By 10 a.m. Friday, July 24, the dew was just drying and the plants were thriving under the morning sun when a group of YMCA day campers visited J.W. Denver Williams Jr. Memorial Park for a hands-on lesson about gardening and where their food comes from.

The Energize Clinton County Demonstration Garden opened its doors to the 32 campers, who learned how to identify plants and sampled tomatoes, cucumbers and fresh green beans. They picked ripe vegetables and sifted soil through their fingers, while learning the basics of composting.

Six-year-old Ben Blake held a red heirloom tomato in one hand and pointed the other at a young tomato plant.

“How did you know that was a tomato, even though it’s green?” asked Maggie Ashmore, an intern at ECC and an organic farmer who helped coordinate the demonstration.

“Because they change color as they grow,” Blake answered, correctly.

Other campers munched green peppers and passed bags of cucumber seeds around, which they later planted in personal pots to take home. Phil Swindler of Swindler and Sons Florists donated soil, seeds and the pots for the campers, and showed them how to best plant their cucumbers.

“Make sure they get plenty of water and sunlight,” Swindler said. “And in four to five days, you’ll start to see a little seedling pop up. It will look like the soil is bubbling.”

Violet Purvis raised her hand and waved it eagerly above her head.

“I put the plant inside and when it gets a little bigger, I put it outside,” said six-year-old Purvis. “That way it can get some sunlight.”

The ECC Demonstration Garden is maintained by volunteers and members of the Grow Food, Grow Hope Garden Initiative, a Wilmington College-sponsored organization that focuses on local food issues. The demonstration on Friday was organized by Ashmore, Swindler, and Eric Guindon and Mariah Fulton, who are both AmeriCorps VISTA volunteers working for Grow Food, Grow Hope.

Across the park, Guindon and Fulton were hopping around in the grass, demonstrating to another group of campers the life-cycle of a vegetable, from seed to fruit. Campers played rock-paper-scissors to advance from a seed to a seedling, then from a seedling to a blossom, and finally from a blossom to a fruit.

“I’m a seedling!” yelled six-year-old Izaia Billingsley. He ran to another seedling, seven-year old Cody Hansford, and challenged him to a game.

“Now I’m a blossom!” Billingsley said when he won, putting his hands to his face and wiggling his fingers like a flower.

Guindon, the Community Outreach Coordinator for Grow Food, Grow Hope, said he was surprised at the kid’s enthusiasm about food issues.

“They were excited about where their food comes from, how it was grown,” he said. “With kids, there’s this stigma that vegetables are icky. But from what we saw today, growing your own food is fun. And the kids loved it.”