SEQUIM — Each Friday during the spring and early summer, Deborah Apple of Blyn supplies several starter plants to the Sequim Food Bank to be distributed to clients.
“Give people food from the food bank, they’ll eat for a week,” she said.
“Give them plants to grow their own food, and they’ll eat forever — if they save the seeds.”
Apple has been providing the starter plants — such as celery, peas, strawberries, raspberries, various herbs, onions, kale, tomatoes and zucchini — to the food bank for distribution for the past three years.
“My garden supplies starter plants each year,” Apple said. “I can’t stand to kill a plant, so I started putting them in pots and bringing them to the food bank.”
She has received a large supply of pots free of charge from Karen Nelson, owner of Blueberry Hill in Carlsborg, but those pots are running out quickly.
To continue providing starter plants each week, Apple is in need of donations of planting pots, she said.
She needs 1-gallon pots and 3½-inch herb containers.
The public can drop off pots any time at the Sequim Food Bank, 144 W. Alder St.
For more information, phone the food bank at 360-683-1205.
Apple brings at least a dozen starter plants to the food bank each week, sometimes many more.
“It just depends on the time of the season and what I have,” she said.
In “my garden, I let things go to seed, so every year, I have so many starter plants.”
The starter plants are very popular and are eagerly snatched up by food bank patrons each Friday morning, said Mark Ozias, Sequim Food Bank executive director.
The plants “go out very quickly, and that just speaks to how much people want them,” he said.
“We’ve learned that a significant portion of people who come to the food bank like to grow their own produce and want to do that.”
The food bank continues “working really hard to provide more fresh and healthy food, and encouraging people to grow their own is the best way to do that,” Ozias said.
“I think it is fantastic. Having encouragement and resources and beautiful fresh plant starts is awesome.”
Matt Rubens and Bethani Hohmann of Sequim, regular patrons of the food bank, grab some of the latest starter plants when they come to receive food.
“We got some mint and some oregano last time here,” Rubens said as he perused this week’s offerings of celery, chives and garlic.
Hohmann said the availability of the starter plants encouraged her to begin her own garden at home.
“This is inspiring. I like the starter garden. You can grow your own. It just takes time,” she said.
Apple is pleased so many people are trying out gardening for the first time because of her plants.
“It gives people a sense of pride to grow their own food, and one doesn’t waste as much food when they grow it themselves,” she said.
And while the vegetables are nutritious, the herbs are also important because they are “used to make everything taste better, from eggs to soups, sauces, meats and fish,” Apple said.
“Also, herbs are medicinal. Mint for digesting, lemon balm for colds, and fennel can be used instead of sugar.”
Apple hopes more area gardeners will consider donating starter plants to the Sequim Food Bank and other food distribution sites across the country.
“I want this not just to be done here, but all over the Olympic Peninsula, the state and the country,” she said.
Starter plants are an excellent supplement to the other food products offered at the food bank, Ozias said.
“It all makes a difference,” he said.
“This time of year, as we are getting into the fresh vegetable season, we like to encourage home gardeners and other people who grow vegetables to think of us if they have excess. We are always happy to have fresh vegetables.”
In 2014, about 2,149 families received items at the food bank at least once, Ozias noted, adding that the families can come to receive food twice in a one-month period.
“In a typical month, we see between 600 and 650 different families.”
The busiest season is the autumn months.
Because of the high demand from those who may not know where their next meal is coming from, the food bank is also in need of nonperishable food items.
“We are always looking for food, particularly canned and packaged proteins: chicken, peanut butter, tuna, etc.,” Ozias said.
Financial contributions are also in great demand.
“They are important, too, because we purchase — whenever we are able to — milk and eggs and other things that are difficult to get by donation because they are perishable,” he said.
For more information about the Sequim Food Bank, visit www.sequimfoodbank.org.
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Sequim-Dungeness Valley Editor Chris McDaniel can be reached at 360-681-2390, ext. 5052, or cmcdaniel@peninsuladailynews.com.
