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Mama Jen
In December 2023 I had the good fortune to rent a gloriously ramshackle old home in Kilkenny, only 7.5km from Adelaide CBD. The home was built in 1900 and the back yard – which used to be part of a dairy farm – is much bigger than the average suburban garden, more than 570 square metres.
I decided immediately to turn it into a community garden. It seems outrageous that one person could have access to all this land and the potential to grow so much food, when so many people living near me ared oing it tough.
The soil is rich, because the tenant before me dug up the whole back lawn and brought in 14+ truckloads of organic mushroom compost.
I’ve got the support of the local Councillor (and my landlord) to turn it into an organic community garden, with space for community talks and activities. Even though it’s on private land, the garden can be a designated community garden.
There is a growing group of community helpers and there’s been a constant stream of donations from people in the neighbourhood – including a big greenhouse, a rainwater tank and an irrigation system.
Couchsurfers often stay and help a little, but I’m keen to find someone who not only helps complete projects (like the chook shed/ yard, which is SO close!) but has ideas and knowledge, and has time to help think things through. I have two comfortable spare bedrooms. I rent one room out but the other one is available and I am a good cook.
This is different from a lot of other Woofer projects, because we’re not on a farm or even in the Adelaide foothills. Instead, you can work to help establish a valuable community garden, and still be close to the city, bike trails, train and bus station. Best of both worlds.

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Why I became a WWOOF Host

I’ve always enjoyed creating Communities and I believe that I’m good at it. I worked in many developing countries, looking for ways to improve communications and relationships between different groups of people. Then, more recently ,I’ve had almost a decade of hosting families for their first month of a new life in Australia.
Now I’m in a position to create a community garden – the perfect gathering point for the community who lives around me – and in this council, they come from more than 125 countries!
For many reasons, this is not a task for one person. I’ve always thought that the best way to make a project successful is to include as many different kinds of people in it, to ask for their help and support and to make sure that they enjoy the benefits of the situation. I’m not sure there’s anywhere that that’s more true than in a community garden. WWoof seems the perfect way to bring what I’m doing into a bigger vision.
I do hope that some of you who read this will come to visit, or to help with the development of this littl community project.

Organic/Biological methods we use

I’m winging it. Companion planting wherever possible. Nothing except organic has been added to this land for the past five years, and an old couple had a lawn and not much else before that. The previous tenant scraped off and replaced the top layer of soil with organic earth – massive undertaking – and then added loads of mushroom compost. I have a lot of energy but nowhere near the strength I need for this project. But I am very good at getting people involved, asking for tools and equipment, and finding grants.
I won’t buy anything if I can get it donated – we’ve got 40 or so square meters of paving, for example, from a guy who takes up old pavers for people. He sells the best and used to have to pay $150 to leave the rest at the dump. Now he gives them to us, so I’ve found a landscaper who’ll put them down properly for us as his donation to the garden. All sorts of random, interesting objects get donated, or we find them somewhere, and they make their way into the picture. The garden reflects this quite quirky, random and I guess in a sense, organic way of making things happen.
We have more than 15 fruit trees on the property, of which at least 10 were “rescues” from other gardens. Three of those – apricot, nectarine and a peach grafted with an early fruiting white peach and late harvest golden flesh too. We’ve made a lot of mistakes and I am constantly overestimating what I can do and how much help I can make appear. BUT, we’ve come a long way in 2 years. I’m still impatient as hell, but I believe we’ll make this happen. Come and see where you could make your mark!

Skills WWOOFers can learn here

Composting Mulching Worm farming Poultry care Fermenting foods Preserving & processing food Bread making Propagating Gardening

Farm type

Suburbia

Farming methods

Organic

Courses & Events

None at this stage.

The Stay

1 WWOOFer
1-2 weeks 2-4 weeks Longer stays by negotiation
In Our Home BYO Accommodation
Non-Smoking No Smoking Inside Pets allowed by arrangement No Children

The Stay

Eat together Share most meals Share cooking
Mixed meals some meat some vegetarian Fish based meals Meat based meals Vegetarian meals
English, Indonesian, French, Spanish, Solomon Island pigin, learning Maori