GOSHEN COUNTY – Goshen County’s “Grow a Little Extra” program provides local gardeners with the opportunity to lend a helping hand to help fight against hunger. Through this program, gardeners can grow produce and then donate any surplus vegetables to those in need. 

“Calling all Wyoming gardeners; we need your green thumbs to fight food insecurity,” the Wyoming Hunger Initiative flyer says. 

The University of Wyoming Extension Cent$ible Nutrition Program (CNP) and the Discover 4-H club of Goshen County are partnering with the Goshen County Community Garden this summer to help fight hunger. The Discover 4-H club will utilize the community garden to grow produce, which will be given to CNP to weigh and distribute to local anti-hunger organizations as a part of Goshen County’s “Grow a Little Extra” efforts.

The CNP’s focus is to serve people with limited resources through nutrition education and local partnerships that help make healthy choices easy. CNP is funded by the USDA Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program Education and the Expanded Food and Nutrition Education Program. 

The “Grow a Little Extra” project encourages community gardeners to “grow a little extra.” They also encourage existing community gardens to dedicate one or two sections to growing food specifically for donation, and churches or community organizations who want to start a new garden to grow food for the community. Individual gardeners are invited to join in the growing efforts.

To get involved, gardeners can pick up free seeds that are available at the Goshen County Extension Office. Varieties include provider green beans, tiara cabbage, sugar daddy snap peas, unagi cucumber, sunshine kabocha squash and butternut squash. 

“We track the seeds that we have out and then just ask that the folks that plant those donate any additional produce that they have in their garden,” Crystal Zerbe, CNP educator for Niobrara and Goshen Counties said. “Then we give that back to the community by giving it to the food banks and the senior centers. Those who are in need of it.”

Also, Zerbe said gardeners are welcome to try each type of seed or select the specific ones they are interested in. While gardeners are encouraged to donate their extra produce, they are not required to do so. 

“Our focus is getting vegetables back into people’s kitchens and promoting them to eat healthily,” Zerbe explained. “We would like for them to donate; that would be fantastic, but they don’t have to.”

Gardeners are also invited to donate other types of surplus produce from their gardens. The produce does not have to be from the available seeds packets.

According to www.nohungerwyo.org, “When you commit to ‘Grow a Little Extra’ for local food pantries or social service agencies, everyone benefits.”

All donated fruits and vegetables have to be uncut and unprepared in any way. They must be straight off the vine. Come harvest season, produce can be donated at the Goshen County Extension Office. 

“Grow a Little Extra” is a collaborative effort between Wyoming’s First Lady Jennie Gordon’s Wyoming Hunger Initiative, the University of Wyoming (UW) and the CNP. 

According to www.nohungerwyo.org, The Wyoming Governor’s Residence Foundation Board works closely with the First Lady and the Wyoming Hunger Initiative. “The board focuses on supporting the work of the Wyoming Hunger Initiative, including raising funds to reinvest in anti-hunger organizations across the state working to fight food insecurity for Wyoming children and families.” 

In 2022, the “Grow a Little Extra” partnership donated over 35,000 pounds of produce to anti-hunger organizations in the state.

CNP is available in every Wyoming county, as well as the Wind River Reservation, and it offers both in-person and online classes on nutrition. Programs are free to those who income-qualify. For more information visit uwyocnp.org. 

For more information on this “Grow a Little Extra” and how to participate contact Crystal Zerbe at 307-334-3534.