Ed. note: This article supplements a larger feature on community gardening in the Spring 2025 issue of Northern Gardener.

Starting a Community Garden is no simple task. There are so many things to manage, whether it’s finding land, coordinating schedules with your neighbors, finding supplies, organizing planting days—and then you have the many tasks that come with maintaining and harvesting for the rest of the season. Fortunately, there are a lot of helpful resources online from people who have gone through the steps of establishing and preserving their own community gardens.

To help make this challenging (and rewarding) process a bit easier, we pulled together some of our favorite resources for your community gardening project. Materials include everything from basic gardening information to where you might distribute the abundance of produce you are about to grow as a community!

Inspiring Stories and Why you Should Start a Community Garden

Community gardens are such important spaces in our world to establish connections, healthy living habits, and access to low-cost healthy food that one can grow themselves. Read a few of the stories below to get a sense of the impact community gardens can make, along with how many already exist around you.

The Growing Power of Placemaking

Creating a Community Garden at Face 2 Face Academy

Ornamental Plants in Community Gardens

Planting a Community Garden in Midway

Inspiring Story: Project Sweetie Pie

Inspiring Story: Vera’s Garden

Map of Community Gardens in MN

Land, Capital, and Low-Cost Gardening Materials

Finding people who want to garden with you is just the first step in starting a community garden. From there, you’ll find there are many moving pieces before you may continue. Here are some resources to help you navigate finding land, money, and low-cost materials.

Connecting Land Owners with Gardeners

Low-Cost Tool Borrowing

Low-Cost Plant Materials

Where to Find Compost for Community Gardeners

Public Garden Funding Resources

Minnesota Department of Agriculture Funding Opportunities

How to Start a Community Garden

As you start to garden together as a group, you may find these tips and tricks helpful for alleviating any stress that might come up throughout the process.

7 Effective Steps to Start a Community Garden

Twin Cities Community Garden Guide

Creating Community Gardens

Resources for successful gardening techniques

If you want to start community gardening, but may not be an experienced gardener yet, this collection of articles and resources will help you gain a foundation of skills and knowledge to share with your community.

Managing Healthy Soil

Companion Planting

Online Garden Designer

Vegetables 101

Freeze and Frost Dates

How to Grow Safe Food

Growing for Nutrition Guide

Northern Gardener Spring Planning Issue

Where to go with further questions

When the gardening season hits, we know you will have more questions to explore (we always do!). Keep these resources bookmarked to see how you can uncover more knowledge to take into the garden with you!

Who Can Answer my Gardening Questions?

Explore our Resource Hub

Watch some Webinars and DIY Videos

Photo credit: Michelle Bruhn.