Hungry? How the community of Ngatea forages and grows to help others

Ngatea Community Garden has been feeding people for a decade. Photo / HC Post

Rolling their sleeves up and sharpening their spades for others, volunteers of the Ngatea Community Garden have provided free vegetables, herbs and fruit without question to anyone who needs it for a decade.

What began as an overgrown patch of weedy jasmine, wild roses and poplars in land beside the Hauraki Plains Co-operating Parish, the garden has grown to feed many hungry tummies in Ngatea.

"Looking back on when we started 10 years ago I think the neighbours must have wondered what was going on," says Jane Robinson of Ngatea. "We put a warratah with some lemons from my garden and got to work clearing the section."

A table at the front of the garden holds baskets of food which this week included feijoas, limes, chokos and eggs. The sign says if you take, please make a donation in the yellow pipe which collects money for products used in the upkeep of the garden.

Some make donations well above what they would pay for the fruit and veges if they bought them from the supermarket. Some don't make a donation. Others will drop off produce they have in surplus.

But there's more than just this table of fresh produce on offer - there's a whole garden that can be foraged.

Silverbeet, herbs and chokos are among the items currently there and Jane says she's surprised at the number of people who drive up to see what's on the table out front and drive away again if there is nothing ready-picked.

"It doesn't look as pristine as it does in the supermarket. I think society isn't used to non-supermarket food that's not wrapped in plastic but, really, if people are short of food, we have heaps of silverbeet, heaps of chokos and they're free.

"It's a matter of re-educating people as to how they can use what's around to make a good healthy meal."

Chokos make a lovely soup, and herbs are full of nutrients that can be an easy addition to anything.

There are an abundance of feijoas as Easter approaches, and many are dropping on the ground in public places, says Jane.

Pick Your Own at Ngatea Community Garden. Photo / HC Post

"I am not sure people realise how good foraging is. There's stuff around without people having to go and buy fruit and veges. You can swap with other people, pick from people's trees once you've asked, and get a bucket and collect from what's on the ground.

"Forgaging from trees that are on the side of the road means food isn't just going to waste."

The community garden initiative has received many helping hands over the years from local garden centres donating seedlings that don't sell to the Corrections Department workers who were a huge help to volunteers, and built the compost bins and garden beds.

The Hauraki Plains Co-operating Parish donated the shed on the site and the group is currently saving donations for a water tank.