Hellbent, glad you asked. I just came from my patch at our community garden, bringing as many of my plants with me as I dared since I didn't have an adequate means to do so. The reason I did so follows.

I was usng my patch as a means of storing perennials such as hippeastra until they were big enough to bloom. But I now know that a community garden is not a place you can keep anything. To some people such as unreconstructed socialists, street people, and non-gardeners who just need to meddle, a community garden belongs to the community and since they are part of the community, your garden belongs to THEM! The concept of sweat equity means nothing to them because they never do anything that would make them sweat. Three (3) times I had had strangers, including city bureaucrats with prison convicts, come onto my garden to destroy some of what I planted so they could plant what they decided they wanted to plant. And almost everything they decided to plant DIED. It reminds of the 1930s with old Joe Stalin telling millions of peasants what to plant and how to plant it and causing millions to starve to death.

I was full of plans of how I was going to contribute to the community garden and I put in many hours digging out weeds that should have been poisoned because of their noxious nature. But that meant nothing to these characters. I have come to believe that the community garden concept is fatally flawed because it does not belong to the gardeners who put in so much of their effort, it belongs to those who choose to take charge of it. Look at the posts under "Nightmare experiences ..."

Charles

"I was using my patch as a means of storing perennials such as hippeastra until they were big enough to bloom. But I now know that a community garden is not a place you can keep anything."

First, Plots get moved around, people get moved around, it's a rental situation, it's not a perminent land purchase. Some places allow perennials some places don't because it is not a perminent thing.

Second, Some of the better managed gardens have a list of prohibited plants that may be invasive or dangerous, ie poisonous. Did your garden have a no perennial rule? Could they have seen your plants as being poisonous? "...the Belladonna is a Cape plant; probably a Hippeastra, which Martius tells us have poisonous bulbs"-John Lindley, Vegetable Kingdom, 1853. Also in "Poisonous Plants of North Carolina," Dr. Alice B. Russell, Department of Horticultural Science

I would not see a community garden as a place to STORE things longterm, the majority of places I have seen support the activity of active gardening, food production, beautification and safe enjoyment in a community setting. I do believe that most gardens would not just evict a gardener and reassign their plot in the middle of a season "rental/lease" just for the heck of it.

mines 12 inches

The only rule against poison I was told was that no chemicals were to be used. The "leaders" are utterly clueless about plants so they would not recognize a poisonous plant if they saw it. Adjoining my plot were agapanthus and I have no idea if they are poison or not but the adjoining area also included lantana and I know that is allelopathic. The entire lot had been taken over by noxious weeds that spread underground plus a grass that produced an extremely nasty burr. I selected a plot that had been abandoned for many years and I picked out all plant parts by hand. Before planting my plants, I hauled in my own home made compost made from tree leaves. I was never told my area was to be moved, in fact I was told nothing. The bureaucrats brought in a crew of state prison convicts to do their bidding who cleaned up the lot because only 2 other people were still gardening there. All other members of the public had abandoned the place. So the bureaucrats had plenty of room to play but they chose my garden, burying some of my tiny plants. I was told by somebody else they would not go back there because their new herb garden had been mowed with a lawn mower, so I am not the only one disenchanted with the concept.

Boy, sounds like the "leaders" have no business trying to manage that garden. It's groups like this that really hurt the reputation of all community gardens. Why is it that so many individuals get the brilliant idea to use "criminal laborers" for community gardens? That is just stupid and "cheap" minded. If done correctly they wouldn't need forced laborers to maintain things, the gardeners would be happy to do it themselves.

It's a shame anyone has to deal with such mis-management conditions. If there are no rules disclosed to you then maybe you could put some kind of boarder or fencing around your area with "private property-do not touch" or "these are not weeds" signs. Or maybe you could advertise for others to form a group and petition the "leaders" to take over the management of the garden and run it correctly.

I am lucky enough to be in a position of influence within the municipality here. The first thing I was asked regarding maintenance was the idea of using the court ordered laborers. I didn't even let them finish the sentence. Absolutely not! I asked who would like to have these people roaming around in your homes with you or in your house while you are at work? No one thought that was a good idea. Imagine that.

For any one interested in some management information go to this post:

Here is a link that might be useful: http://forums.gardenweb.com/forums/load/commgard/msg0512352924361.html

Many years ago I had a plot in a community garden for a few years. While my plot was changed each year, the long-time gardeners got to keep their same plots each year, as they had improved the soil over the years and usually had the best water spots. These people often had perennials and fruit trees/shrubs growing. The problems that I ran into were mostly theft and vandalism. There was also a large deer problem, as the community gardens were located at the edge of a park. Minor issues were being a long way from the water source and having parked cars blocking the access road.

I just joined my local community garden this year, and compared to some of the stories I've seen here, things have gone very smoothly.
The garden is new this year, so the only real drawbacks had to do with getting the actual plots constructed (they're raised beds). and one weird occurrence when a random "mystery gardener" planted a whole bunch of plants before the beds were divvied up. To this day no one knows who it was. People at the garden just divided up plants from the plot, so we all ended up getting free plants out of it... no big deal. No thefts that I know of thus far. There was a delay getting access to water at the park, but that's been remedied. Carting water from home was a bit of a pain, but again, not too big of a deal.