Garden Club Events & News

Citigroup Returns to RIGC for a Second Day of Service

6/5/2019

On May 21st we heard from Nancy Glynn, Strategic Program Manager Global Information Security at Citigroup. By the next week, shortly after the Memorial Day weekend, we had confirmed our second day of service with Citigroup employees for June 5th, 2019. Citigroup has their office on the Cornell Tech campus and are relatively new members of our greater Roosevelt Island community.

Just like last year, we were amazed by their enthusiasm and hard work.Getting outdoors helps everyone. This year the day was also timed so that with RIOC's help, they could help us receive a wonderful load of compost from NYC Compost hosted by Big Reuse!

Neal Weissman, Curtis Lowry, Takelu Gross, and Anthony Longo were all available to host this morning of service. Neal wrote to Nancy after that morning saying,

I just want to thank you and your professional team, who did a great job. The weather cooperated and we were so happy to see familiar faces from last year as well as new people who we hope to see again next year.

From 9:30am to 12:15pm we got so much done. The help with the compost delivery, the painting of the tables, the dreaded nail removal, the discarding of old wood, the clearing of paths, and work in the landscape areas: these were all a great help to our club. Last year we did a survey and found out that a significant percentage of our membership are people over 70. So what is easy for your team can be a challenge for some of our members. Much appreciation. Let's do it again next year!

Nancy responded quickly writing,

Hi Neil! It was our pleasure, and it was fun work to do outside the office. As a member of the Cornell Tech community, we are committed to Roosevelt Island and happy to support and contribute to your special organization.

Thank you Citigroup! We will continue enjoying the fruits of your work all season. "A garden requires patient labor and attention. Plants do not grow merely to satisfy ambitions or to fulfill good intentions. They thrive because someone expended effort on them." (Liberty Hyde Bailey) RIGC is a community of volunteers and it is great to host other volunteers to help us with all our work.

Spring into Summer Gardening Classes at RIGC

6/3/2019

Calling interested 3rd to 9th graders who want to experience gardening. RIGC is offering free classes on Thursdays and Sundays from 4:30 to 6:00 p.m. from June 6th and extended through June 30th.

Everyone needs to pre-register by emailing rigardencluboutreach@gmail.com because there are required permission/liability forms and class sizes are limited. You may choose to attend one session or all sessions based on availability.

rigc_liabilitywaiver_students_2019_pdf.pdf
File Size:	79 kb
File Type:	pdf

Download File

Why We Garden...

5/30/2019

by Iliada Bass

I think the true rewards of gardening are bigger than the sum total of its many obvious and well-publicized benefits: the work-out that you don’t even feel sometimes that dispels stress, improving our heart health, mental health, and physical dexterity. Gardening reduces our risk for a number of ailments and strengthens our immune system; but most importantly, it gives us the veggies and flowers themselves in their glory and accomplishes all this with no treadmill or prescription in sight.

Beyond the usual reasons - to grow our own organic herbs and vegetables, the love of nature, “it’s therapeutic for me”, or “I need to be outdoors”, there’s always a story, a very personal story. Whether being in the garden is a need to reconnect with our childhood in some countryside around the world, or just a way to balance our busy city lives, there are so many layers to this attraction that sometimes we’re not even aware of.

You may have a Proustian moment one early spring when you go and plant the first seeds of the season and realize that smell of the earth brings memories of you and your grandfather walking home from the vineyard, way back. Or you may go to have your coffee in the garden on a Saturday morning, with a slightly stiff back and thinking the garden is in good shape, no need to get down to it. But then one weed leads to another and, an hour later, you realize that your back has never been better. Now that’s what I call therapeutic.

For me, dabbling around our little plots, from one plant to the next, checking each bloom or vegetable out, picking up a tiny stone, weeding relentlessly, watering and watching the little water rainbows, replanting, figuring out the rebellious and prolific self-seeding flowers can be better than meditation. Your focus is so far away from the mundane. Your world has been reduced to several important but very simple coordinates - and you’re in tune with them.

Yes, I want all the fresh organic lettuce, tomatoes, green beans, cucumbers, herbs, zucchini and everything else. We cannot deny the moment of pride and joy serving our garden goods to our families and friends, but the joy of actually being in your garden among your flowers and vegetables is so simple and pure that I feel it makes us better humans.

No, maybe we wouldn’t be able to grow potatoes on Mars like Matt Damon in The Martian if it came down to it, but, according to NASA, we can still all enjoy the “gardening glow” that plants are gifting us with through stress relief and positive sensory stimulation. Apparently, even the dirt under our fingernails can benefit our immune system via friendly bacteria in the soil.

Just walking around the paths admiring (or being envious of) a gorgeous bloom, sensing their fragrance, noticing some luscious tomatoes or ripe strawberries gets us on a higher vibrational level. By the time we leave the garden - we’re just nicer, and friendlier. If nothing else, we should garden for this.

Please send in your own thoughts and musings. Why do you garden?

P.S. I.S. 217 Pre-K and 1st Grade Classes Learn at RIGC

5/30/2019

A special shout out to members Anthony Longo, Kaz Buzno, Beverly Schutes, and Graciela Ramirez, and associate Zita Slonevsky who made these visits possible by hosting this year. A seven to eight year tradition of spring field trips from P.S. I.S. 217 continues. This began with 2nd graders studying with iDig2Learn (before we even had a website), and has now shifted now to Pre-K and 1st grade classes. These visits are definitely a source of joy and learning for all of us.

Watch the video below as students who visited last year explain composting to Anthony. Be on the lookout as well for these future gardeners when they visit with their parents on weekends. (I ran into two lovely young visitors with their mom this week as they returned to guide their parent through our pathways and exclaimed at wonders like spiderwebs on pink zinnias.) A very special thank you to P.S. I.S. 217 teachers for reaching out so we can welcome all these learners.

Garden Learning Day and Zero Waste Picnic at RIGC

5/18/2019

Gardeners of all ages shared their learning and passions with each other on this sunny Saturday in May. It was a wonderful day of connections and good weather after lots of spring showers.

The twenty minute workshops offered included: Gardening for Birds and Bees, Composting, Growing Varied Herbs, Composting, Landscaping ideas, Elements of Garden Design, Gardening with Native Plants, Growing Vegetables 101, Edibles: Eat the Weeds, Composting in your Own Plot, Frugal Environmental Gardening.

#EarthLoveDay at Roosevelt Island Green Market

4/28/2019

What can we do? We can slow down and listen to the youth, relearn ways to love our Earth, bring our own bags, compost our food scraps weekly, share a plant with a neighbor, add some compost to the soil, use plants for natural dyes, share a smile and a sandwich with someone we just met, and enlarge our circles of kindness.

Roosevelt Island has a wealth of social infrastructure (libraries, athletic fields, youth & senior centers, pocket parks, gardens) that we cherish. Our Wengerd Farm green market has long been a staple for greeting and connecting with community as well as for restocking our kitchens with fresh produce.

Over three years ago, NYC Compost hosted by Big Reuse began providing us with an official Food Scrap Drop Off site next to our market. Since then, Islanders have been able to divert more than 100,000 pounds of food scraps from landfill! NYC Compost hosted by BigReuse turns them into soil enhancing compost and gives them back to the community - like they did for individuals on Saturday, April 27th!

Thanks to iDig2Learn, RIOC, and many more, our regular Roosevelt Island green market Saturday morning was transformed into a very special day for all ages. We learned more about practices that make a difference and help to reverse global warming. We found out about ways to reuse and recycle right here on RI. In addition to food scraps, clothes and electronics are reusable resources, too! RI Garden Club Outreach was honored to participate in this event.

(Most photographs above by Olya Turcihin! Enjoy the beautiful moments.)

RIGC Compost and RIOC's Youth Center

4/25/2019

On the two Thursdays before #EarthLove Day, Anthony Longo and Julia Ferguson met with RI Youth Center students and staff to discuss, teach, and experience the compost process first hand. What a wonderful connection! We look forward to more times for learning together in the future.

Community Service Opportunities Abound

4/20/2019

Late March and early April brought weekend days for painting the shed and preparing new compost piles. Sunday, April 28th, our first official Community Service day will be complete with many projects to upgrade and maintain our infrastructure: border repairs, path clean up, tool shed organization, water pipe repairs, more compost layering, and landscape planting!

If you have to miss the weekend dates, remember there is a list of possible tasks in the shed and and sign up sheet for your time. The front common area needs sweeping up weekly and we always have trips to AVAC needed regularly as well.

The gardens are now open to the public on weekends. Spring planting season is upon us. Enjoy the new 2019 season.

A Few Guidelines for Spring Clean Up

4/1/2019

Go gently with your garden clean up until the weather stays warm in the 50 degree range Fahrenheit. If you cut back and clear, try to leave some of the dry leaves, hollow stems, and branches stacked neatly standing in a sunny corner so that pollinators can hatch.

Find out more about pollinator planting and pollinating creatures. Click on this link to find a wonderful pdf booklet with extensive resources. Bee Basics North America. The end of this booklet gives specific recommendations like the following abridged list:

What You Can Do

Plant a pollinator garden. Some gardeners are fearful of being stung by bees and would rather they were not in their gardens. Most native bees are quite different from honey bees and yellow jackets (which are not pollinators) as they rarely sting gardeners and if they do, the sting tends to be mild. In fact, there are some bees, such as the Andrenid bees, that are incapable of stinging humans because their stingers are too small and weak to penetrate their skin.
Avoid pesticides or choose non-chemical solutions to insect problems.
Provide a source of pesticide-free water and mud.
Plant native plants from your ecoregion.
Allow some small wildflowers to become part of your lawn.
Provide nesting habitats for bees.

Our New Shed Has a New Coat of Paint

4/1/2019

RIGC community service in action! Many thanks to Neal, Jack, Farouk, Richard, Kas, Patty, Antonio ,Catherine, and Stephane from sections C, B, and A! The paint on our new shed matches our old shed and is looking great. If the weather holds on Saturday, April 6th at 11:00 a.m there will be more paining opportunities for the trim.

<<Previous

Forward>>