This summer, in the little village of Tyonek, something big happened in the community garden: About 60 pounds of watermelons were raised from seed in two high-tunnel greenhouses.
What's even more impressive is that the village has gone from very little gardening experience to growing watermelon, which is rare in Alaska, in only four seasons.
Nicole Swenson, conservation director of the Tyonek Tribal Conservation District, said the garden is a little different from a traditional community garden -- instead of everyone being assigned their own plot to maintain, everyone works together to care for the plants. There's lot of community involvement, especially with young people, who are engaged in every level of the gardening process, from growing seeds to harvesting produce.
Swenson said gardens in Tyonek, a small village of 200 on the west shore of Cook Inlet, used to be common. That knowledge didn't get passed on to younger generations. By 2012, when the community garden was started, there were hardly any gardens left. She said residents asked the conservation district for the garden as a way to improve overall health and food security. The village isn't connected to the road system, so most residents fly in their groceries.
The garden's tunnels have been more than productive since they were built, growing everything from zucchini and tomatoes to pumpkins and corn. This year, they produced over 1,800 pounds of produce, according to Tyonek garden volunteer and longtime resident Gwen Chickalusion.
Swenson got some watermelon seeds from Fairbanks gardener Kurt Wold, who has experimented with growing watermelon for the last 10 years. Reached by phone Tuesday, Wold was astounded by the amount the village was able to grow.
"That's incredible," he said of the 60 pounds Tyonek harvested.
Wold said he grew about half of that this year using seeds he cultivated himself. He said in some years watermelon does well in the high tunnels, especially if it's warm. Cool years can be a total bust.
University of Alaska Fairbanks horticulture professor Meriam Karlsson said watermelon is a challenging crop to grow in Alaska. It requires a warm, long growing season -- two things Alaska summers rarely have.
"It's one of those crops that gardeners like to try," she said, "and sometimes they're successful and sometimes they're not."
Chickalusion initially wasn't sure if the watermelon would make it. Having only started gardening in 2012, she wasn't sure where to begin with the plants. So she did what most people would do: she Googled it.
She said the watermelons were cute at first -- only the size of a nickel. She wasn't sure if they would grow beyond that.
But they did, each one weighing in at about 5 pounds when they were harvested. And they were delicious.
"They were sweet and juicy, just like the personal melons you get at the store," she said.
She's taken what she's learned in the community garden and is trying it on her own. She's built her own high tunnel and is harvesting her own produce.
Chickalusion said it costs about a dollar a pound to ship over groceries -- and those fruits and vegetables often don't make the trip very well.
"It's a lot better," she said of the produce from the garden.
It's even had an effect on her family. She said her son Tommy Allowan, 7, loves eating food from the garden. Recently, she went to make a pumpkin cake and cookies from canned pumpkin and she said her son scoffed at the idea. If it didn't come from the dirt, how could it actually be a pumpkin, he wondered.
"That makes sense," she said. "A pumpkin isn't supposed to come out of a can."