Hydroponic and Community Gardens Feed Local Residents

The Upper-Susitna Food Pantry in Talkeetna has created a hydroponic operation that, along with a Community Garden, is feeding a number of local residents during the summer months.  KTNA’s Colleen Love has more.

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LuAnne Carroll-Tysdal is the Executive Director of the Upper-Susitna Food Pantry in Talkeetna. It’s her job to make purchasing decisions for the Pantry, which feeds local families in need. 

The produce that the Food Pantry used to purchase in the summer had sometimes travelled great distances and arrived looking… kind of tired. In response, Carroll-Tysdal started a small hydroponic operation right beside the Pantry and the results were encouraging.  

She wrote a Food Bank Alaska Infrastructure Grant which allowed the Pantry to purchase a piece of land. An Alaska Community Foundation grant provided funds to purchase greenhouse tents.

The hydroponic project is now in it’s fifth year and grows impressive quantities of lettuce, cucumbers, cabbage and tomatoes.

“So we looked at how we could grow it all through the summer without ever having to purchase lettuce. And we overachieved, quite a bit, um because it grows fast, as you can see they’re beautiful heads. We have harvested so many cucumbers out of here this year and we still have them!” 

The hydroponic operation works in conjunction with a Community Garden that the Food Pantry also manages.  The Community Garden grows produce that doesn’t thrive hydroponically.  Things like potatoes, carrots, beans and beets. Carroll-Tysdal says the Community Garden is a true community project.

The kids over at the high school… start starts for our garden. They ask us what we want to grow.  And then they make starts and they give them to us and we transplant them into the garden.”

Carroll-Tysdal says that local farmers also contribute seeds, starts and expertise. 

She says the hydroponic operation and the Community Garden have allowed her to proved fresh produce at the Pantry for four months already this summer.  She says this translates into fresher food and lower costs for the Pantry.  

Carroll-Tysdale say her next goal is to find a better cold storage solution so that the Pantry can provide locally grown food….for even longer.  In Talkeetna, I’m Colleen Love