News
GreenThumb Harvest Fair and Garden Recognition Awards are almost here!
GreenThumb’s annual Harvest Fair will be held on Saturday, September 16th at Brooklyn Bears Pacific Garden in Brooklyn, located at 590 Pacific Street, where we’ll be awarding ribbons to the winners of the annual Harvest Competition and also celebrating the 2nd annual GreenThumb Garden Recognition Awards.
FUNDING OPPORTUNITY: Parks Equity Initiative
We are pleased to inform you that the New York City Council has made additional funds available in every council district to support the Parks Equity Initiative (PEI) in Fiscal Year 2018. The PEI is a City Council-funded effort to help build a more equitable park system, providing Council Members with discretionary funding that they can allocate to enhance the maintenance and beautification of parks and gardens in their districts, to activate green spaces with vibrant programming or to support increased community engagement through volunteer projects and community-led activities.
GreenThumb has created a menu of options that are eligible for funding through PEI. Council Members have the option of funding gardens through the provision of various materials and equipment, including soil, lumber, plants, tools, picnic tables, rainwater harvesting systems, picnic tables, sheds, and greenhouses. If you would like to seek funding for your garden through this initiative, we recommend reaching out to your local Council Member today to request support. Council Members are expected to begin making allocation decisions in August, so call now!
Membership Updates are Past Due!
All registered GreenThumb community gardens should send an updated complete list of all their members to the respective Outreach Coordinator via email or US Mail.
Save the Dates!
Bronx Green-Up Harvest Festival
Saturday, Sept. 9
Join Bronx Green-Up for a celebration of the efforts of community gardeners that will include food, music, activities for kids, and much more. Learn more about the Bronx Green-Up Harvest Festival
GreenThumb Harvest Fair 2017
Saturday, Sept. 16
Bring your best harvest from your GreenThumb community garden to win prizes! Join us as we celebrate the close of the growing season.
Sixth Annual LUNGS Harvest Arts Festival
Saturday, Sept. 23 and Sunday, Sept. 24
The Sixth Annual LUNGS Harvest Arts Festival will feature music, dance, theater, spoken word, performance art, workshops and more in 50 community gardens on the Lower East Side. It’s free and open to all. Check their website for more details: Learn more about the Sixth Annual LUNGS Harvest Arts Festival
Grants and Opportunities
New Yorkers 4 Parks – Daffodil Project
Registration for the 2017 Daffodil Project – one of the largest volunteer efforts in the city’s history – closes soon! Registration ends on Friday, September 1 at 3:00 pm.
Register for the 2017 Daffodil Project.
STEW-MAP is Live!
The STEW-MAP 2017 survey is now live! STEW-MAP is a map and searchable database of stewardship groups designed to help understand and strengthen our civic capacity to take care of New York’s neighborhoods. Your response and input helps support a vibrant, connected, and green NYC. Learn more about STEW-MAP, and contact stewmap.ufs@gmail.com with any questions.
Home Depot Community Impact Grant
The Home Depot Foundation offers grants up to $5,000 to 501(c)(3) organizations that are using the power of volunteers to improve the physical health of their community.
Deadline: Rolling basis until Sunday, Dec. 31, 2017
Learn more about the Home Depot Community Impact Grant
Partnerships for Parks Capacity Grants
Partnerships for Parks makes small grants of up to $5,000 to strengthen the outreach, membership, and program-planning capacity of community groups who care for their neighborhood parks in all five boroughs of New York City.
Deadline: Oct. 1, 2017
Learn more about the Partnerships for Parks Capacity Grants
Captain Planet Foundation: Environmental Education Grants
The mission of the Captain Planet Foundation is to give the next generation of environmental stewards an active understanding and love for the natural world in which they live. The Captain Planet Foundation primarily makes grants to U.S.-based schools and organizations with an annual operating budget of less than $3 million. Funding range: $500 to $2,500.
Deadline: Sept. 30, 2017
Learn more about the Captain Planet Foundation: Environmental Education Grants
Citizens Committee for New York City: Reuse and Repair Grant
Citizens Committee for New York City is partnering with the Manhattan Solid Waste Advisory Board (SWAB) and Manhattan Borough President Gale Brewer to launch our newest grant initiative: NYC Reuse and Repair. The goal of the grant is to support New York City in reusing, repairing, and refurbishing 100% of all discarded products that can be reused in some capacity, with the balance being recycled.
Deadline: Sept. 12, 2017
Learn more about the Citizens Committee for New York City: Reuse and Repair Grant
Safe in the City Grant
The Safe in the City Grant offers funding opportunities designed to support community based actions and activities that will make neighborhoods safer. In addition to funding, applicants will also receive best practices and strategies from the Mayor’s Office of Criminal Justice’s Public Safety Tool Kit, further empowering them to employ prevention, intervention and trauma response methods while amplifying the voice of community to stand against violence and promote healthy, vibrant neighborhoods.
Deadline: Rolling
Learn more about the Safe in the City Grant
Farm School NYC Certificate Program
Whether you’re a novice gardener or you want to dive deeper into the world of urban agriculture, Farm School NYC classes might be the right fit for you! Farm School NYC also offers a two-year certificate program in Urban Agriculture. Their courses are taught by experts in the field, and focus on a wide range of topics from social justice issues, to urban planting techniques, to grassroots community organizing. Farm School NYC also offers a more intensive, year-long certificate course with the Youth Farm in Brooklyn. More information on the program and how to apply here. Or attend an info session to learn more!
Deadline: September 30, 2017
City Parks Foundation
View a listing of grant opportunities and other resources on the City Parks Foundation website.
Workshops
Did you know that ALL our workshops are free and open to the public? You can find soil and lumber request forms at ALL GreenThumb-led workshops.
GreenThumb Workshop Survey
Do you have ideas for GreenThumb workshops? Would you like to host a workshop in your garden, share your skills by teaching other gardeners, or simply let us know which workshops you’d like us to offer? Let us know in the GreenThumb Workshop Survey!
Saturday, Sept. 9
Annual Bronx Green-Up Harvest Festival
1:00 p.m.–4:00 p.m.
Bronx Green-Up of The New York Botanical Garden, International Rescue Committee, and GreenThumb
Bronx Green-Up, International Rescue Committee and NYC Parks GreenThumb will celebrate the efforts of community gardeners citywide with our annual Harvest Festival. Join us at the New Roots Community Farm for food, music, activities for kids, and our Harvest Contest featuring prizes for best vegetables and fruits, floral arrangements, garden photos, and pies! Contest entries must be submitted by 2 p.m..
For more information, contact Bronx Green-Up at 718.817.8026 or e-mail bronxgreenup@nybg.org.
Location: New Roots Community Farm, 670 Grand Concourse, Bronx
WormShop
11:00 a.m.–12:00 p.m.
NYC Compost Project hosted by Snug Harbor
Let worms convert your food scraps into compost for your plants. Learn how to set up, care for, harvest, and use vermicompost from a worm bin. Register for the WormShop
Location: Snug Harbor Compost Demonstration Site, Staten Island
Get directions. The Compost Demonstration Site is #23 on the map.
Tuesday, Sept. 12
Rat Prevention for Community Composting: Part 2
6:00 p.m.–7:00 p.m.
NYC Compost Project hosted by LES Ecology Center and GreenThumb
Learn about the things you can do to prevent rats at your community compost sites. We’ll be covering composting techniques and equipment that discourage a rat habitat. This two-part workshop series will cover rat biology and behavior, and explore best management practices that help community composting sites avoid rats.
RSVP for Rat Prevention for Community Composting: Part 2
Location: La Plaza Cultural, 674 E. 9th St., Manhattan
Thursday, Sept. 14
Vertical Gardening: Pallet Planters A-Frame
5:30 p.m.–7:00 p.m.
Community gardeners from La Isla Community Garden and GreenThumb
Transform recycled pallets into vertical gardening structures. Pallet planters provide a fantastic way to add green to walls and small spaces. In this workshop, we’ll connect two pallet planters to form an A-frame that can stand on its own. Este taller se ofrecerá con traducción al Español.
Location: La Isla, 96-98 W. 163rd St., Bronx
Tuesday, Sept. 19
Welcome! The Garden is Open: Making A-Frame Sandwich Boards
5:30 p.m.–7:00 p.m.
GreenThumb
Invite neighbors and passersby to your community garden with an A-frame/sandwich board that you can place on the sidewalk in front of the garden gate. Learn how to make this very simple but very effective welcome sign. We will make and give away a limited supply of A-frame/sandwich board kits to registered GreenThumb garden groups at the end of this workshop.
Location: St. John Cantius Parish Community Garden, 476 New Jersey Ave., Brooklyn
Saturday, Sept. 23
Walk This Way: Laying Bricks and Pavers for Garden Paths
1:00 p.m.–4:00 p.m.
Angel Sepulveda, GreenThumb community gardener at River Garden, and GreenThumb
Follow the [red] brick road! Join us for a hands-on workshop where we’ll learn how to create beautiful brick pathways that your fellow gardeners will enjoy for years to come. Este taller se ofrecerá con traducción al Español.
Location: River Garden, 1086 E. 180th St. Bronx
Sunday, Sept. 24
Honoring Ancestors Through Medicine-Making
2:00 p.m.–4:00 p.m.
Myrna Cabán Lezcano, Casitas Wisdom, and GreenThumb
When we honor our ancestors, we honor ourselves. We will uplift the legacy of New York City’s casitas as community healing spaces and make medicine for nourishment and resiliency. All will walk away with their own herbal tea blend or body spray. To learn more about Casitas Wisdom, please visit casitaswisdom.org. Este taller se ofrecerá con traducción al Español. This workshop is part of the Sixth Annual LUNGS Harvest Arts Festival
Location: 9th St. Community Garden & Park, 703 E. 9th St., Manhattan
Tuesday, Sept. 26
They Only Come Out at Night: Inviting Bats to your Garden
5:30 p.m.–7:00 p.m.
NYC Urban Park Rangers and GreenThumb
Bats love eating mosquitoes, so we love bats! Join NYC Urban Park Rangers for a workshop on how to create bat habitat in your garden. We’ll discuss bat house design and installation.
Location: Green Oasis Community Garden, 372 E. 8th St., Manhattan
Wednesday, Sept. 27
South Asian Medicinal Plants
5:30 p.m.-7:00p.m.
Muhammad Rahman and Nazma Begum, GreenThumb community gardeners at Drew Gardens, Sara Katz, and GreenThumb
Join gardeners at Drew Gardens to discuss South Asian medicinal plants that grow in this region such as turmeric, ginger, black seed/nigella, bay leaf, moringa, bitter melon, and stinging nettle. Este taller se ofrecerá con traducción al Español.
Location: Drew Gardens, 1059 East Tremont Avenue, Bronx
Thursday, Sept. 28
Eat Your Greens: Delectable Vegetarian Recipes for Your Garden Veggies
5:30 p.m.–7:00 p.m.
GreenThumb
Put the superfoods from your garden to use in recipes that heal the body and appease the palate. An assortment of colorful fruits, veggies, and herbs from the garden will be the backdrop to this hands-on workshop celebrating the healing qualities of our gardens harvests. Be ready to eat, learn and share. Este taller se ofrecerá con traducción al Español.
Location: Riverside Valley Community Garden 699 W. 138th St., Manhattan
Grow to Learn Fall 2017 Workshop Registration
Grow to Learn, the citywide school garden initiative, of which GreenThumb is a principal partner, provides workshops and programming for school and community gardeners as well as the general public. GTL has a wide variety of topics for you to select, including learning about soils, carpentry or about how your fellow school gardeners are raising chickens in their gardens. You must register to attend any Grow to Learn workshop- fill out the information below to sign up for one or more workshops of your choice. View the Grow to Learn Workshop Calendar. The sign-up information is there as well. We hope you will come and join us this fall to learn and share skills with us.
Access all workshop info and more in GreenThumb’s Summer Program Guide
