Why Join a Community Garden?
There are so many great reasons!
Joining a community garden is a way to grow fresh food, meet neighbors, and improve your mental and physical well‑being, especially if you lack your own yard or growing space. Many people also join because gardens make neighborhoods greener, safer, and more connected. There is nothing better than sharing seeds, seedlings, harvests and growing tips and experiences with others! Here are some of the benefits:
Benefits of Joining a Community Garden:
- Access to land lets you grow fresh fruits and vegetables even if you live in an apartment or dense urban area.
- Joining a community garden is also great even if you do have your own garden at home... perhaps you don't have much full sun in your yard, veggies like lots of sun! But it's not just extra growing space, it's also all about the community connections and friendships that you'll grow!
- Benefit from sharing seeds, seedlings, and extra produce with fellow gardeners – you'll find gardeners are a generous bunch! They'll even help you water when you're out of town.
- Be inspired by our fellow community gardeners – often if you see they are growing a type of vegetable or flower that you haven't tried, you'll be able to ask their advice and try growing your own! It's fun to grow a wide variety of vegetables so that you can enjoy for the entire growing season and beyond.
- Collect seeds from many plants to use and share with gardeners. One of our gardeners have rogue dill, lettuce, calendula, cilantro and borage that the gardeners let some go to seed and reseed themselves every year at their community garden, offering free no-effort food!
- Community Gardens often have a pollinator garden in or throughout the garden. This helps bring lots of pollinators to your vegetables, resulting in bigger harvests. If your garden does not have one, consider volunteering to help put in some flowers in the front or back of the garden, or even designate one plot as a flower pollinator garden!
- Gardening offers low‑impact exercise, which can reduce stress and support overall wellness.
- Community gardens usually have compost setups, which are a wonderful way to recycle your garden waste and turn it into gardener's gold for adding to plots over time. Seeing compost in action is a great way to learn how to compost and divert compostable items from the landfill.
- Spending time outdoors and with plants is linked to better mood, a greater sense of calm, and can lower blood pressure.
Social connection
- Community gardens give neighbors a safe, welcoming place to gather and talk face‑to‑face outside in a beautiful green space.
- Working side by side helps build friendships, mutual support, and a stronger sense of belonging. It's easy to talk about gardening when you're working together! Even introverts can be talkative when gabbing about gardening.
- Gardeners are generous and often share seeds, seedlings, tools, and harvests!
Food and health
- Community garden pots can significantly lower grocery costs by letting families grow part of their own food – and you can share your extra produce or swap with other gardeners to round out your meals. Growing veggies from seed is one of the most cost effective ways to grow your own food, and pick varieties that you love.
- When you grow your own food at a community garden, you can grow organically without any chemicals, so you'll know that you're food is all-natural! Most community gardens use organic practices, which fosters a healthy ecosystem with lots of beneficial insects and birds that help control vegetable pests like aphids and cabbage looper caterpillars.
- Community Gardens are by their very nature very diverse, as everyone grows their own varieties so this creates a great ecosystem. Gardeners often grow heirloom and native species of flowers, and these spaces create rich habitats that attract pollinators like bees and butterflies, as well as essential beneficial insects such as ladybugs and lacewings, which in turn support natural pest control.
- Regular access to fresh produce supports healthier eating patterns and better nutrition – everyone loves fresh picked, vine-ripened produce as they taste so much better than store-bought.
- You can preserve your harvest for winter meals by canning tomato sauce, making pickles, hot sauce, or salsas. You can dry peppers and herbs for use year-round as well.
- In areas with few supermarkets, gardens help ease “food deserts” by providing local, nutritious options.
Community and environment
- Gardens often transform vacant or neglected lots into attractive green spaces that people enjoy.
- Organic community gardens support wildlife such as birds and pollinators. Add a bird bath to your community garden to bring in birds, your free pest control. Did you know that bird parents feed their baby birds 200-500+ caterpillars a day? That's a lot of cabbage loopers.
- Planting fruit trees and berries is an excellent way to incorporate permaculture principles into a community garden, adding beauty and increasing food production over time. Think: strawberry patch, raspberry patch, fruit trees... galore!
- Joining a Community Garden can increase neighborhood pride and civic engagement.
- Shared gardens support more sustainable food systems by reducing transport impacts and creating habitat for pollinators.
- Many community gardens donate extra produce to local food banks, as well as friends and neighbors. It's wonderful to share the abundant harvest!
Learning and skill‑building
- New gardeners can learn planting, soil care, and pest management from more experienced members.
- Learn when to pick vegetables, how to water them properly, and general care and tips from fellow gardeners.
- Learn to grow different vegetables and expand your harvests and success!
- Children and adults gain hands‑on education about where food comes from and how ecosystems work. You get to see a lot of cool insects and birds at a community garden!
- Leadership, organizing, and teamwork skills grow as people help run meetings, events, and join group maintenance days to talk and work together to weed paths, spread mulch, rotate compost bins, and plant pollinator gardens.
How to find a Community Garden:
You can find a community garden near you by combining a few online searches with local networking and city resources. Most areas have at least one garden, but you may need to check several sources. Also, get on your bike or feet and explore you're neighborhood, their may be a community garden near you at a school, church or park!
Use online directories and maps:
- Search “community garden near me” in Google Maps or Apple Maps and zoom into your neighborhood to see tagged gardens and reviews.
- Use national or regional directories, such as the American Community Gardening Association’s Find a Garden Map, which lets you click on map pins by state or city.
Check local organizations:
- Look at your city or county parks and recreation department website; many run or list community gardens in public parks.
- Contact your local Cooperative Extension offices, Garden Clubs, Herb Society, Wild Ones, Native Plant Society, Food Pantry, Urban Agriculture/Farming Nonprofits, or Gardening Alliances, which often maintain lists of neighborhood gardens or have good contact people to reach out to for information about garden spaces.
- Find local organizations that support or run local community gardens, such as Denver Urban Gardens in Colorado or the Los Angeles Community Garden Council in California, or Wasatch Community Gardens in Utah.There is also the American Community Gardening Association that can help you find gardens in your area.
Ask around in your community:
- Post in neighborhood groups (Nextdoor, Facebook, local Reddit) asking if there is a garden that accepts new members or volunteers. Residents often know about small, unlisted plots.
- Visit nearby churches, schools, parks, and community centers, since many host gardens on their grounds and advertise openings on bulletin boards rather than websites.
What to ask once you find one
- Ask about wait-lists, plot sizes, costs, and whether there are options to volunteer if plots are full.
- Confirm garden rules (organic only, hours, shared tools) and whether they offer orientations or workdays for new gardeners.
- Offer to volunteer and/or get on the wait-list if a garden is full, usually plots open up often each season so you'll likely get one soon. In the meantime, you could volunteer at the garden to get to know some of the gardeners and be the first to know when a plot opens up!
We love community gardens, and we donate seeds each year to community gardens & seed libraries around the country. Learn more about our seed donations »
Happy growing!
