Learn more about gardening in St. Louis by listening to Episode 3 of St. Louis Magazine‘s home/design podcast, House of Lou, where local gardening experts share their insights about native gardens and landscapes.
Kimberley Wirch is a service industry veteran, who currently works as a server/bartender at the Missouri Athletic Club. At her Affton home, she’s also elevated her interest in gardening, including raised beds and in-ground gardens in her front yard and chickens out back. She recently shared about her planting passion.
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How did you get started gardening? I’ve always had gardens. Both sides of my family were farmers—I guess it’s in my blood! This year has been sort of an experiment for me. I’ve had chickens for a while, and I’ve had gardens. However, I decided to get numerous types of chickens to see which were the friendliest and which were the best egg-layers. I got a bigger chicken coop, and I had all of this scrap wood left over, so I decided to make a raised garden bed. I thought, This is fabulous, so I built another and thought, This is event better! I ended up making six of them early last spring instead of doing in-ground gardening. It’s an experiment to see what likes the beds and what likes being in the ground. It was a really fun year!
What types of produce do you like to grow? I do tomatoes every year. I start them from seeds that I save, or I will go to a farmer’s stand and get starts. I always do some sort of squash, like a zucchini or some sort of pumpkin. I do basil every year with the tomatoes. I do ginger and garlic in the ground, as well as carrots and onions. I do a lot of climbing things—I really like peas. I’m experimenting with different flowers this year, too. I also do corn and sunflowers—we’re doing a corn and sunflower ‘fence’ this year.
Do you grow mostly for yourself now, or do you plan to sell your crops? Right now, I mostly grow for myself. Instead of ‘farm-to-table’ I do ‘yard-to-table.’ I don’t have huge commercial ambitions. I also take all of the seeds I save and make little packets and give them to my friends as gifts.
You’ve recently bought some land and are expanding your gardening efforts, right? I looked for a property for several years. When I was 8 years old, I decided I wanted to have a property in the middle of nowhere. So 40-odd years later, I got it. It’s the last property before a forest, and it has a huge natural spring that was part of a mineral springs resort that was active 100 years ago. I’m going to retire there.
So what you’re doing now is sort of a dry run for ‘retirement’? Yes, what I want to do is support myself off what I grow [on the property] and sell at the market. At some point, I’d like to be down there making money off of everything I’m growing and supporting me and my animals.
Any tips for aspiring gardeners? I found out that Dollar Tree sells seeds for 25 cents per packet, and they’re wonderful—they do better than a lot of my other seeds. They did so well [last year], I was able to harvest seeds from the zinnias that I grew. They were huge, like 3- to 3.5-feet tall! You never get zinnias that big. I think it’s important to let something go to seed and pick a couple of plants to sacrifice for their seeds. I also talk to farmers at farmers’ markets to see what’s producing. I would say the best resource you have is yourself, trial and error.
