Growing Greens in the Camp Garden

By Kristin Marie Bivens and Amanda Bailey | Ozark, IL

At dinner each night, the salad bar is stocked full of delicious goodies grown in the Camp summer garden. From crisply washed dark green, purple-veined organic kale to thinly sliced, hydrating cucumbers and tomatoes, the Camp’s farm to table initiative is spearheaded by food service director, Dru Kee.

Rows of kale, lettuce, and tomatoes in the Camp Garden.

This summer, Camp proudly enters it fourth year of on-site sustainable farming. Since it’s inception, the Camp garden is now part of a sustainable system that includes a greenhouse, as well as the 1,400 square foot garden plot.  In fact, the garden plot plentifully provides the fixin’s for the dinner salad bar, as well as the garden produce that regularly appears in side dishes and entrees.

   Rows of tomatoes in the Camp garden during session I.

According to the University of California-Davis’s Agricultural Sustainability Institute, “The goal of sustainable agriculture is to meet society’s food and textile needs in the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.”

This summer, Camp provides it’s own Farm-to-Table Manager in order to further develop Camp’s sustainability program.