Members of the local First Lutheran Church are putting a new “SPIN” on gardening.

Church members started the Tahlequah Community Garden about a year ago, according to Coordinator Julie Gahn. When Kiwanian Earl Smith introduced Gahn as the guest speaker at Wednesday afternoon’s meeting, he called the garden “one of the best-kept secrets in Tahlequah.”

Volunteers working with the local gardening project have implemented the SPIN method of farming: “Small Plot INtensive” farming. The technique allows people to earn a middle-class income on less than one acre of land, she said. Experts claim a family that learns the method and utilizes it on their own land can make as much as $50,000 a year on 1 acre.

“It’s not easy,” said Gahn. “It’s hard work. But it’s doable. We looked at this as a way to give some people job skills. If you’re new to gardening, we’ll mentor you. SPIN makes agriculture accessible to anyone, anywhere.”

Through the garden, the coordinator says families will be nourished, people will learn and hone job skills, and the hungry people in the community will be fed. Participants can either use a plot of the land to do their own gardening, or become a SPIN farming apprentice through the program and learn the full spectrum of market gardening.

“Tom Lewis, CEO and co-founder of Project O Si Yo, told us that one in five Oklahomans goes to bed hungry,” said Gahn. “In parts of Cherokee County, that number spikes to one in three. We wanted to start helping people grow their own food. Food raised in the community garden that isn’t used by families or sold at the farmer’s market will be donated to local programs that can best use it.”

During the past year, local farmers used the approximate one-eighth of an acre of land – besides the portion set aside for families – to grow foods and sell at the farmer’s market.

“Something we still need to work on is how to reach out to those people who need the food,” said Gahn. “That was our goal – to start a second garden and give some [food] to the CARE Food Pantry and O Si Yo.”

Now, through fundraising and a matching-grant award, the volunteers have enough to buy a second plot of land for another community garden. Gahn hopes to have three to five families committed to farming on the plot before it is purchased and set up.

“This method enables folks to not only feed themselves, but to also learn to run a small business by setting up at the farmer’s market,” she said.

Farmers at the community garden can learn new ways of farming, like a method of crop rotation to keep away unwanted bugs and diseases.

“We rotate the crop so the same plant doesn’t grow in the same spot every year,” said Gahn. “We set up an eight-crop rotation. That should decrease the problem we have with pests. Everything works together kind of like pieces of a puzzle fitting together.”

Garden volunteers have also implemented a system of attracting “good bugs” that will keep away the unwanted pests.

Through the process of growing the organic food, Gahn said, the community comes together through the creation of special bonds. “It’s part of the effort to build the community,” said Gahn. “The average shopper at a farmer’s market has 10 times as many conversations as a supermarket shopper.”