Ron Bohrer happily jabs at the dirt, pushing away the weeds that continually creep up beside his rows of tomato, radish, squash and okra plants.

He relishes the task of caring for these vegetables, that, in the coming weeks and months he will harvest and eat.

“If you’ve ever eaten a tomato that you grew yourself, they taste wonderful,” he said.

Dr. Bohrer, a retired UTC Latin professor, has grown tomatoes and other vegetables and flowers at Crabtree Farms community garden for the past three years, traveling 26 miles roundtrip from his home near Hamilton Place for the sheer fun of growing his own food.

Those tomatoes he loves so much cost from $1.50 to $2 a pound at the store, he said, compared with $5 or less for a tomato plant that could yield eight to 10 pounds or more of the juicy, red fruit each year.

“It does have an impact on my grocery bill,” he said.

Community gardening is a growing trend across the country, and in Chattanooga little gardens are sprouting up in neighborhoods, behind churches and next to community centers.

Area churches such as St. Augustine’s Catholic Church on Signal Mountain and St. Alban’s Episcopal Church in Hixson have community gardens.

Staff Photo by Meghan Brown -- Ron Bohrer weeds one of his two garden plots at Crabtree Farms. Dr. Bohrer has kept the garden for three years, and his harvest includes tomatoes, squash, beans, okra and eggplant.

Workers and volunteers with the St. Andrews Center recently plowed a 2,000-square-foot plot on its property in the Highland Park neighborhood. The goal of the garden is to encourage residents of the diverse neighborhood to interact in a positive way through growing and caring for the plants, said Drew Jennings, farm manager at St. Andrews.

“We want to promote community and neighborliness among our neighbors, so that way they are working together,” Mr. Jennings said.

Instead of having many individual plots, St. Andrews will have one big garden so people can interact with one another. The center also will hold occasional work days for members of the community to come and maintain the garden. There is no charge to participate in St. Andrews’ garden, but Mr. Jennings said it is limited to people who live near the center. He has invited several Guatemalan families who live nearby to participate.

While fostering a sense of community is an important part of the St. Andrews garden, Mr. Jennings said high food prices also are behind the interest in using the garden to grow their own food.

“Most of the people in the neighborhood we talked to about it, (saving money) was the first thing they mentioned — that this will be great for saving money this summer,” he said.

Dr. Bohrer rents his two plots at Crabtree Farms for $90 a year for each 4-foot by 50-foot tract. Even with that cost, he still said he comes out ahead because Crabtree Farms, which is 100 percent organic and allows no man-made pesticides or fertilizers, provides all of his water, tools and makes sure the soil is in the best possible condition for growing, he said.

Janet Mauldin, garden coordinator for the Chattanooga Area Food Bank, said she also has noticed the trend of community gardening. The food bank’s garden started back in the mid-1980s, but Ms. Mauldin said there was a tremendous amount of interest.

“I have never had so many people come over and ask for a garden spot,” she said.

She even started a list that now has about 10 people waiting. She also has seen gardens springing up in neighborhoods and at area schools.

Joel Houser, farm manager at Crabtree Farms, helped dig the St. Andrews garden. He said community gardens seem to be popping up everywhere, even in random lots in neighborhoods around the city.

“All the coverage of (rising food prices) makes people start thinking about it,” he said. “They don’t have control over oil, but they can control food.”