Hays County Food Bank And Bobcat Blend Growing For Good

Hays County Food Bank is no stranger to fresh produce, receiving boxes of it daily from local grocery stores and through partnerships with local gardeners and farmers.

In recent years, through donations from the community, the food bank began its own on-site garden. It started as an herb garden with aspirations to grow into something more.

This fall, the food bank has partnered with Bobcat Blend to help grow its small garden.

Bobcat Blend is a faculty managed, student-run, and grant-supported research and teaching-oriented waste management campus composting program at Texas State University.

The goals of the organization are to teach students, faculty, and staff through daily operations and development of habits the environmental, economic, and intrinsic values of composting, in the cafeterias and in the classrooms, labs, and landscapes on campus.

If residents would like to get involved with this organization, please contact Dr.Tina Cade at tc10@txstate.edu.

Bobcat Blend is graciously donating soil and compost for the food bank’s new planter box. Recently, Bobcat Blend was burglarized and an important piece of equipment was stolen.

This stolen Bobcat was vital to their work, but they have persevered. Sunbelt, a large equipment and tool rental facility, has come to their rescue with a discounted Bobcat rental for them to use.

Thanks to both Bobcat Blend and Sunbelt, the food bank will be loaded up with nutrient-rich compost that will be used to grow healthy and nutritious foods to be given to households in need at various public food distributions.

The food bank is grateful for new partnerships like these that can provide sustainable ways to continue to provide food assistance to those in need in this community.

If community members would like to donate seeds, plants, or equipment to the food bank garden, please contact Jessica Cruz at jcruz@haysfoodbank.org or call (512) 392-8300.