Gardeners are cleaning up their plots and planting cover crops, like mustard. Flowers on the street side. Cover crop. The pollinator plot still flowering. All red. Ready for winter! Happy kale, tall leeks and marigolds ..read more

Lush and green! Yay for the rain! Everything looks very healthy and lush. Tomato. BIG tomato. Purple tomatoes are so cool. Lovely. Sunflower and one coming. Such great kale. Purple cone flowers. Great for the birds, especially goldfinches. The pollinator plot. Goldenrod in the pollinator plot is serving its purpose. Blackberries are coming! Purple Zinnia ..read more

Your lettuce is going to self-destruct in the heat, your peas too. But you can keep your plot going through the whole season. Plant from seed (direct sow into ground) in July Green (bush) beans. If you sow them now you will have a crop at end of August. Easily grown and productive. You can sow up to July 15 if you get full sun. If you have partial sun, best to sow right now. Later in July, maybe, but you may not get a full crop depending on the weather. Green onions (scallions, aka bunching onions). You can sow now through July or into August for spring use. The beauty of scallions is that th ..read more

Watering Luscious lettuce. Look at this bountiful plot. Squash blossoms! Peas and pea ladder. Flowers! The pollinator plot is coming on strong. Tomatoes and basil. Even plants need support ..read more

We have a new plot for a pollinator garden. It’s all planted, so watch this space!There are still some Romaine lettuce starters from Gotham Greens.This kale over-wintered and now has gone to bolt. That is one healthy specimen…Amazing tulipsCheck out the new flower plat. Love the edging ..read more

This from MJ Robinson, the city’s Community Gardener in Residence… “The Parks Department has about 50 water connections that we start making as soon as the weather allows. This process requires coordination with Water Supply Board and balancing with our other responsibilities and capacity. Generally, we try to have all water connections flowing by Mother’s Day at the latest. This year, that is May 7. Our priority is on gardens that are needed for food security in some of our neighborhoods that have been hardest hit by COVID. I know all things green are popping earlier, but we ask for your pati ..read more

From their press release… For more than 20 years, the University of Rhode Island Cooperative Extension and its Master Gardener Program have teamed with the Ocean State Job Lot Charitable Foundation to give away more than a million packets of vegetable, flower and herb seeds to schools, youth groups, community gardens and individuals throughout Rhode Island and beyond. But the COVID-19 pandemic has forced the organizers to modify the distribution of the seeds in 2021 to reduce the risk to the volunteers who traditionally sort, pack and distribute the seeds. Read the full article ..read more

Lettuce, spinach, radish, kale, greens, broccoli, beets, cauliflower, peas & snap peas, carrots, potatoes, turnips, green onions (scallions). Peas and snap peas don’t tolerate heat.  Plant by mid April or wait until next year. Spinach doesn’t tolerate heat or long days.  Plant now and choose varieties that say “long standing” or “slow bolt”.  You can plant again at end of summer.  Basic gardening information from the University of Illinois Extension ..read more

Every year we spread wood chips on the paths between the plots. This is done to keep the path from getting muddy and to keep the weeds down. This year, the city delivered a load of wood chips and garden members helped to spread them. Many hands made light work! Here’s the pile that we started with.Look at those nice, fresh wood chips!This kale survived the Winter and looks ready to eat!We all made a big dent in the pile ..read more

The garden has a new sign! Rather than get a sign made, we made one. The sign uses all repurposed materials – an old piece of plywood, the end of old paint and polyurethane and old hardware ..read more