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| Project Name: |
Quad City Edible Food Forest
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| Project Purpose (Include city and state): |
The Quad City Food Forest Project, proposed to be located at Black Hawk Gardens, Davenport, Iowa is intended to create the first public food forest in the Quad Cities area where all residents from the community will be able to visit and pick fruits, nuts, and berries for free. The project is volunteer driven and anyone that would like to participate is encouraged to contribute in any way they can. We will show an example to the community of as many native food bearing plants that will naturalize in a forest setting as possible. We want to educate, and intend to teach people how to propagate the plants in the food forest so that they can grow them at their own home. Our target population is the next generation as it will be they who benefit from the fruit of our labor.
Purpose:
To design, grow, and maintain an edible food forest, community gardens, and orchard that will produce healthy food for Davenport, Iowa and surrounding communities; foster education; and support the environment.
Proposal: To develop a portion of the land at Blackhawk Gardens with an option for expansion if the community and our group would like to continue to work together at the Blackhawk Gardens location.
We propose that the lower right part of the Black Hawk Gardens property in Davenport, Iowa would be a food forest that our group has creative control and freedom on the creation of with the exception that we have to maintain the wetlands / retention ponds to serve their purpose of flood prevention. We will maintain the distances required of plants from the levy so that it can be maintained and serve its purpose. This food forest would be native plants only.
We propose that the part of land with the pavilion and path would be landscaped nicely with edible and particularly perennial edibles that could be grown there, native or not, that is not an invasive species. This could include edible flowers, shrubs, trees, and art installations. This would include a lot of input from the community at large on the landscaping and input on plants.
We propose that part of that land closer to the levy could also be a small public orchard with common cultivated fruit trees. It could also include a small vineyard of Concord grapevines. They grow prolifically here and we are just off Concord Street and it could serve as a Concord Street Public Vineyard.
We propose expanding and improving the community gardens to include installations of works of art. The community gardens of course, will have a lot of input from the community at large and we will work hard at getting the immediate community involved in the community gardens.
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| City: |
Davenport
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| Project Location: |
Davenport, Iowa
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| Project Website: |
http://www.qcfoodhub.com/community-gardens/
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| Target population and how they will benefit: |
The project is volunteer driven and anyone that would like to participate is encouraged to contribute in any way they can. We will show an example to the community of as many native food bearing plants that will naturalize in a forest setting as possible. Through partnership with the City of Davenport, Iowa, local organizations and volunteers, the Quad City Edible Food Forest volunteers and Quad Cities Food Hub will educate, and teach visitors how to propagate the plants in the food forest so that they can utilize this knowledge and carry it in to their home landscape and teach others what they have learned. Our target population is local residents who will not only benefit from experiential learning opportunities and food available from the forest but who will also create a sustainable and perennial food system benefitting future generations. |
| Why your project deserves the funds: |
The Quad City Edible Food Forest deserves funding because it is a project that not only benefits current generations through helping to create a sustainable public food system, rich in experiential learning opportunities, but also future generations who will benefit from the work of the project's founders. |
| Project Timing: |
Phase I of the project will begin in September 2014 and be complete by October 2016, but will be an ongoing and continuing effort spanning multiple generations. |
| State: |
Iowa
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| Organization Name: |
Quad Cities Food Hub
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