Oakes Community Garden at UCSC

Those interested in getting involved with Oakes Community Garden can learn how to grow food, compost, and care for plants while getting involved with the Oakes community. We host volunteer hours and garden workshops every Sunday from 11:00 am to 1:00 pm during the academic year, with snacks, hands-on gardening, and the chance to take home herbs, flowers, or veggies. It’s a great way to build skills, meet people, and help make our space even better. Further, if you’d like to be involved in the space outside of the volunteer hours, you may reach out to the stewards via our instagram or email below. We accept any contributions to the garden, that being creative arts, new gardening methods, and any other community ideas, as we only exist as a result of the effort of our school’s community. Additionally as a community space, our doors are open 24/7 and you, or any other community members do not need our permission to go in. So, if you ever need a space to be outside, hang out with friends, or have a small club meeting, you can use the Oakes Garden as your community resource.

Funding with CSC:

The CSC grant helps Oakes Garden’s expand its outreach, improve community engagement, and enhance long-term sustainability. The grant directly funds essential garden upkeep, helping us successfully run a composting system for the Oakes apartments, maintain and repair the garden’s structures, complete general plant care and make the space appealing and comfortable for the Oakes community. The grant has largely supported some larger projects like building an agroforestry area with new fruit and nitrogen-fixing trees, restoring and upgrading our pond’s ecosystem, and launching fall and winter food crop production, using the CSC resources to purchase materials, tools, and plants additionally expanding volunteer involvement and fostering sustainable knowledge within the garden and Oakes.