Volunteers from the Sackville Community Garden and Open Sky Cooperative were in downtown Sackville on Wednesday, planting four Bridge Street flower beds with new pollinator gardens.
The idea came from the Sackville Community Garden, said Tantramar’s Active Living and Culture director Matt Pryde. In past years, the municipality has planted the beds with annual plants, but this year, “the community garden reached out to us to just try to do something a little bit different,” said Pryde on Wednesday.
Hear this story as reported on Tantramar Report:
The new downtown pollinator beds will help the case for a possible Tantramar application to become a Bee City Canada community. Active Living & Culture manager Jamie Ferguson pitched the idea of applying for the pollinator-friendly designation to council last week, and council is expected to make their decision on June 10.
“This is a great kind of kickoff to the Bee City proposal,” said Ferguson. “Creating new beds with native pollinator plants in the downtown core is pretty great to see happening here.” Ferguson says after the Sackville Community Garden and Open Sky Cooperative brought the idea to the town, they decided to “convert some of our annual budget over to doing a more perennial garden beds here on Bridge Street.”
And because perennials come back year after year, there will be reduced costs over time, said Ferguson. “Eventually, you know, we’ll be able to split these out and put them in other beds around the municipality,” he said.
Sarah Evans is one of the Sackville Community Garden members who spearheaded the downtown pollinator initiative. She says members were inspired by the pollinator gardens created at the Charles Street garden, and decided they could expand downtown.
“These beds have been here for a few years on Bridge Street,” said Evans, “and they’re very noticeable. And I’m downtown every day and look at them, and people kept saying they could look really nice with better annuals or different annuals. And we just thought, what a great opportunity to put perennials in here and just have it be a really fun, exciting, permanent garden.”
Evans says the group has chosen plants that will offer a variety of shapes, colours, sizes and flowers all season long.
“This is a pretty challenging space for plants to grow in, so they’re not going to do a tonne this year,” said Evans, “but in following years, they’ll do better. And it’ll be interesting to see also what plants really thrive. Some are going to spread and go crazy. Others are going to probably disappear and die out because they don’t like this kind of an environment.”
Christie MacFadyen is a new Sackville resident, member of the Sackville Community Garden, and a volunteer at the Open Sky Cooperative, who are both partnering on the pollinator project. MacFadyen brought some urban planting experience to bear on the project, having a 15 year background as a horticultural technician.
“It’s really wonderful to be involved in this here today with you guys here in Sackville,” said MacFadyen, “our new, wonderful home.”
MacFadyen says volunteers from Open Sky and the community garden worked as a group to choose the plants, focussing on native perennials. “It’s a great investment,” said MacFadyen. “Ecologically fantastic.”
Anthony William Jeremiah McLean was helping with the planting on Wednesday. The Open Sky Co-op member is relatively new to Sackville and says the move, “really opened up a lot of doors for me.” McLean said he enjoyed being part of the planting crew on Wednesday because the work was “very good for the mind, body, mind and soul… like moving with hands, working as part of a team, and just enjoying and giving back to the community,” said McLean.
