Copiague class teaches organic gardening

Kathleen Dunn has sad-looking peppers and her tomatoes seem to give up before they've even started. One year her garden produces so many vegetables, she has to give them away. The next year, she's lucky if she has enough to make a salad.

"I am a gardener who has no idea why things aren't going well for me," she said.

Dunn, 55, of Deer Park, expressed her gardening woes Monday night at the first in a series of organic gardening classes in Copiague sponsored by the Town of Babylon and organized by the Copiague Chamber of Commerce.

The class was lead by Vince Cirasole, 71, who has earned a master gardener title through training at Cornell Cooperative Extension of Suffolk County. Cirasole has worked the soil his whole life and now grows a host of vegetables in a 7,000-square-foot garden at his Copiague home.

He told the more than 50 people in attendance that agriculture has changed in this country in the past 70 years, going from family farms to an industrial system that emphasizes a vegetable's appearance and shelf life rather than its taste.

"I'm trying to go back," Cirasole said. "My dream is to have a small local food system where people know each other and care for a small piece of land and give each other nutritious food."

Cirasole gave a primer on gardening without chemicals but spent most of the evening fielding questions. Everyone had a topic: horse manure, soil testing, peat moss, cover cropping.

Seven more free classes, held at Copiague's Christ Covenant Church during the planting seasons, will take place March 14, May 2 and 9, July 11 and 18 and Aug. 8 and 15.

Cirasole said the classes would hopefully inspire town residents to grow their own organic vegetables, either at home or in one of the free plots available at the town's Edith Salzer Organic Community Garden in Deer Park. Gardeners can sell their goods at a downtown Copiague growers market on Saturday mornings from July to November.

Cirasole said the classes followed a nationwide trend toward more natural food, echoing first lady Michelle Obama's call for Americans to eat a more nutritious diet. "People are concerned about the food [recalls] that have been happening," he said. "They're concerned about the chemicals."

Marilyn Bell, 52, of Lindenhurst, attended class in hopes of inspiration. An agricultural college graduate, Bell said her gardening had trickled off over the years. "I figured this might inspire me to get the shovel out and dig a hole," she said.Alexandra Rivera, 38, of Deer Park, hopes to nab one of the community garden plots and enlist her children to help out. "I want them to learn about a healthy style of living," she said. "Even if I have to get a baby carrier on my back while I garden, I'm doing it."