Growing Food Security on Pine Ridge

It seems like winter is having a hard time letting go of us this year, but spring WILL eventually be here, and One Spirit hopes to be off and running quickly with plans for this year’s garden program.

This year’s gardens will be especially important. One Spirit Gardening Program Director Sheilah Melsness says the gardening project has always been “near and dear” to her heart, but adds it’s not just a program now—it’s a matter of survival: recent funding cuts by the federal government have jeopardized programs designed to help feed people here on Pine Ridge Reservation, such as the cuts that affected the Charging Buffalo Meat Processing facility, and recent cuts that will clearly jeopardize the gardening program. It’s now more important than ever to ensure the success of this program, and we hope our generous donors will help us in sustaining and expanding it.

Melsness said, “Anybody who walks around the Rez can see that the sources of food are drying up fast,” adding that the foods offered by government programs are “not helpful in keeping people healthy.”

This is her second year with the program, and she is looking forward to working with the garden managers on getting things going for this year’s gardens, which will include expansions and the addition of new gardens. One Spirit currently has a vegetable garden at the Allen Youth Center, about 90 x 100 yards in size, one in Manderson, and one in Pine Ridge, near the Charging Buffalo Meat House. There is also a small orchard in Red Shirt. Plans for this year include doubling the size of the garden in Allen, adding a garden in Manderson, and potentially adding one more in another district.

The One Spirit gardens are managed using “regenerative techniques” that help promote and maintain the health of the soil, to help sustain them for the long term. These techniques include mulching, composting, companion planting, crop rotation, and minimal rototilling, to name a few. However, the new gardens will require rototilling to get started, and, Melsness says, large, “industrial strength” rototillers will be needed for that. The garden expansions will also require the purchase of other equipment, including cultivators hoes, rakes, wheel barrows, etc. And most importantly, they will require seeds and seedlings that are already started to get a jump on the season.

Melsness said she is excited about working with Travis Thunder Bull, manager of the garden at the Allen Youth Center. Thunder Bull said he has been managing that garden for about three years. He said he’s involved in the program because “It’s been my passion.”

He said that last year’s crops at the AYC garden “did very well,” doubling in size from the previous year, which was, he said, “all-in-all pretty good.” Last year’s AYC crops included assorted hot peppers, cantaloupe, bell peppers, cukes, pumpkins, watermelons, corn, tomatoes, and onions. A one-acre garden planned for this year is targeted for potatoes.

Thunder Bull said he is already looking ahead to this year’s gardens. This year, he said, workers need to install fencing, and apply fertilizer “soon,” and he has plans to build trellises in Allen, to grow crops vertically when possible. Thunder Bull said he’s among about 30 people from the Rez taking beginning gardener classes at the Youth Center in Kyle, to help build and sharpen skills.

Melsness noted that plans are for the food harvested from the gardens to be distributed at the three One Spirit food pantries in Allen, Manderson and Pine Ridge. The One Spirit food pantries feed an estimated 6,000 people per month, with seasonal variations. The gardens play a critical role in making sure people have access to the fresh, nutritious foods that are critical components of a healthy diet.

Spring is just around the corner. You can support One Spirit’s plans to help ensure food security on Pine Ridge Reservation with a donation to One Spirit today at www.onespiritlakota.org/donate.