The only thing better than staining your hands with dirt to make something grow, is to give back to the community at the same time. Kate Charuk, community librarian at Stanley A. Milner Library, is excited to share seeds and gardening knowledge in the Edmonton Public Library’s first Seeds Library Pilot Program.
The program has three stages. The first is the borrowing stage, where people get seeds of their choice from the library, all of which were donated to begin with. Then comes the growing stage, where people plant the borrowed seeds in their gardens. Finally, there is the sharing stage — once the plant has fully grown, gardeners harvest the new seeds to share with the community and start the process all over again.
It doesn’t quite make sense to “borrow” seeds from the library that you’ll never return, so Charuk clarifies that the whole borrowing idea is to encourage people to donate the seeds their plants produce back to the library and community.
“I hope [people would be] able to grow some beautiful flowers that they can enjoy this year. It’s magical. You never know what you’re going to get,” Charuk says. “Stick [the seed] in the ground and see it do what it wants to do, which is to grow.”
The Seeds Library Pilot Program started May 20, and runs all season. Get your seeds at Stanley A. Milner Library and get growing today.
