Volume 8 • Number 1 • Fall 2009

Harvest Bounty for 4-H Green Giants

Members of the 4-H Green Giants pose in their garden.

At their August meeting, the Green Giants 4-H club enjoyed homemade, garden-fresh salsa – tomatoes, garlic, green peppers, cilantro and onions – made all the more satisfying by the fact that this bounty was from their own garden.

Carissa Hartman-Wozniak, Stephanie Carpenter and several other Worcester County parents formed the club last winter to focus on “green and the environment,” according to Lynne Hartman, Carissa’s mother and a force behind getting Green Giants off the ground.

The Hartman family has been involved in 4-H for many years. While most clubs were focused on animal and livestock husbandry, Lynne felt that gardening was a better fit for the local community. The Hartmans also have a pedigree when it comes to growing vegetables: they are the owners of Hartman’s Herb Farm, a seventh-generation family farm in Barre.

While the grown-ups were the ones who first planted the seed of getting a new 4-H club up and running, the kids have taken over the nurturing as membership has grown to about 15 youngsters. The members also decided which vegetables to plant in their raised beds and they did the watering, weeding, harvesting (and much of the eating). Along the way, they picked up the kind of experiential skills needed to grow healthy, and healthful vegetables.

“It really is the kids’ club,” Carissa explained. “They picked the name, they elect officers and run the meetings.”

Lynne’s husband, Pete Hartman, built raised beds from slab wood for each club member and, like most home gardens, the Green Giants’ vegetable plots were overflowing with produce by late summer. That had the club members excited about 4-H fairs and fall festivals where they planned to show their best tomatoes, cucumbers and other vegetables, as well as homemade crafts.

Credits:
Writing: Ben Barnhart
Photography: Ben Barnhart

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