A trip to AT&T Park in San Francisco for a Giants baseball game, gave me a chance to see the vegetable garden they have. The garden with the co-operation of the Giants and Bon Appétit is to be a teaching garden.

The over 4000 square foot garden is located behind the centerfield wall. All the beds are raised, which makes it easy to tend and pick the produce; this also prevents people from walking on and mashing down the plants. In the center of each bed they have planted small trees, lime, lemon, avocado, and cumquat. Around these trees they have a variety of vegetables growing. One bed is planted with tomatoes and basil, another is planted with artichokes and many varieties of lettuce. Two beds other beds are filled with almost every herb including borage that grows, and they must like lemon grass, because they are growing a lot of it. Throughout the beds they have planted violas, marigolds, and pansies.

There are three vertical tall towers that resemble tall strawberry pots, in which they have kale, strawberries, lettuce. On further investigation, I learned these towers are Aeroponic towers. Each tower can hold up to 44 plants.

Another bed has peppers, squash, blueberry bushes; the vegetable will be harvested year round to be used in the community and by some of the vendors at the park.

The garden is open to all who attend the games. There is a fire pit to sit around, a bar that serves drinks and snacks. In a few weeks, they will open a restaurant called “The Garden Table” which will feature produce grown in the garden. This garden has two purposes; one that some of the food venders at the park will have use of the produce, the main purpose is to be an outdoor teaching garden for youth groups in the bay area. Their goal is to teach the youth about healthy eating, sustainability and gardening in cities along with nutrition. Another benefit is that instead of throwing away the coffee grounds from the coffee that it sold at the park, they will use it to fertilize the beds.

They have a sod field growing in the garden area; this sod is used in the playing field if necessary. You can picnic on the sod and children can play on it.

The center field wall is too high to see the game, so they have big screen TV's for that. It is a wonderful garden to visit and to see what they have done with space, to watch a baseball game and have fresh greens for your snack is a good day-especially if your team wins.