little part in this and hope to be able to continue to help as the garden progresses. If you’d like to keep in the loop on how you can help, try Common Roots’ events page, their facebook page (with photo gallery), or following them on Twitter @commonroots.