It almost always rains on the Earth Day Celebration at the
Stoddart Avenue Community Garden. After all, April showers bring May flowers, so they say. We had
fabulous weather in 2009 and 2010, but in 2011
it started raining within an hour or so after we picked up 14 bags of litter. This year, we were very lucky and it did not
start raining until almost 2 p.m., permitting us to accomplish most of our
tasks with a great group of gardeners and volunteers. Unlike last week, there was no snow on the ground and we had a nice breeze to keep us cool. Although there were a few hiccups, I’ve
decided that I want to look on the brighter side of life. We planted three fruit trees and two
elderberry bushes, and got a lot of weeding accomplished. We
also raffled off a bicycle that had been donated to us by Strader’s Garden
Centers through the Greater Columbus Growing Coalition.
Saturday was the culmination of our major fundraiser this
year. In February, we won a door prize at the GCGC meeting of a sweet Schwinn Signature Series bicycle.
The Board decided to have a raffle to raise money and each Board member
was required to sell at least 20 raffle tickets (although I provided them each
with 40 raffle tickets). One Board
member sold all 40 tickets to his breakfast group at the Bexley United
Methodist Church and they each agreed that if any of them won, they would hold
another raffle of the bike at BUMC to raise more money for the SACG. So, for weeks, that’s who I hoped would win
the bike. Some Board members sold more
than 40 tickets, which was a achievement because, with the weather as cold as it
has been, no one has been in the mood to buy a bicycle. Sabrina and I camped out in front of the
Bexley Public Library this week with the bike and sold over $100 tickets. 
A lot of people (including several Board
members) donated money without filling out any tickets. Some folks told me (and Taylor) to give the
bike away or give their tickets to someone else. For instance, I put the name of Zion (a boy
whose mother gardens with us) on two tickets that were purchased by one of the
Garden’s neighbor landlords. One little
boy came by on Friday and only had a quarter, so I put his name on a ticket and let him
keep his quarter. A lady who lives about
3 blocks from me bought a ticket and so I briefly wished that she would win
because it would help me get the bike out of my garage sooner than later. One of our Board members put in the name of a
neighbor who has done a lot for our Garden.
(I wish that I had realized that before the raffle and I would have
filled out all of the unassigned- but-paid -for raffle tickets with his name, but I didn’t go
through most of tickets until after the raffle). So, without further ado, the winning ticket
was Barbara who bought 5 tickets Friday afternoon and plans to give the bike to
her husband. We had little Zion pull the winning ticket out
of the bucket (which we raised so that he could not look inside for his own
name). She could not be more excited.
Last Sunday, I went over to Strader’s and purchased a peach
and plum tree for us to plant on Saturday.
Ken picked them up on Thursday and delivered them yesterday. I'm a bit worried about our peach crop for this summer because -- as you can see -- the peach trees are in blossom (with bees and everything) and it's predicted to snow on Monday, probably killing the blossoms and our peach crop this year. Keep Columbus Beautiful also donated about 50
bareroot native trees to GCGC, so Ken went over and picked us up some
elderberry bushes to plant as well. We had
wanted to also add 2 serviceberry trees, but they were taken before he got
there. Melissa gave him redbud trees to
compensate, but our orchard is ONLY for fruit trees, so I sent them back. He then came back with black cherry trees and
so we planted one of them and sent the other home with Rayna. I grew up with a black cherry tree in my back
yard, so I know how tall that they get and don’t want them taking over the
entire lot. Elderberry has become increasingly popular and
wild/black cherry is often used to flavor
jams, syrups and brandy. This is the information that Melissa sent
along about our new “native” trees:
Elderberry: Sometimes propagated as an ornamental shrub, the elderberry
bush attracts birds and butterflies and can be pruned back every few years to
keep it looking good in a landscaped garden. This deciduous shrub produces a
fruit that, in recent years has become very popular. The white flowers
transform into dark purple fruit late summer. Although the flowers and berries
are edible all other parts of this bush are poisonous containing toxic calcium
oxalate crystals. This shrub has soft, smooth, gray-brownish bark with corky
bumps. There is spongy, white pith inside the twigs and branches. The
elderberry bush produces showy white umbel flowers in the spring. Edible
purplish-black fruit ripens in drooping clusters late summer. Elderberry
prefers moist soil but tolerates dry soil as well. It grows best in full sun.
It is native to a large area of North America, east of the Rocky
Mountains. The berries and flowers are edible. Flowers can be tossed into
a salad. Elderberries tend to end up as pies, in pancakes, jams, jellies, and
in wine making.
Black Cherry: Black cherry is an attractive
deciduous tree that reaches heights of 50 to 80 feet at maturity. The tree is
somewhat drought-tolerant and grows well in sunlight or partial shade and well-drained,
loose soil. Black cherry is valued for its many ornamental and practical uses.
Also known as wild cherry, black cherry displays fragrant white blooms in early
spring and reddish-black berries in summer. The large, dark green leaves turn
yellow, orange and red in autumn. The bark of young trees is smooth and
reddish-brown, maturing to an interesting scaly texture. To minimize cleanup,
plant black cherry trees away from sidewalks and other paved areas. Lumber from
black cherry trees has been in high demand by cabinetmakers, fine furniture
makers and other woodworkers since Colonial days. Although the wood is
relatively hard, it holds screws securely and is easy to saw. The wood is also
used for veneers, flooring, wall paneling, interior trim, handles and toys. The
tart fruit of the black cherry tree is an important source of nutrition for
many animals, including deer, rabbits, foxes and squirrels. The fruit also
provides sustenance for a large variety of birds, including sparrows,
mockingbirds, chickadees, woodpeckers, robins, bluebirds, cardinals and
bluejays. The leaves provide food for the caterpillars of butterflies such as
red spotted purple, painted lady and viceroy butterflies.
I stopped by Keep Columbus Beautiful
on Friday to pick up supplies (like snacks, litter grabbers, safety vests, trash
bags, lawn waste bags, etc. and volunteer rewards (from Jeni’s and Chipotle,
etc.). Ken picked up mulch and soil
donated by Ohio Mulch. As always, I made
some chocolate no-bake cookies for the volunteers and picked up some
donuts. I also soaked and cooked some
chickpeas to make some hummus (with fresh carrots) for lunch.
I started off the morning running over to Lowe’s to pick up
tree soil for our new trees and then l loaded up my car. When I arrived to the SACG at 9 a.m. on
Saturday morning, Rayna was already there weeding the strawberry patch (which I
had started to weed last Saturday). She
remained there for about five hours and got half of it weeded. She eventually concluded that the weeds
(including ragweed and mint) were so well entrenched, that it made more sense
to simply dig everything out and replant the strawberries. Because it had been predicted that we would
receive two inches of rain over the next two days, that seemed like a good
plan. However, that prediction was then
cut in half. I may need to go over and water them in some
more in a few days. Both of our tanks
were empty yesterday (since we did not get any rain this week after I connected
the big tank on Saturday). She still had a whole bucket of seedlings left
to replant when we were chased out by the rain and we didn’t have time to do
anything with them, so she said that she’d take them home and put them in some
water until we figure out what to do with them.
We sold a bunch of strawberry plants back in 2010 or 2011 and raised
$110, but that was before Four Seasons City Farm also started selling their
extra strawberry crowns . . .. We also
give them away to other community gardens (like Highland Youth, Kimball Farms and Morrison
Hill) who are looking to start their own strawberry patches, so any community
garden should contact me asap if you want some strawberry plants. Rayna hopes to find time to come back and
finish the rest of the strawberry patch. (I hope that she does because this requires
a certain level of skill and gardening experience and I'd like to focus this week on planting the neighbor beds and possibly a food pantry plot).
New gardener Phil came to put in his work equity to join the
SACG. He lives just a few blocks from
the Garden. I showed him around and then
set him on finishing what the OSU students started last week – weeding out
around the compost bins before they become overtaken again with weeds. That took him most of the morning until he
had to leave to referee a volleyball game.
Bill Dawson – the Growing to Green Coordinator from Franklin
Park Conservatory – stopped by to wish us well.
His van was well stocked with supplies that he was distributing to 20
different gardens in all quadrants of the City.
He applauded us for starting early before the rain. He brought us another Garden fork to
turn our compost and a compost thermometer so that we could see how hot it
getting in the middle. I never would
have thought about buying one of those.
One of our gardeners, Alyssa, took a six week course at the Conservatory
over the winter and plans to start her own compost bin at home. She had the opportunity to get one of those
thermometers, but turned it down, silly girl.
I can’t wait to try it out. I’ve
always been curious (and a little dubious) whether our compost piles get hot
enough to kill microbes and seeds, etc.
Now, we’ll be able to figure that out.
Rayna reported that she planned to start vermicomposting with her
special needs class with their lunchtime food scraps. Bill’s an old hand at that and so they
chatted a bit about different approaches (with different price points) that she
could consider. Alyssa had been asking
about a particular weed which had popped up in Sabrina’s old plot, so we asked
Bill to identify it for us. I had no idea, but observed it showed up where
there used to be potatoes. It was wild
parsnip. 
Alyssa and Taylor came to put in their work equity. They anticipated our usual chore of
distributing wood chips, but instead, I put them to work digging up volunteer
raspberries all around the inside and outside of the Garden that were more than two feet from the fence. They had quite the time with that. They also sanded the peeling rain barrel and
Alyssa painted it until we ran out of paint.
Then, I had them weed some other
areas. Marcel came with her new baby and
Zion and I put them to work weeding the south side of the Garden (which is a
challenge to do when they both want your undivided attention). Zion did his best to distract all of us from
our work. Taylor had to give him chase a
few times;-) Neighbor Rose stopped by to see the baby, chat with Marcel and I caught her weeding, too. She then gave them shelter on her front porch when it began to rain.
Leigh Anne also sent us four volunteers at 9:10 a.m. to help
with some major projects. One lady
picked up litter in the neighborhood for four hours. Ken picked up a little, too. One of the gentlemen mowed our lawn and the
two block watch lots. He also finished
up weeding around the compost bins after Phil left. He and two other gentlemen also finished
emptying out the compost from two of the bins and put it in our neighbor beds
(along the alley) as well as with some of the soil donated by Ohio Mulch. Two of the gentlemen dug the holes and helped me to plant the fruit trees and elderberry bushes.
When I discovered that we were not going to get the service berry trees
after all, I had them refill two of the holes.
They did such an exceptional job that you couldn’t even tell that there
had ever been a hole there. Then, they
had to re-dig a hole when Ken returned with a wild black cherry tree. After lunch I had them to begin weeding
the paths inside the Garden, which is what they were doing when it started to
rain. 
I ran around to keep everyone engaged, etc. and managed to
finally weed two rows in my plot and get some lettuce, bok choy, spinach and
onions planted. I also distributed some
seed potatoes and seed onions to Alyssa and Rayna. I also connected the tall rain cistern.
When I turned around, I found a volunteer had veered off the
path and into an unassigned plot, where he was digging up giant weeds. I walked over and redirected him back to weeding just the path. About
ten minutes later, however, he had again veered off the wood chip path and had
started to dig up the flowers in the center flower bed, including tulips,
daisies, salvia, bachelor buttons, irises, etc.
I had been tending that bed for three weeks now (even before we broke
ground last Saturday for our 10th growing season) to weed, transplant
and thin it. I NEVER assign unskilled
volunteers to do anything in any of the flower beds because they
rarely can
tell a flower from a weed. It is an
understatement to say that I freaked out.
It was the screech heard in Licking County as I screamed for him to stop
what he was doing and get back on the path.
Realizing that I was displeased as I ran towards him, he then instead decided to try and fix
his mistake by digging new holes and to possibly replant some of these
items. I screamed louder for him to stop
and get out on to the lawn and away from the flower bed. Stay there I said. I cannot fix tulip bulbs that had been split in half and
separated from their stems. Some root
systems were separated from the plants.
Hours of work down the drain. No
amount of rain today can bring back some of those flowers this season. I sat there on my knees as it started to rain
and tried to fix what I could. Rayna
tried to take charge of the situation and redirect the volunteer. Everyone spoke in whispers for the rest of
the day because I was in no mood for anything after that. I had no interest in going out and putting
that volunteer to work on anything else, so Rayna had him pack up my car with
everything that was still laying around.
 |
| Wild parsnip weed |
This is not how I would have liked to have finished out an
otherwise fabulously productive day. I did
manage to compliment all of the
volunteers on all of their work before they left, but I didn’t get the keys or
codes distributed because of the rain. There’s always Wednesday. . . . . It’s
going to rain all day today and, groan, snow flurries on Monday.
Meanwhile, Urban Connections had a volunteer crew of 48
folks show up at 1 p.m. to pick up litter, etc. for their Earth Day
celebration. Just in time for the
rain. They hoped that our crew wouldn’t
pick up all of the litter, but to be
safe, Doug had scoped out nearby areas that had lots of litter to pick up and
took them South of Main to clean up some seriously neglected alleys. Closer to the SACG, Cathy
supervised a crew of middle
schoolers to mulch the areas around the Ministry House. Their group leaders said that they would be
happy to work in a warm drizzle like we had yesterday, as long as there was no
thunder, lightning or downpour.
(Meanwhile, I learned during last night’s CSO concert that the Nature
Conservancy was postponing until June their planned nature walk today).
There’s still work left to do, of course, at the SACG. Three of our gardeners will be starting their
work equity this week and Phil will be finishing up his. We still have a few plots available for
anyone brave enough to join us. I’m
unlikely to screech again if you stay away from digging up established
perennial flower beds. My rule of
thumb: don’t dig it up unless you KNOW
what it is. If you only recognize
dandelions, then that is the only weed you should be digging up. Otherwise, ASK ME FIRST;-)
