Daughter puts her plant training to good use

Julie Schwartz didn't have much interest in working her family's vegetable garden.

Just ask her mother.

"Can we ever get her to help in the garden? Nooooo," Susan Schwartz teases.

It's a running joke in the Palatine family because Julie - who's now 23 - studied horticulture, worked at the renowned Chicago Botanic Garden in Glencoe and is now an intern at the prestigious Longwood Gardens in Pennsylvania.

What she did do to help her mother, though, was just as important as weeding: deliver the surplus tomatoes, cucumbers and other prolific veggies to the Plant a Row for the Hungry drop-off site at Knupper Nursery & Landscape in Palatine.

And that's by no means a small accomplishment. There's barely a vacant square inch in the Schwartz's Palatine backyard plot.

"Twenty-four tomato plants for a household of four," Schwartz says, nonchalantly. "Ya never know when you might lose one ..."

She also plants cucumbers, four different kinds of peppers, two varieties of eggplant, squash, herbs. Oh, and pole beans, too.

With all those plants, it's a sure bet there are plenty left over, which is why Susan Schwartz started donating to Plant a Row three years ago.

"What a great way to get rid of all this stuff," she says.

Given Julie Schwartz's family history, then, it should come as no surprise she chose to follow in her mother's footsteps by packing as many plants as possible into her own first vegetable garden.

Longwood makes land available for its employees, and Julie took them up on their offer by planting squash, cucumbers, carrots, tomatoes, eggplant, peppers and onions - all in one 10-by-15-foot plot.

"I learned that from limited space in a suburban back yard and from my internship in community gardening with the Chicago Botanic Garden. You can plant a lot in a small space," Julie said.

Her first effort is also easy on the eye.

"Her garden is very artistically arranged," Susan Schwartz said.

And just like at home, Julie makes good use of all her garden extras by taking them to the food bank truck that stops at Longwood weekly to pick up donations from its gardens.

Plant a Row for the Hungry, the program sponsored nationally by the Garden Writers Association, has been a big part of Julie's life at home, and now continues to be important as she starts her horticultural career.