[upbeat folk music]
[gentle folk music]
- Inga: I traveled to downtown La Crosse,
where Natalie is working
at Hillview Urban Agriculture Center,
growing fresh foods in the middle of the city.
[soil clattering] In addition to the greenhouse,
Hillview is also making some special compost
with the help of some wriggly little friends.
Hi, Natalie. - Hi.
- Nice to see you. - Nice to see you.
- Boy, spring has sprung in here.
- Ah, yes, we're very excited.
- Well, can I see a little bit around the greenhouse?
It's just-- - Yeah, I'll show you around.
- I'm so excited for spring
and to be able to see living things.
- Yeah, if we go around here, I'll show you around.
- So, what kinds of things do you have
going on in the greenhouse?
- So, we have lots of things going on,
but this is just one place where we
do all of our services for the community.
We also have cooking classes, but here at the greenhouse,
we host lots of community members to come here
and learn how to grow plants and the food,
so they can take it back home and then implement it
in their gardens, or even just their one pot of basil
that's not really doing so well.
- I got to learn from my grandparents and my parents.
They drug us out to the garden all the time.
I imagine folks in the city sometimes,
they didn't have that opportunity growing up.
Do you find that's a problem?
- I find that's a big problem in the cities.
A lot of people, when they think of agriculture,
they think of the farm fields,
but they don't know that it can happen right in their cities
and even right in their homes and their backyards.
You know, when the people don't have bigger spaces to grow,
they think it's just not possible.
But even teaching kids or the next generation
or even yourself as an adult,
how to care for that one basil plant or that herb,
or just that one thing that you could
probably even grow in your house.
I think it's really important for people to still keep
the growing culture alive.
- What does it mean to you to be able
to be a part of such an amazing project?
- I absolutely love, you know, what I do at my job here,
and the reason why I love it is 'cause I really believe
in the mission of Hillview Urban Agriculture,
is to give people access to a healthy,
sustainable food system,
which really isn't always possible in the city.
So, really to teach people and kids of all ages
and gardening ability, whether they've been gardening
for 50 years, or they kill everything they touch,
I love to teach everyone how to grow the plants
and how to somewhat be sustainable themselves.
- Well, one of the reasons I wanted to stop down here
is I'm really interested in your compost
that you make from worms.
- You want to see it? - I would love to go see it.
- All right, let's go check out the worms.
[gentle folksy music]
- So, this is actually where the worms are living?
- Mm-hmm. - I don't see any.
Are they kind of underneath the whole thing?
- Yeah, so just like in nature,
you never really see worms right on the top.
So, they actually live right underneath the surface.
So, if we take a look... - Okay.
- ...we could see them under there.
- Oh, wow.
- Yeah. - And it's fun.
So, you've got eggs in here,
carrots, all kinds of different vegetables and fruits.
Where are you getting all this from?
- So, we pick up from two local universities
as well as a health care center in La Crosse,
and that's gonna be about 400 pounds of food waste a week
that we pick up and feed to our worms.
- That's a big deal.
I mean, food waste is such an issue in the United States.
We have so much food waste.
What a great way to utilize it. - Yeah, it's really happy.
You know, once you see all the numbers add up
and when you carry those heavy buckets of food,
you really understand, you know,
once you get into this operation, you know,
it's reused in such a great way
instead of just sitting at the landfill.
- Sure, yeah.
So, for the people that don't know about compost,
can you explain what it is
and what's the benefits of compost?
- Yeah, so there's a few different kinds of composting
and a lot of people are familiar with, you know,
kind of your pile of your grass and your branches
and maybe some food waste outside in a pile.
But vermicomposting is really special 'cause it uses worms,
and the worms that we have here are a kind of earthworm,
they're red wigglers, and they're special
'cause they reproduce really fast and they eat a lot.
- So, they're actually taking these scraps and eating it,
and then, that's their-- it's coming out and it's soil,
basically, or soil amendment.
- Yeah, so we get to harvest their waste,
which acts just like any other manure,
and this is actually really special
because of the type of worms that we have.
They have a special bacteria in their stomach
that their end product or their waste that we harvest
is actually more nutritious than when they ate it.
- Wow, interesting.
Is this something, you're doing it on quite a big scale.
Can I do this at my house, if I wanted to?
- Yeah, it's very possible to do this on a small scale
with just your average tubs
that you pick up at your hardware store.
You could buy the worms online or even from us,
and you use some basic bedding like newspaper, grass or...
And you just start feeding the worms
and they adapt very well, and they're here to eat
and reproduce, and that's what they do well.
- One of the things that I like about using compost is,
I never have to worry about burning the plants.
I know it's an organic resource
and I know you're just building that soil by adding compost.
Is that what you're encouraging folks to do?
- Yeah, we definitely encourage, you know,
people are always asking, you know, "How do you,
how do I use this fertilizer?"
You can use it in many different ways,
from top dressing throughout the season.
So, just putting a little teaspoon to a tablespoon
on a plant and watering it in.
You can mix it into your raised bed or your garden rows
at the beginning of the season,
and you can even make a worm tea.
So, you just put, you know, put it in a sock
and leave it in a bucket of water for 24 hours,
and it seeps through and that's a liquid fertilizer--
- Sure. - That your plants can use.
- Sure.
Well, I'm gonna let these guys keep the worms in their garage,
and I'm going to grab some compost
and then head out to our next location.
[upbeat folk music]