Still blooming: Master Gardener gives back to the community

This story first appeared in Prestige - May 2025, a biannual special section distributed in The Gazette dedicated to Iowans 55+.

When she retired from a long career in education and human services in 2012, Beula Dvorak, 77, knew she needed to stay active.

“I’m not one to sit at home,” Dvorak said. “I heard about Master Gardeners, and I thought ‘that’s something I could enjoy doing!’” Having grown up on a farm, where the vegetable garden was large and bountiful, Dvorak had continued to garden throughout her life. Joining the Master Gardener program was a natural next step.

Linn County’s Master Gardener program, the second largest in the state, offers a hybrid online and in-person training program for anyone who has a passion for gardening and volunteering. Ten-week training sessions are offered every fall. They include science-based education in horticulture, supported by Iowa State University’s Extension office.

According to Hailee Sandberg, ISU Extension and Outreach regional director for Linn County, the Master Gardener program has traditionally been very popular with retired people like Dvorak.

“We have Master Gardeners in their 80s and 90s who are still going strong,” she said. “But we’re also getting an influx of younger people these days. We do have a diversity of ages.”

Although many people in the Master Gardener program already have gardening experience like Dvorak did, it’s not required.

“You can be totally new to gardening, and you will learn,” Sandberg said. “You will also get hundreds of mentors to help you learn.”

Since completing the Master Gardener training, Dvorak has volunteered hundreds of hours educating the public about gardening and working in public garden spaces.

As the chair of the Master Gardener committee that runs the Linn County Community Gardens committee, Dvorak oversees the care of about 20 community gardens located throughout Linn County.

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Many local organizations have reached out to the Linn County Extension Office to offer space on their property for community gardens, including the Catherine McAuley Center, Five Seasons Senior Housing, Hilltop Manor, The Heights Apartments, FaithLife Church and the Southeast Linn Community Center. Each organization that hosts a garden also provides volunteers to help work in the gardens under the supervision of Master Gardeners.

On a visit to one particular garden site — once run by the Olivet Mission and now owned by HACAP — Dvorak points out the new raised beds lined up across the large city lot. Raised beds, which will be filled with compost and peat, make it easy to care for the plants (less bending down). They also help keep weeds at bay.

“These garden beds will be ‘rented’ free to people in the neighborhood,” Dvorak said. “Master Gardeners will be there on set days to provide support and information.” As with all the community garden sites, volunteers and Master Gardeners will fill any remaining raised beds with vegetable plants, which will provide produce for local food banks.

Thanks to volunteers and Master Gardeners like Dvorak, community gardens all over Linn County will soon be booming with fresh produce.

“Last year, the Community Gardens program harvested 11,000 pounds of produce,” Dvorak said. “The goal this year is to harvest 15,000 pounds.”

Dvorak and the other Master Gardeners are very aware of the problem of food insecurity in the area. One in eight people in Linn County are food insecure. Food pantries can fill gaps, but it’s rare for them to get fresh fruits and vegetables.

“In food pantries, fresh fruits and vegetables usually are only available in small quantities,” Dvorak said. “They are a coveted item.”

“People are excited to get produce,” added Nicole McAlexander, executive director of the Southeast Linn County Community Center. “There are times when we get an abundance of cukes, zukes, squash, peppers (and) beans from community gardens. People are just thrilled to get it.”

The Community Gardens program doesn’t just deliver produce, though.

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“Our program really goes from garden to table,” Dvorak said. “People who grow produce in our garden or get it at the food bank may not know how to use it.” So the Master Gardeners provide education about storage and cooking, such as “make your own salsa day.”

Dvorak herself runs programs for children at the Southeast Linn Community Center, teaching them about gardening, like identifying “good and bad bugs,” and she gives children at the Springville Library a chance to do taste tests of different vegetables.

While tomatoes, potatoes and green beans are always popular, sometimes Master Gardeners might need to encourage the use of less well-known vegetables. Dvorak relates a story about dealing with a bumper crop of kale one year. She cooked and brought in kale soup, kale salad and kale chips. Neighbors at the food pantry were impressed and decided to try the unfamiliar vegetable.

Besides providing much-needed, delicious fresh vegetables, community gardens also offer other benefits to neighbors, volunteers and Master Gardeners.

“Gardening has health benefits,” said Dvorak, who’s done research and given talks on the physical and emotional benefits of gardening. “Just getting outdoors and digging in the dirt is good for you. It can be as good for your body as going to the gym.”

Gardening also offers opportunities to socialize, especially at the community gardens, where people come to work on a project together. Then there’s the sense of accomplishment and self-sufficiency that comes from growing your own food. McAlexander has seen that at the Southeast Linn Community Center’s food pantry.

“Some of the food pantry neighbors have been able to bring in produce that they’ve grown,” McAlexander says. “People who grew up here and learned to garden from grandparents are able to garden in our community gardens. They’re so proud to be able to give back.”

Dvorak encourages all gardeners to share extra produce, just as the Community Gardens do.

“We invite individual home gardeners to join us,” she says. Through the Share a Row program offered by Linn County Extension, home gardeners can plant an extra row or even just an extra plant, share the produce with a local food pantry, and know that they are helping to fight food insecurity.