Vegetables Gardening - Growing Organic Vegetables

Dear JoAnne, Would it be possible to line your fence with sandbags or a low
berm that would route the runoff around your gardens and to another area?
Bernie

From: MittleiderMethodGardening@yahoogroups.com
[mailto:MittleiderMethodGardening@yahoogroups.com] On Behalf Of Jim Kennard
Sent: Thursday, October 27, 2011 9:21 AM
To: MittleiderMethodGardening@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [MittleiderMethodGardening] Long Beach, California Community Garden
- Problem with Runoff from Dog Park

Group: Please consider the following from our "resident disease expert"
Joanne, who is troubled with a problem faced by her Community Garden.
Thanks, Jim Kennard

Dear Jim,
For several years now, I have been giving advice to the group regarding
disease and pest control. Now I need some input from all of the group as to
a problem we are having at our community garden.

The Department of Parks has decided to put a Dog Park on the other side of
our fence. We will be sharing the fence and that would be fine except, that
parcel of land, when it rains (and we get very big rains here that flood us)
floods us regularly. That means that when it rains, we will be getting
contaminated water into a great many of our garden plots. Water that will
carry every disease that dogs carry in their feces.

We have tried to bring this health issue to their attention but they are
adamant that this Dog Park is going to be there. We are not against a Dog
Park. Just the location.
IF our El Dorado Regional Park did not encompass miles and miles of park, I
could see why they are insistent on locating it where they want to. But,
they are insistent and will not listen to anything we have to say.

Dog excrement carries many diseases. Even though they say they will grade
the area so that there will not be run off into our gardens, there is still
potential for that run off to happen. Twice they have promised us that there
would not be run off into our community gardens and twice, it has failed and
we are flooded with every rain.

Jim, please put this letter out to the group. I am hoping they can give us
some ideas on this. The uncertainty of contamination of our gardens is of
great concern to me.
It seems like insanity to even think of putting a Dog Park next to vegetable
gardens especially when the chance of contamination is one hundred percent.
The fact that they will not even listen to us makes me wonder why they think
dogs are more important than the health of people.

The sad part is that we, as a community garden, feed the poor. We deliver to
the missions and shelters every day. How can we safely do that knowing that
our vegetables could carry disease?

Thank you, Jim.

As Ever,
Joanne

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