Sense of community grows at shared gardens in Lake County

Deeply rooted in several villages throughout Lake County, community gardens are selling out.

Nestled in the villages of Grayslake, Fox Lake, Libertyville, Mundelein and elsewhere, the gardens serve as shared spaces for green thumbs to compare tips, gather outdoors and, of course, garden. They offer both refuge and resources for residents to feed themselves and others. And they seem to be more popular than ever.

“We sell out the plots pretty early every year,” said Zack Smith, senior management analyst for the Village of Grayslake.

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Candace H. Johnson-for Shaw Media Kat Iverson, of Grayslake checks out one of the sunflowers she is growing in her plot at the Village of Grayslake Community Garden. (7/9/22) (Candace H.Johnson)

The village offers 42 garden plots on the east side of Library Lane across from the Library Lane Senior Residences and Grayslake Public Library. A waitlist contains about six people hoping for future plots, which typically are 20 feet by 20 feet in size.

The gardens bring together neighbors who might be close friends or complete strangers while cultivating sustainability and a sense of community.

“It’s a great asset for community members interested in using it,” Smith said of Grayslake’s Community Garden.

Many community gardens designate plots as resources for area food pantries, becoming vital food sources for those in need. An array of fresh vegetables, herbs, fruits and flowers are grown.

At least two of the 82 plots at the Community Garden of Fox Lake are designated as food bank plots, said Matt Trujillo, manager of parks and recreation for the village.

Like the Grayslake Community Garden, the Fox Lake garden at 17 Forest Ave. sold out this season. Each raised garden plot is 4 feet by 12 feet, with some residents buying two plots at a cost of $40 a plot – a typical plot price.

Along with helping those in need, the garden provides neighborhood green space for those without access to that sort of land, Trujillo said.

“I see lots of benefits,” he said. “It provides fresh fruits and vegetables for people in the community, people that don’t have big house lots or who live in apartments and don’t have access to that. It gives them an opportunity to come down and grow vegetables.”

Promoting the garden at www.foxlake.org, the village sees the community garden as not only a source for food, but a way to promote healthy outdoor recreation, public nutrition and community self-reliance and sustainability.

“Perhaps most important in today’s increasingly hurried and urbanized environment, community gardens are places where people can share their love of nature and growing their own food,” the website stated.

Many who own plots have done so for years.

Valerie Gallegos of Round Lake first started gardening a few years ago in the Community Garden of Fox Lake to help out a friend, John Kaufman, whose wife, Kris, had recently died. The garden plot served as sort of memorial to her.

John Kaufman since has died, but Gallegos has kept the plot. Steadily becoming more involved, she’s now a committee leader for the garden and helps organize planting and monthly meetings. She’s also working with her hometown of Round Lake to develop a community garden.

“It’s kind of a neat thing there. It’s for everyone. It is truly a community,” she said. “It’s all ages, young children to seniors.”

Along with plots designated for food pantries, the Fox Lake garden has a plot specifically for the Fox Lake Fire Protection District, which originally donated land for the garden. Firefighters can pick the vegetables and fruits from the plot to use for meals at their stations.

The garden also has an area designated for children to garden, encouraging area day care centers and schools to get involved and plant. Events and classes, such as stone painting, are hosted for children.

And Friday Night Concerts take place throughout the summer on the Community Garden Green near the garden. Every third Friday, community gardeners gather before the concerts to meet one another, compare crops, trade seeds and sample each other’s produce.

Working with the Illinois Master Gardeners as part of the University of Illinois Extension, the Community Garden of Fox Lake hosts several gardening presentations a year to help educate gardeners.

Some gardeners like to use the plots to try out new things, Gallegos said. This season, it was purple beans, basically green beans disguised in a violet-hued skin, she said.

“I think it’s just a great place for people to come together of all ages and all walks of life,” Gallegos said.

Volunteers are encouraged to help keep the garden blooming, she said, by watering or taking care of a “sharing cart” filled with produce and left at the front of the garden for those in need.

“People who don’t even have a plot can come and volunteer,” Gallegos said, while others simply come to enjoy the greenery.

“People sometimes just walk through to ground themselves, to be with nature, see what’s there,” she said. “The other thing that’s really good is it’s a good place to relieve a little stress if you’re having a stressful moment.”