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Community Corner

Long-time ConsCom Member Mike Benenate Takes to Community Gardens

Also 'cultivates' other open space in the city, including Spence Farm.

Wearing a camouflage-patterned cap, weed-whacker at hand, Mike Benenate stood on a path in a garden with more than 120 plots, where tomatoes redden, zucchinis lengthen, squash sprawls, pole beans climb and sunflowers tower.

Benenatesaid he's gardened there for years, since the city bought the former farm, around 1975 and created a community garden.

He also oversees the garden for the city’s Conservation Commission. He was a member of that commission for about a quarter of a century, stepping down four years ago.

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Benenate has dirt under his fingernails, figuratively speaking, and in his genes. His mother, a war bride, grew up on a farm in Germany. He also spent time on that farm, he said. His father was a member of the local Conservation Commission here and, Benenate said, always had gardens. 

“I was brought up with the outdoor environment,” Benenate said, “and a love of nature.” He’s camped and hiked, climbing about 40 3,000-foot peaks in New England.

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Tending to the Garden

Every spring, he hammers in the stakes that delineate the community garden plots.

He also put in the watering system, he said, laying pipe in a trench dug by a backhoe five to six feet deep. Originally, gardeners had to lug water by hand from the nearby pond. The 12-to-15-year old watering system is holding up well, he said.

And he helps keep the paths between the plots trimmed.

 

Cultivating Friends and Veggies

Benenate knows the histories of some of the gardeners as well as the garden. The oldest gardener there, Louie Tuzzolo, once worked at farms in Woburn that no longer exist, said Benenate.

A semi-retired Tufts chemistry professor started to garden there when he taught full time. Benenate said the professor, Bob DeWald, swears that gardening helps him stay active and healthy.

Another gardener, Bill McKay, imports seeds from Italy.

A Korean family grows all the ingredients for kimchi at the garden. They can include cabbage, red pepper, onions, garlic and ginger.

A high number of new gardeners—12—began to cultivate plots in the garden this year, according to the garden coordinator.

There’s a waiting list for a garden plot. The boom began around 2008, when, Benenate observed, the economy started to falter. There is no room to expand the garden, but Benenate said the boulders in the parking lot may be moved to allow more parking.

About 10 years ago, “We couldn’t give (garden) plots away,” he said.

To cultivate a plot in the garden, you must live in Woburn. Because the city bought the land with state money, some non-city residents are grandfathered in, Benenate explained. Garden space opens up only if a gardener cannot maintain his or her plot or dies.

 

Reaping the Benefits

This has been “very good” growing season, according to Benenate. The garden started later than usual—in June—because of work on the access road. The state Department of Environmental Protection required that paving on the road be removed because, the garden administrator explained, it was done without a permit.

So where does all the garden produce go? Gardeners usually trade it among themselves, Benenate said.  

By prior arrangement, the is accepting produce from several specific parcels for the first time this summer.

 

Open to Nature, for Good or Ill

The garden was peaceful, with birds chirping and a red-tailed hawk landing on a tree branch on the perimeter of the garden last Saturday, when woburnpatch interviewed Benenate.

There are some issues, though, in the local Eden. Some people want to fence in the entire garden to protect it from four and two-footed uninvited visitors. That can’t happen, Benenate said, since the garden is on conservation land, and must allow animals to move freely. Some gardeners fence their plots or even cover various crops with netting, he pointed out.

Outside the community garden, Benenate is active in “anything with open space” in the city. He declined to show Woburn Patch his garden at the community garden off Lexington Street because, he said, he’s been busy elsewhere.

 

Developing More Open Space in Woburn

He is one of the original three—now five—members of the city’s relatively new Agricultural Commission, which oversees the use of the city’s property. They’re planning their first Oktoberfest there for Saturday, Oct. 1, in the afternoon. They’re planning to have a popular Bavarian band and serve German food.

He’s also working to try to pull together a series of “homecoming” events starting in October, 2012, “to bring people back” to the city. They would include traditions like the city’s Halloween parade, he said, and the new Oktoberfest.

Since spring, he’s been helping a group of residents who are fighting development off Wyman Street and Colonial Road. Area residents have flooding issues now, he said.

“I do not want to stop development,” he said firmly. “I want it done right so it does not worsen the (flooding) problem” there.

He’s interested in the city acquiring a farm on Lexington Street, west of Cambridge Street, the “last big parcel left” of undeveloped land in the city, so parcels of city open space can connect.

 

A Life of Service

Weekdays, Benenate worked for BAE Systems as a government contractor. He retired from the Army around 2000, where he said he served on active and reserve duty for a total of 27 years.

He holds an associate’s degree in biology, among others, and a bachelor’s degree in photography and photo science. When you major in biology, you study botany, too, he said, and learn about plants. His wife, Kathleen (Leland), holds a bachelor’s degree in biology, he pointed out.

Yes, Benenate does garden at home. He plants flowers there. His wife is the flower expert, he said. “She tells me where to go,” he said, pausing after the double entendre, "and what to do” in that garden.

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