What is a Community Garden?
A community garden is a shared green space maintained by community members to grow food, flowers, and other plants. They also provide opportunities for people to meet their neighbours, share knowledge, and build social connectedness.
Richmond Community Gardens
In partnership with the City of Richmond, Urban Bounty proudly cares for 17 garden sites across Richmond, home to over 770 gardeners of all ages, abilities, and backgrounds. Each plot is loving tended and cared for by an individual community member – everything grown in the community gardens is for person use only and can never be used or sold commercially. If you are walking through the gardens we kindly ask that you enjoy with your eyes only or ask the gardener to tell you more about their garden and what they are growing.
Urban Bounty is here to make your gardening experience as smooth and enjoyable as possible. Here’s what we take care of:
- Managing Community Garden memberships and processing yearly renewals
- Maintaining the community garden waitlist
- Acting as a liaison between gardeners and the City of Richmond
- Visiting our garden sites regularly (weekly to bi-weekly) to oversee their maintenance, plus conducting formal reviews each spring and fall to make sure the rules and agreements are being followed and every plot is being actively tended
- Keeping our shared tools — wheelbarrows, shovels, rakes, spading forks, and more — stocked and organized in locked sheds at each site
- Supporting gardeners in using organic growing methods that are gentle on the local ecosystem
- Running workshops and hands-on learning opportunities
- Organizing mulch deliveries, when possible
- Gathering your feedback to shape future projects and programs
We continue to strive to make all community gardens welcoming, inclusive spaces where gardeners, visitors, and staff are treated with kindness and respect — and we’re always here to help if you have questions or need support along the way.
The community garden membership fee helps cover some of the costs of running the program, like liability insurance for all gardeners, shared tools and supplies, and administration. However, membership fees are provided at a subsidized rate to make them accessible for all members of the community, and these fees don’t cover the real cost of managing the community gardens. As a registered charity, we’re always seeking additional funding, so we can provide more support to our gardeners, subsidize memberships for community groups, and keep growing the program for everyone.
Interested in Becoming a Community Gardener?
Select the garden site closest to you and then add your name to our waitlist HERE
Community Organizations in the Garden
We reserve and subsidize space at all of our garden sites for community associations, including nonprofits, co-ops, and schools, to garden in for free.
27 associations garden with Urban Bounty, include the Richmond Addiction Services Society, the East Richmond Community Association, the Somali Women’s Empowerment Society, and many more! We’re very grateful for their contributions to the garden and to the wider community.
If you’re part of a community organization interested in a full-year commitment to a garden space, please email gardens@urbanbounty.ca.
Check Out Our Gardening Resources
Click here to see all our gardening resources from tips and tutorials to vegetable guides and more! https://www.urbanbounty.ca/how-to/gardening/
New to gardening? Read our introduction to gardening guide https://www.urbanbounty.ca/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/Introduction-to-Gardening-1.pdf
Cover Crop Programs
Cover crops are beneficial plants that restore soil in between garden plantings! To support our gardeners and our earth, Urban Bounty has created two new cover crops programs: the Cover Crops Relief Program and the Spring and Fall Cover Crop Challenge. These programs will introduce new gardening practices to improve soil health, reduce the establishment of weeds and increase productivity.
ADAPTING COMMUNITY GARDENS TO CLIMATE CHANGE
Click here to download our step by step guide on how to implement water conservation and soil health practices in your community garden plot or home garden.
