Progress report on the No-till Flower Border Project

 

Progress report on the No-till Flower Border Project

An energetic group of community garden members came together in the late morning and early afternoon today to continue building no-till flower beds along the main path of the garden.

In attendance were Shane, Rachel, Barbara, Brian L., Jen Sch., Tera, Jen Saa., and Matt.

Volunteers were able to construct two 8 foot by 2 foot (approx.) flower bed before running out of soil and compost. One bed was sown with zinnia seeds and the other bed was sown with two varieties of sunflowers.

Additional volunteers continued to lay down cardboard and wood chips to help suppress the existing vegetation and provide an outline for the rest of the flower beds.

There will another opportunity to help complete five more flower beds next weekend.

A schedule will be released once the delivery of additional compost/soil is confirmed.

We hope to have a mid-morning session and an early evening session.

Please make plans to join us in this exciting community garden project!

 

The No-till Flower Border Project

SCHEDULE

Saturday May 25th,

Session #1: 11:30 am - 12:30 pm

Session #2: 12:30 pm - 1:30 pm

Join us for one or both sessions. We need volunteers to load and haul compost and wood chips. Also needed are people to help put down cardboard and help spread wood chips and fill beds with soil and compost.

Have you noticed the little raised bed near the front gate of our garden? It's the exciting beginning of our no-till flower border project, and we need your help to make it flourish! Imagine a vibrant border garden coming to life in just 1-2 hours with the power of our amazing volunteers.

This no-till flower border will stretch from the front gate to the garden shed, creating a beautiful community plot filled with stunning annual and perennial flowers perfect for bouquets. We'll be constructing around eight flower beds using the innovative no-till method, with each bed showcasing a different variety of flower.

We'd love for you to join us in bringing this project to life! 
To participate, please reach out to Matt at the usual connections. Let's come together and make our garden even more beautiful! This project is fully funded by the Davis Park Community Garden.

Less than an hours work and they are ready for planting.

 You're invited...

Sign up for the 2020 season

Click or tap the join tab at the top of the page.

Grow Your Own Vegetables - Join The Garden!

2019 Earth Day Providence

Get ready to #ProtectOurSpecies this #EarthDayPVD! Cleaning up our city helps keep our urban flora & fauna healthy & prevents harmful biodiversity loss. Help protect our urban wildlife! #Volunteer for a clean up today: http://www.providenceri.gov/providence-parks/parks-earth-day-volunteer-registration-2019/ … … @ProvidenceParks @Sustain_PVD

Registration Day

Registration is this Saturday, April 20th starting at 9:00 am.
Sign up, pay your garden fees, and get your plot assignment.

Gardening: Resolve to be ready for spring planting

The holidays have come and gone. Resolutions have been made and broken. Now we New England gardeners are faced with that long, dismal wait before we can start our gardens, and it’s a good time to think about those resolutions we never made: the garden resolutions.
More at providencejournal.com: Gardening: Resolve to be ready for spring planting

The Best Books on Honeybees | Five Books Expert Recommendations

Humanity has a long history of keeping bees. But what do we really know about them? Beekeeping memoirist Helen Jukes selects five books that examine both the behaviour of bees as individuals and colonies as 'superorganisms.'

The Best Books on Honeybees | Five Books Expert Recommendations

60 Free Seed Catalogs and Plant Catalogs

Now is the time to order vegetable and flower seed catalogs.
You will be able to spend cold winter days browsing through the catalogs and planning for the warm days of spring and summer.
Click or tap the link below:
60 Free Seed Catalogs and Plant Catalogs

Zinnias: How to Plant, Grow, and Care for Zinnia Flowers | The Old Farmer's Almanac

Zinnias: How to Plant, Grow, and Care for Zinnia Flowers | The Old Farmer's Almanac: Zinnias are one of the easiest plants to grow, as they grow quickly and bloom heavily. Zinnia flowers make a massive burst of color in your garden, and they attract butterflies.

Garden Meeting: March 6 2018

Meet at the Mt. Pleasant Library on Tuesday, March 6th at 6:30 pm.
We will be discussing plans for the 2018 season.
New members are welcome.

About Davis Park Community Garden

The Davis Park Community Garden provides garden plots to residents of the Smith Hill, Elmhurst, and Valley neighborhoods in the city of Providence, RI.

Garden members can rent plots on a yearly basis. The garden plots vary in size, but most are 4’ x 10’ and 4’ x 8’. Rental fees range from $10 to $50.

Members are required to maintain their plots in accordance with common organic gardening practices (no chemical fertilizers or pesticides, no invasive species planted, etc).

Work days are held monthly from April to October where members join together to help maintain and improve the garden.

Meetings are held in the Fall, Winter and Spring.

All gardeners are expected to contribute 4 hours per month to community service projects involving the garden.

Garden members are encouraged to volunteer for various jobs and teams that help maintain and improve the garden

Garden members help maintain a herb garden, strawberry plot, blueberry bushes, raspberry plants, grape vines, flower beds. Members are entitled to harvest these plants throughout the growing season.

The garden maintains a compost bin and finished compost is available for all garden members.

Garden funds are used to purchase compost in the Spring to supplement our own compost.

The city forestry department provides wood chip mulch free of charge.

Two yard hydrants provide water for the garden. The parks department performs major repairs.

The garden also provides tools that all members can use to maintain their plot and other areas of the garden. Some of the tools are shovels, cultivators, lawnmowers, string trimmer, and hand tools.

Weekly Garden News June 6th

Here’s what’s happening in the garden for June 6^th 2017

Tomato Cages

Our excess tomato cages will be given away.

We will place an ad on Craigslist and put up a sign at the garden entrance

If you you need any cages, please claim them as soon as possible.

Picnic Tables

If you would like to help with the repair of the picnic tables please send and email to Matt

We will then schedule a time to complete the project.

Garden Hoses

We will keep two garden hoses and giveaway the rest of them.

If you would like a free garden hose please take one by the end of the week.

Wood Chips

We are still waiting for a delivery of wood chips

Unused Plots - Clean out plots

We need to continue to clean out plots that have not been rented.

If you would like to help, check the bulletin board for a list of plots that can be cleaned.

Mulch around Trees

We need someone to place wood chip mulch around the trees at the top of the hillside.

Any help would be appreciated.

Abandoned\unkempt Plot Policy

By now you should have your plot planted or ready to plant.

Don’t forget that we will enforcing the abandoned\unkempt plot policy.

Terrace planting bed

We continue to sheet mulch above the terrace to create a planting bed for next year.

Plot numbers

If you need a plot number sign, please email Matt or Nina.

June Work Day

Our monthly work day is on Saturday June 17^th

We will concentrate on improving the hillside area around the grape vines.

New Border

The border along the gravel path has been installed.

Thank you to Bob for staining the borders.

Clean up hillside task

There is litter and other debris on the hillside.

Please considered picking up the some trash the next time you are at the garden

That’s all for this week.

Hope to see you in the garden!

Weekly Garden News May 30

Here's what's happening in the garden.

Rhubarb

Thanks to all that helped with caring for the rhubarb

Compost

The compost has been turned by Brian. Thanks.

Wood chip mulch

The city forestry department will be delivering more wood chips later this week

Hillside and lawn

Another section of the hillside has been mowed.

We need volunteers to cut the lawn and continue to mow the hillside.

If you can help, please let Matt know.

New planting bed

The area above the terrace has been cleaned out and mulched with wood chip.

We plan to plant this area next spring.

Three Sisters Garden

Nina and Eddie have started a Three Sisters Garden.

This is a Native American method of growing corn, beans and squash.

This is a community plot that all members can help maintain and harvest.

StrawberriesStrawberries in the community plots are starting to ripen.
In addition to the raised bed (#43) there are three other areas that are community strawberries.
The first is on the hillside above plots 22 and 24.
The second area is plot # 34.
The last area is on  the terrace between plots 49 and 50. By the way this area could use some cleanup by a volunteer.

Task ListLook for a garden task list on the bulletin board later this week.
We need volunteers to continue garden maintenance and to help with other projects.

That's all for this week.
See you in the garden.

Square Foot Gardening (SFG)

Weekly Garden News

Here's what's happening in the garden.

Work Day Summary

On Saturday May 20th garden members joined together to maintain and improve the garden

The lawn and part of the hillside was mowed.

Kathy cleared out the grass and weeds from the trees at the top of the hillside.

We now need to sheet mulch around the trees.

Eddie and Sarah removed the weeds from the planting bed at along the fence.

Matt and Eddie mulched the planting bed

Wendy planted marigolds in the new flower bed along the concrete wall.

Brian cleaned up some plots on the terrace

Mark mulched the blueberry bushes.

Bob cleaned some plots and stained the wood that will be used as a border along the gravel path.

Our next Work Day is on June 17th.

Bindweed in the Iris beds

Bindweed is a climbing vine that wrap themselves tightly around plants or other upward objects.

The flowers resemble morning glories.

Please help remove this invasive plant by pulling out the vine from around the irises.

Toss the vines into the trash. We do not want to add this to the compost.
Read more at Gardening Know How: Bindweed Control – How To Kill Bindweed In The Garden And Lawn https://www.gardeningknowhow.com/plant-problems/weeds/controlling-bindweed.htm

Hillside Irises

The iris bed on the hillside needs to be weeded and mulch/wood chips added.

Garden hoses

You may have noticed the garden hoses outside of the shed.

These are extra hoses that are taking up space in the shed.

We are planning to store some hoses outside of the shed. If you would like a hose for home use, contact Matt for more information. Any excess hoses will be advertised on Craigslist.

Volunteers Needed

We need help with the following projects:

Build and install new raised beds.
Repair picnic tables.
Install a shade cloth over the picnic tables
Continue to mow the hillside
Prune the rhubarb stalks
If you would like to help with any of these projects, contact Nina or Matt

That's all for this week.

See you in the garden!

Work Day This Saturday

We will be concentrating on sprucing up the front of the garden

If we have enough volunteers we will also work on building raised beds and improving other areas of the garden.

If you have a cordless drill/driver, please bring it along so that we can build new raised beds.

See you in the garden!

Weekly Garden News

Here's what happening in the garden.

Garden Shed

Labels have been created for the tools that were not  labeled

Hooks have been added for the small hand tools.

Garden Plot Number Signs

The Garden Club at Nathanael Greene Middle School have made plot number signs.

Look for them to appear sometime this week. They look great!

Tomato Cages

We have lots of tomato cages next to the shed

Feel free to take as many as you want.

We will give away any surplus by putting an ad on Craigslist.

Compost

There is now a garden hose for the compost bins

Adding water to the compost will help with decomposition

Work Day This Saturday
Don't forget that our monthly work day is on May 20th.

We will concentrate sprucing up the front of the garden.

Look for a more detailed email later this week.

That's all for this week.

See you in the garden!