Three Sisters Garden by UCSB American Indian & Indigenous Gardens Alliance
HISTORY:
Beginning in 2016, the first garden project of AIIGA is our garden space at West Campus Family Student Housing on Storke Road. This our indigenous foods garden. This project was born through the ideas of our co-founders Jessica Foster and Margaret McMurtrey who felt it was important to create a space for natives to grow food and medicinal plants that are important to indigenous cultures and ancestries. Being on Chumash lands, it is important for us to honor that and see these gardens as a means to doing so and an opportunity for inter-tribal and inter-community engagement and sharing.
Beginning in 2016, the first garden project of AIIGA is our garden space at West Campus Family Student Housing on Storke Road. This our indigenous foods garden. This project was born through the ideas of our co-founders Jessica Foster and Margaret McMurtrey who felt it was important to create a space for natives to grow food and medicinal plants that are important to indigenous cultures and ancestries. Being on Chumash lands, it is important for us to honor that and see these gardens as a means to doing so and an opportunity for inter-tribal and inter-community engagement and sharing.
SPACE:
The garden at Family Student Housing is divided into two main sections. The primary garden area is a 25’x25’ garden space that we plan to make into what we call “the four directions garden”–to honor the four sacred directions and our diversity inter-tribal community by designing the garden beds to have on bed per cardinal point arranged around a central bed dedicated to the Chumash. In these beds we will grow indigenous foods that are cultivated from that region. In this section of the garden, there are also two arbors–one is at the entrance gate which is a grape arbor and the other is a squash arbor in the south corner of the garden. Additionally, we also plan to use the Northwest corner of this garden to grow medicinal herbs and plants. In the other section of the garden (which is about 19’x25’) we plan to have a “3 sisters’ garden” where we will grow the traditional, native companion planting of corn, beans growing up the corn stalks, and squash growing as ground cover.These gardens will have signage around the outside explaining who we are, what we are doing, and also reminding the community that a Native American community on campus does exist and the knowledge we have that’s been passed down inter-generationally matters.
The garden at Family Student Housing is divided into two main sections. The primary garden area is a 25’x25’ garden space that we plan to make into what we call “the four directions garden”–to honor the four sacred directions and our diversity inter-tribal community by designing the garden beds to have on bed per cardinal point arranged around a central bed dedicated to the Chumash. In these beds we will grow indigenous foods that are cultivated from that region. In this section of the garden, there are also two arbors–one is at the entrance gate which is a grape arbor and the other is a squash arbor in the south corner of the garden. Additionally, we also plan to use the Northwest corner of this garden to grow medicinal herbs and plants. In the other section of the garden (which is about 19’x25’) we plan to have a “3 sisters’ garden” where we will grow the traditional, native companion planting of corn, beans growing up the corn stalks, and squash growing as ground cover.These gardens will have signage around the outside explaining who we are, what we are doing, and also reminding the community that a Native American community on campus does exist and the knowledge we have that’s been passed down inter-generationally matters.