Gardening Can Help the Elderly Stay Active Year Round

Imagine the excitement of picking the first vine-ripened tomato of the season, and how delicious the first bite tastes. Or think about the wonderful feeling a person gets when sharing vegetables from the garden with a neighbor.

Being around plants tends to make individuals feel better. A garden can bring great satisfaction and pride to oneself.

Candice Shoemaker, Kansas State University Associate Professor of Horticulture, truly believes in the benefits of gardening. Almost two years ago she began a research project: Gardening with Older Adults for Health and Nutrition, to demonstrate what gardening could provide to the elderly. The first two years of this project were funded by USDA’s Food Stamp Program through a contract awarded by the Kansas Department of Social and Rehabilitation Services.

“I asked my father why he had given up gardening, and he told me he couldn’t get up and down anymore to tend the plants,” said Shoemaker. “I told my father of a special chair that would allow him to be more mobile, and which was fairly inexpensive at Lowes. With that little bit of assistance, he is gardening again.”

Shoemaker said after seeing that her father could continue gardening, she wanted to share with other elderly people the simple things that could allow them to begin or continue gardening.

Shoemaker’s first year of research consisted of putting together information to create a program for the elderly. Her team consists of human nutrition assistant professor Mary Meck Higgins, kinesiologist Nancy Gyurcsik, and horticultural therapy graduate student Mu-Chuan Lin.

Through their research, Shoemaker and her team found that gardening is America’s favorite outdoor leisure activity, and it has many benefits.

• It is calming and useful for relieving stress.
• It’s a source of personal satisfaction and pride, which opens doors of social interaction with people.
• Gardening also offers opportunities for mild exercise.

As people get older, weakening muscles and decreased flexibility tend to challenge their ability to exercise. The motions of gardening will help both problems.

Through their research Shoemaker’s team decided to design an eight-week program for older Kansas adults that emphasizes gardening for physical activity and good nutrition. It educates participants on gardening basics so people of any gardening ability can succeed. The program gives tips on growing fruits, vegetables, and herbs that are popular with older Kansans, and even gives harvest, storage and preparation techniques/tips.

“I am very glad to be a part of this research. Gardening is an activity that promotes mental, emotional and physical health for people of all ages,” said nutritionist Higgins.

Shoemaker’s team knows it is critical for everyone to exercise, especially the elderly, so the team incorporated two kinds of exercises into the program: endurance and stretching.

“As people get older it is vital for them to continue to be active. It is hard for a doctor to prescribe walking for 30 minutes a day to a person who doesn’t walk every day,” said Shoemaker. “That is like asking someone to play Bach when they don’t play the piano.”

The first and main exercise in the program is an endurance exercise, which is gardening. Gardening gets the heart working harder than normal. By building up endurance many day-to-day activities will get easier, such as climbing stairs, getting groceries and getting in and out of the bathtub. Endurance activities also help prevent or delay the onset of diseases of the elderly.

The second exercise in the program is stretching. These are easy to do and they help keep the body limber, which is very important for the elderly.

“By having people stretch regularly, the risk of falling and the chances of injury are reduced,” said kinesiologist Gyurcsik. “Endurance exercises such as gardening will be easier to do if people will stretch stretching routinely.”

The fruit and vegetable gardening in the program provides nutritional and economic benefits as well. Vegetables grown in the home garden are fresher, may have better nutrient values and usually cost less than vegetables sold in markets.

Shoemaker’s team found that Kansas adults aged 55-64 years consume less than four servings of fruits and vegetables per day, and Kansan adults aged 65 years and older consume less than two servings per day. Both amounts are less than the daily recommendations of nutritionists.

The program teaches participants that eating more servings of fruits and vegetables can decrease the risk of poor health and of getting cancer, heart disease, high blood pressure, cataracts and many other problems the elderly face.

Last fall two groups of elderly from Manhattan and Wamego areas were the first to participate in the eight-week program.

“Even though the eight-week program was in the fall, a time when older people tend to stop being active outside, the groups in our study maintained their physical activity,” Shoemaker said. “This was very rewarding to see.”

In January 2004, Shoemaker provided extension agent training for the Gardening with Older Adults for Health and Nutrition program. Plans are for eight Kansas counties to conduct the eight-week program within the next year.

Shoemaker said she is anxious to see the program results from the other Kansas counties. She hopes the program will continue to expand throughout the state and beyond.

“My goal for the end of this five-year research is to find ways for everyone to garden regardless of their ability and no matter what their age,” said Shoemaker.

Article prepared by Katie J. Patterson
HOMETOWN: Holton, Kansas