SEATTLE - It's an unusual program, flourishing because of unusual weather.
Jo Moore sees it in the soil of the Maple Leaf P-Patch.
"We've been harvesting stuff since May," she said. "It's just growing like crazy."
The peas and beans have been sprouting like no other season.
"Once or twice a week, we come over and harvest," said Moore, who lives at the nearby Al Joya retirement community.
Moore's group has been focused on a small plot within the P-Patch nicknamed a "Giving Garden." It's one of 39 dedicated plots around the city. Seattle pays for the soil, water, and seeds. Volunteers do the rest. The goal is to grow crops that can be donated to local food banks.
And this year it's been a bumper crop.
"We have chard, and kale, lettuce, beans, peas," she said. "The soil has been so warm, it's grown much faster."
"It's been a great summer," said Kenya Fredie, who manages the program. "It's been pretty awesome, I'm not going to lie."
Kelly Brown, the Executive Director of the North Helpline Food Bank, agrees. After all, her organization received nearly 10 pounds of produce from the Maple Leaf P-Patch on Tuesday.
"(We've) had a lot of lettuce. We were coming up with creative recipes to hand out to clients to take lettuce. We had a lettuce soup recipe!" she said with a laugh.
Brown says the P-Patch program helped collect 4,876 pounds of produce in 2014. This year, it's ahead of pace, with 4,253 pounds collected thus far.
Fredie says, city-wide, roughly 41,300 pounds of produce was grown and given to food banks in 2014. The program is on pace to exceed that number this year.
