Philbrook Garden Helps Tulsa Food Bank

By Rick Wells, The News On 6

TULSA, OK -- The Philbrook Museum of Art and the Community Food Bank of Eastern Oklahoma is teaming up to feed the hungry.

Melinda McMillan is the garden manager at the Philbrook Museum of Art.

About six weeks ago, the Philbrook announced it was partnering with the food bank.

The Philbrook had some vacant garden space and decided to use it to help the food bank. They'll plant vegetables; food bank volunteers will harvest it and provide fresh produce to client agencies.

"We'll start harvesting our first green beans this week," said Melinda McMillan, Philbrook Garden Manager.

Marigolds being planted will ward off some harmful insects and will protect the tomatoes.

McMillan says there is a delicate balance between giving the plants too much and too little water.

"The balance is, the best time of day to water is always in the morning," said McMillan.

The garden will produce tomatoes, corn squash, okra, melons, beans and more.

"We have a ton of room, and there's no limit to what we can grow because the garden's in full sun, we have irrigation, we have great gardeners," said McMillan.

They created some trellis-like arches from cattle panels and fence posts to give the cucumbers something to cling to.

All the tomato plants need cages. They figure they'll need 73 and since they don't normally plant tomatoes, they don't have any.

If you want to help, you can drop off tomato cages at the Philbrook Museum front desk.