This Saturday, the Druid City Garden Project (DCGP) is sponsoring a hands-on workshop designed to help Tuscaloosa residents create vibrant dirt in their own backyards. This class, titled “Backyard Composting,” will be held at University Place Elementary School on April 19 from 9:00 - 11:00 a.m.

In this workshop, participants will join DCGP’s Garden Manager, Josalyn Randall, to learn how to reduce waste, build soil, manage vermicompost, and create sustainable gardening practices by making compost. Participants will leave this workshop with the skills to begin compost piles at home and get their spring and summer gardens off to a tremendous start with excellent soil.

“Composting is an essential part of growing organically,” said Lindsay Turner DCGP’s executive director. “Every plant lives or dies by the quality of its soil and adding compost is the best way to guarantee a productive garden.”

Any size yard, house, apartment, or office is suitable for composting or vermicomposting, the practices of composting using worms. “Participants will be shocked at how much waste they can divert into their compost systems and at how easy it is,” Turner said.

Compost is often referred to as “Gardener’s Gold,” due to its importance in gardening.

This is the second workshop in DCGP’s series. The final workshop in the spring titled, “Free the Plants! Propagation Techniques for the Home Gardener,” will be on May 17 from 9:00 to 11:00 a.m.

A $20 fee will be charged for participants and students will be charged $10. Contributions will go toward DCGP’s mission and efforts to help diverse communities of Alabama build vibrant food systems.

Interested community members and students are encouraged to reserve their spots in advance by emailing This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. and should plan to wear clothes that can get dirty. The first workshop that DCGP held last month reached capacity.

For more information on the Druid City Garden Project please contact Lindsay Turner at (205) 523-5450, email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or visit their website at www.DruidCityGardenProject.org or on the DCGP's Facebook page.

Happy A-Day week, DCL readers! That’s right: The annual A-Day game is this Saturday, April 19, and for anyone having football withdrawals, it marks a great time to get a fix. Alabama’s final football practice of the spring promises to be an exciting one, and hopefully everyone will get the chance to hit campus and enjoy the free festivities. If not, know that this year’s A-Day game will be televised by ESPNU.

Kickoff for the A-Day game is 1 p.m., but plenty of fun activities are happening long before the Crimson Tide takes the field at Bryant-Denny Stadium. Locker room tours, a fan zone, and a Walk of Fame Ceremony: Those are just some of the exciting things going on before the spring scrimmage begins. For a complete lineup and information, including traffic and parking info in and around the UA campus, check out rolltide.com and uagameday.com.

What should we, as Tide fans, be looking for in Saturday’s game? Which positions are most up in the air? For this, I’d like to introduce all of you to Druid City Living’s sports writer extraordinaire, Stan J.Griffin. Stan knows sports. Stan really knows football. So of course, we wanted Stan to weigh in on what he thinks are the most important things to watch for on the field on Saturday.

Much to Watch For at A-Day This Year

Bryant-Denny should be packed for likely the most intriguing spring game in the Nick Saban era at the Capstone. Of course, the reason for much of this fan frenzy is the still-continuing battle to succeed AJ McCarron at the pivotal quarterback position. While many observers and fans believe that Florida State transfer Jacob Coker will be the frontrunner for the position when he reports in the fall, senior signal-caller Blake Sims has seemingly separated himself quite a bit from other contenders such as redshirt freshman Cooper Bateman and sophomore Alec Morris with his performance during spring practices and in scrimmages held leading up to A-Day. Saban has noted Sims' command of the Tide offense thus far and his decision making, so it will be interesting to see how the quarterback play shapes up Saturday and how it will proceed once Coker is actually on campus.

It will also be worth watching Saturday to see how the Tide offensive line is continuing to develop for this season after an overall uneven campaign in 2013 that began with a dismal effort in the opener against Virginia Tech and ended with another struggle against Oklahoma in the Sugar Bowl. Alabama has a good nucleus to build around with key returnees such as right tackle Austin Shepherd, left guard Arie Kouandjio and center Ryan Kelly. Other key parts will likely include sophomore right guard Alphonse Taylor, sophomore Brandon Greene (recently moved from tight end) and senior left tackle Leon Brown. More consistent play from the offensive line will be crucial if Alabama is to reestablish a physical identity which Saban said he felt was lost a bit in 2013, especially during the Tide's season-ending two-game losing streak.

I feel the Alabama secondary will also definitely be an area of intrigue for the Crimson Tide Nation heading into Saturday, especially with the loss of standouts such as Vinnie Sunseri and Ha Ha Clinton-Dix. That area took a solid hit with the recent knee injury to sophomore cornerback Eddie Jackson, who will not return until the fall at the earliest. While Alabama is fairly deep at the safety position with standout Landon Collins, as well as Geno Smith and Nick Perry among others, cornerback will be a question mark with Jackson's absence. Bradley Sylve and Cyrus Jones are the most experienced cornerbacks currently on hand and it's possible that the Tide may have to rely a great deal on youngsters such as true sophomore Maurice Smith and true freshmen like Marlon Humphrey and Tony Brown to have a huge impact if Bama's overall secondary is to be a formidable one in 2014.

See? Told ya: Stan J. Griffin is an expert when it comes to Alabama football analysis. Stan will be contributing a post-game analysis in the May issue of Druid City Living. Thank you, Stan the Man!

And Roll Tide, everyone.See you on Saturday!

Photo credit: Wikimedia Commons