By Joe Laur
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For over 15 years, Buster English has been transforming the little plots around his Brooklyn public housing project into a community garden.

In a stunning feature in the New York Times “One in 8 Million” series, you get to hear Buster’s voice as he explains how he started gardening as a child in South Carolina, and then took it up in the Walt Whitman public housing projects when he moved to New York. The garden helps him put fresh produce on the table for himself and 3 teenagers. He calls his little plot of land The Cabbage Patch, has own several awards for his efforts and shares his produce with his neighbors in his Fort Greene neighborhood.

He gives the vegetables away for free. Collards, mustard, green peppers, peas , cabbage, tomatoes thrive under his care. He uses no fertilizers or pesticides, grows this amazing crop with just “dirt and rain”. The garden is educational too. One child, raised in the city, asked him if eggplants were where he got eggs from.

Imagine how little sun this gets with the buildings around it - yet a garden grows in Brooklyn! Talk about waste to resources - you really can grow food anywhere.