One student's experiences outdoors with her grandmother sprouted a personal passion for gardening. After being unable to find a gardening-centric club on campus accessible to many students, second-year biology student Jackie Taylor started Cocks in the Garden. The club provides students at USC with an easy introduction into gardening.
Cocks in the Garden offers students of any level of gardening experience the opportunity to admire and experience nature through growing plants and tending to gardens, according to the club's page on GarnetGate.
Taylor said her interest in gardening came from her grandmother, who would often spend her time identifying different plants she found in a collection of books.
“I would always go with her with a different book and match different plants to the pages. So I said that was like, the main memory I have that like sparks my interest,” Taylor said.
Though Taylor's passion for gardening spanned years, the club is relatively new to campus and has only been around for several months. Taylor began the application for Cocks in the Garden in August 2021 and received approval for it about two weeks later.
Cocks in the Garden operates out of the garden behind the Green Quad dormitory. The garden "began as a few student garden boxes in 2007. Since then, it has evolved into a successful student-run urban garden and agribusiness," according to USC's website.
The garden is available for any student to use, but Taylor reserved a few of the garden beds specifically for the club.
The university provided the supplies for what the gardening club needs to grow and maintain the gardens.
Last semester, members were able to clear away mold that had been collected on the beds. The mold could potentially weaken the plants and inhibit growth.
Taylor and the club hope to either donate what they grow to different homeless shelters and other nonprofits around Columbia or sell them at the farmer’s market on Greene Street.
The club's focus on gardening gets its members outside and more engaged with nature, according to co-Vice President and third-year accounting student Mark Steffan.
In his hometown of Charleston, Steffan used to go to the beach or take a walk through parks. Though Steffan felt Columbia didn't offer those same kinds of outdoor experiences, he said the Cocks in the Garden club allows him to go outdoors more in Columbia.
Preya Simmons, co-Vice President and third-year political science student, said she has always wanted to start gardening, especially with the trend of keeping plants in your house becoming more popular.
"Personally I've always wanted to kind of start gardening and you know, like plants, having plants," Simmons said.
Simmons said she would help her mother garden when she was home in Charleston. After joining Cocks in the Garden, she is able to also garden here in Columbia.
"My mom was a big gardener. Like she takes care of like, our, our lawn in our yard at our house and stuff. So I've always just been there to help her out in the yard as well," Simmons said.
Club meetings are bi-weekly, according to its GarnetGate page. Taylor can usually be found working in the garden between 3 p.m. to 6 p.m. every other Tuesday, and club members are welcome to work with her during that time for however long they are able available to help.
In her spare time when she isn't working in the garden at Green Quad, Taylor said she takes care of the plants she grows in her apartment, including beets, carrots, house vines and peace lilies.
Although neither of her vice-presidents see themselves being involved in the agriculture business in the future, that hasn't stopped Taylor from pursuing her career interests through her club.
“I would love to do something in agriculture through biology, like maybe be a scientist who studies a certain plant or animal, but that's a bit like a long goal, like just way out there in the future,” Taylor said.