Spring is in the air for the Upper Perkiomen Valley Garden Club, thanks to a small group of volunteers who are focused on helping the community and having some fun in the process.

          The UPVGC is a new nonprofit organization made up of community

members who want to share their interests in gardening, area beautification and conservation of natural resources.

          Club President Kevin Stephenson has envisioned the UPVGC for more than a year and has two projects in the works.

          The first project Stephenson came up with was a vegetable garden located at the previous site of the outdoor pool facility at Kistler-Bitting Park, Second Street in East Greenville. With his background as a Pennsylvania-registered landscape architect, who has lived in Upper Perk since 2006, drawing up the plans for a community garden was an easy task. The vegetable garden will provide fresh produce for families in need through The Open Link. Area resident Genevieve Loose will manage the Community Benefits Garden project.

          The second project is beautification of the entrance to the Upper Perkiomen Valley YMCA on Quakertown Road, East Greenville. This project will feature landscaping with all native plants. Upper Perkiomen High School science teacher Jim Coffey and technology/engineering teacher Dan Moyer, along with their respective students working in the community service program, will assist with the project.

          "The whole idea is aimed at the community, with community benefits, community involvement and active participants rather than 'volunteers,'" Stephenson explained.

          The club's objective for the Community Benefits Garden, according to Stephenson, is to create, maintain and harvest vegetables for families in need from an assembly of raised planter boxes.

          The plan incorporates 30 raised planter boxes at the Kistler-Bitting Park site that will contain 7-12 inches of sandy loam for a drainage layer on the bottom, 3-5 inches of organic loam for planting in the middle layer and a half-inch of organic matter on a surface layer. The perimeters of the planters will be covered in mulch, 3-inches deep by 2-feet wide, donated by Red Hill Borough.

          In developing the raised planters, Stephenson said, several needs were taken into consideration by the club. One important factor was to provide participants with a safe and easily accessible layout. The planters are constructed from wood that have no exposed fasteners and will be of a height and spacing that is accommodating to children, handicapped and elderly individuals.

          With involvement of the Upper Perkiomen Valley YMCA, children's summer camp programs will also allow for education on gardening and grid cultivating with rotation of food crops throughout the season.

          The planter parts are compostable and easily replaceable, and made of locally sourced materials with no plastic fabrics or assembly components. Some have already been installed. The wood used for the planters was cut and painted by the UPHS shop students, then assembled on site by the UPVGC participants.

          "The first nine planters are paid for and we have enough wood right now to build 24 with plans for 30," Stephenson said.

          "We plan to be out there Wednesday (April 5) to start planting in the boxes that have already been installed. Vegetables like radishes could be harvested as early as 3 to 4 weeks depending on how well the weather treats us. As soon it is ready to plant warm weather crops, we will plan for those crops and set a date for planting," Loose said. 

          Local businesses and individuals have sponsored raised planter boxes through a program the garden club launched to accept donations for the project, Stephenson said.

          While the garden club currently comprises fewer than 10 volunteers, participants are hoping interest will grow with time. Stephenson is hopeful that through generous individuals willing to donate money and time, as well as the Upper Perkiomen Valley YMCA summer camp involvement, community involvement will increase.

          For more information on the UPVGC and its projects, contact Stephenson at Kevin@UPVGC.com or Loose at UPVGCinfo@gmail.com.