Category Archives: Events

Wedge Grafting Techniques & The Politics of Graft

Saturday March 16th from 11 AM – 12 PM

Rahma Edible Forest Snack Garden
3100 S Salina St, Syracuse, New York 13205
https://www.facebook.com/events/320190132037459/

Margaretha Haughwout hails from San Francisco where she worked with the Guerrilla Grafters art/ activist group, and Hayes Valley Farm, a 2.5 acre interim-use permaculture farm built on top of a former freeway, ruined from the Loma Prieta earthquake. For this workshop, she will introduce the wedge grafting techniques and give a brief talk based on her recent essay “The Politics of the Graft.”

Learn more about Margaretha at http://beforebefore.net/words/

Enter to Win a Copy of “Forage, Harvest, Feast” by Marie Viljoen

The Alchemical Nursery Project has  teamed up with the folks at Chelsea Green Publishing to offer one lucky person the chance to win Forage, Harvest, Feast by  celebrated New York City forager, cook, kitchen gardener, and writer Marie Viljoen. 
 
“In this groundbreaking collection of nearly 500 wild food recipes, Viljoen incorporates wild ingredients into everyday and special occasion fare. Motivated by a hunger for new flavors and working with thirty-six versatile wild plants—some increasingly found in farmers markets—she offers deliciously compelling recipes for everything from cocktails and snacks to appetizers, entrées, and desserts, as well as bakes, breads, preserves, sauces, syrups, ferments, spices, and salts.”
Thank you for following and supporting The ALchemical Nursery Project, follow this link to enter until November 25th:
Read all about this title at https://www.chelseagreen.com/product/forage-harvest-feast/
The regular price is $40.00 for those who would like to purchase it outright, but we are able to offer our readers a discount of 35% off. The discount code CGP18 is valid through 12.31.2018 (cannot be combined with any other offers).

Herb and Plant Walk at Rahma Food Forest

Tuesday July 17, 5pm-6pm

        Rahma Edible Forest Snack Garden,

3100 S Salina St, Syracuse, New York 13205

Our landscapes are filled with beneficial and useful plants, so close at hand yet unrecognized by many, even when they are literally beneath our feet! Urban spaces in particular tend to be abundant with edible and medicinal plants due to the unique and diverse ecosystems created by human impacted environments. Some of these medicinal plants can made into tea or tincture to improve digestion, reduce stress, support the immune system and much more. In this workshop Nick Cavanaugh will help to you learn to identify some of these common plants, how to harvest them from clean locations, and how to consume them for health and enjoyment. Nick is an herbalist from Syracuse, currently practicing as a clinical herbalist in Burlington, VT and helping to run a retail herb store and herbal classroom. You can learn more about Nick’s work at www.nickherbalist.com.
https://www.facebook.com/events/1849817231773315/

2018 Opening Season Clean-Ups and Special Events Schedule

Opening Season Garden CleanUps and Resource Drive

  • Clean-Up Cuse and Resource Drive on Saturday April 21
    Rahma Food Forest Garden from 10am to 3pm
    3100 South Salina St
    In addition to trash pick-up at the food forest and surrounding streets, we will be propagating hardwood cuttings of currants and gooseberry by plugging them directly into the ground in areas that we have targeted for restoration work.  We will also be digging and separating root/bulb perennials to have on stock for our upcoming plant swap and sale (see below).  Finally, we’ll be receiving compost and mulch deliveries from Syracuse Grows that we’ll need volunteers to unload and haul around the site.

    Clean-Up Cuse and Resource Drive on Saturday April 21
    610 Gifford St Community Garden from 11am to 1pm
    Trash pick up at the garden and on surrounding blocks as part of a neighborhood wide effort coordinated by Take Back The Streets.  We’ll feast on rice and beans too provided by our volunteers.  We’ll also start seeding cold weather crops as the ground is supposed to be thawed, and propagating cuttings and other perennials as possible.  Finally, we’ll also be receiving compost and mulch deliveries from Syracuse Grows that we’ll need volunteers to unload and haul around the site.

Special Events

  • EarthFest at Thornden on Sunday April 22
    Thornden Park from 12noon to 4pm
    Come paint garden art signs with us!  Participate in a  community painting event by sharing your style in painting a garden art sign that depicts one of the species in our gardens.  We then use the signs for education in the gardens, and fundraising.  There is no cost for folks to paint!

 

  • Revolution’s Regard Art Show on Sat April 28 from 4pm to 12midnight
    The Gear Factory (Corner of South Geddes and West Fayette)
    Come paint garden art signs with us again!  Participate in a  community painting event by sharing your style in painting a garden art sign that depicts one of the species in our gardens.  We then use the signs for education in the gardens, and fundraising.  There is no cost for folks to paint!

 

  • Plant Swap & Sale on Sat May 5 from 11:30am to 2 pm
    405 Westcott St at Bread and Roses Collective
    Plant lineup will be on Facebook event pages of both organization soon (or contact us if you don’t use FB). This year, Worker’s Center of CNY will be serving Zapatista coffee & selling Handmade crafts, and Brad from Salt City Syrup will be selling his Syrup and Maple Cotton Candy!

Revisiting Rahma – restocking of Rahma Edible Food Forest after 5 years of tree growth

A fundraiser for $500 dollars

In 2012 we started the journey together through design, fundraising and organizing, to build a forest garden on the grounds of the Rahma Free Clinic.  In 2018, after 5 years of growing a forest, we will revisit and renew, taking an intentional look at what succeeded and what failed, redesigning plots and polycultures, and replanting and newly mulching spaces that haven’t yet fulfilled their potential at the Rahma Edible Forest Snack Garden in Syracuse NY, located at 3100 South Salina St.

For example, one of our first plots – the paw-paw/currant/gooseberry/mint polyculture – has been very stable, though we lost one pawpaw tree following a dry period during the summer of 2016.   Most of the groundcover and herbaceous layer is productive, but some spots have seen takeover by plant species that we would rather convert to other productive residents.  Thistle and wild lettuce will be replaced with  friendlier clover, gaps between under-story specimens will be re-mulched and filled in with cuttings from the adjacent gooseberry and currants, and the pawpaw loss will be replanted with two new 4-foot tall saplings (approximate cost with shipping $100.00).

Second, the center of out garden has often suffered from dry periods, and the trees planted there have either been mortality specimens or have grown very very slowly.  We will replant with a monarch waystation patch of 32 plants including 6 different species* ($136.85), as well as a triumvirate of Adirondack Gold Apricot trees ($104.24)!

The remaining funds from the $500 raised will go towards supplies and materials such as plant stakes, ID tags, snacks for volunteers, and clover seed.  If we raise more than the $500, we’ll be able to extend our revisit to other patches in the forest too!  Come take a look and share what areas you’d like to see receive some extra special TLC this year.

* (5) Butterflyweed for Clay (3″ Pots), (5) Rough Blazingstar (3″ Pots), (5) Common Milkweed (3″ Pots), (5) Sky Blue Aster (3″ Pots), (6) Hoary Vervain (3″ Pots), (6) Purple Coneflower (3″ Pots)

Picture above is from our annual Juneberry harvest!  The perks we are providing to donors of this campaign are not metered out in buttons, or keychains, or postcards, or any other trinkets, but in real food, and planting stock, and seeds, that we give away and share with anyone that visits the edible food forest, from the plants that we grow on site!

Member Patrons Benefits and Supports

Become a member patron today by giving only $1 per month ($12 annually or more if you can), and support our ongoing projects:

  • caring for and growing 3 plant communities (gardens),
  • plant sale and swap,
  • film events (this year we will feature “Project Wild Thing” as part of the Gifford/Artrage What If? series),
  • curating information for followers on social media,
  • leading community clean-ups in 2 neighborhoods for Earth Day/Clean Up Cuse,
  • continuation of the garden art signs project,
  • SALT-CNY list-serv

and some new projects:

  • partnership and fiscal sponsorship with Spark Art Space,
  • lionhearted zine gallery in the wild,
  • seed saving and seed library introduction to Syracuse,
  • Board diversity campaign,
  • 2nd location/date for the spring plant swap/sale added to calendar –
  • and more to come, with more details about each of these projects in abundance.

Please donate today as we celebrate 10 years of serving the Permaculture/CNY Community. https://www.patreon.com/alchemicalnursery

NOTE: $12 minimum annual patrons receive one free garden art sign yearly (extra signs available to purchase for $10 each); and $10 in credit to our annual plant sale.

 

 

Winter Fundraising Raffle and Supporting Pledges

Our Annual Winter Fundraising Raffle!! Tickets 1 for $2, 3 for $5, 7 for $10, 15 for $20. Buy tickets at https://squareup.com/store/the-alchemical-nursery-project-inc

1st Prize: Johnny’s Organic Growing Bucket:
30 packets of seeds, everything you need to grow a whole garden, including sweet and hot peppers, zucchini, pink bumblebee tomato, lollo lettuce, red beets, broccoli, cantaloupe, butterhead lettuce, cauliflower, spinach, early carrots, king richard leeks, pie pumpkins, habanero, pink beauty radishes, swiss chard, pickling cucumbers, yellow squash, genovese basil, delicata squash winter, purple top turnip, kaleidoscope nasturtium, zohar sunflower, green cabbage, encore lettuce mix, new girl tomato, goldkrone dill, jade bush beans, sugar ann snap peas, jumbo bush beans, PLUS a Johnny’s bumper sticker and pen!!! A family pack of 4 Alchemical Nursery T-shirts, and a package of Giant Red Garnet Amaranth grown by the Alchemical Nursery at Bitternut Homestead, and a package of 5,000 pelleted Ridgeline Romaine Lettuce Seed from Johnny’s. A total value of $185.

2nd Prize: Turtle Tree Seed Heirloom Gift Pack – Aunt Ada’s Pole Beans, Schweizer Riesen Snow Peas, Myona Tomato, Boothby Blonde Cucumber, and Petunia Perseverance. Plus a pair of Alchemical Nursery T-Shirts, and a package of Giant Red Garnet Amaranth grown by the Alchemical Nursery at Bitternut Homestead, and a package of 5,000 pelleted Ridgeline Romaine Lettuce Seed from Johnny’s. A total value of $45.

Become a “$1 for Permaculture” Supporting Member.  Having a sustaining number of pledgers willing to donate $1 per month (more if you can) allows us to better budget for our annual expenses, and gives us more time for growing food rather than fundraising.

Pledgers will take home a free garden art sign from our SaltQuarters gallery show on March 4th.  Enter your pledge at https://www.patreon.com/alchemicalnursery  See the gallery of signs at http://1forpermaculture.wixsite.com/1forpermaculture

 

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Citizen Science: Testing a small-scale rapid aerated composting system for urban environments

Update January 4, 2017: Success! With an abundance of support for this research, the project earned sufficient funds to proceed with the study, and was awarded a $500 grant for placing first in amount of pledged supporters for the project by a common deadline between other projects within the realm of Cities & Transportation on Experiment.com! Thanks for supporting this citizen scientist, Syracuse resident, and backyard forest gardener in their proactive research efforts – we look forward to learning from his findings, and putting them to practice!

A local Syracuse resident is engaging their passion for environmental science and waste management with composting. Through crowdfunding, Ethan Bodnaruk hopes to kick off a science project to explore efficient, decentralized composting systems that can be used throughout Syracuse and other cities around the world. Here is an excerpt from Ethan’s research proposal:

Urban food and yard wastes can contribute in multiple ways to greenhouse gas production and water pollution. But they can instead be transformed into resources through efficient neighborhood-scale composting. I will test and demonstrate the use of a novel small-scale aerated composting system for rapid composting coupled with bicycle-powered collection of neighborhood yard and food wastes. I aim to make it simple and fine-tuned enough to replicate in many locations.

Ethan with compost piles

Almost half way through the crowdfunding campaign, the experiment is just over 50% funded. If you have the means, would you contribute? Visit this experiment’s proposal page to learn more about his qualifications, research idea, its significance and its goals. In any case, this may be something worth considering and sharing to help cities achieve increased resilience, less environmental footprint and degradation, and greater community empowerment and connectivity. Continue reading →

Annual Winter Potluck image

Annual Winter Potluck – 2016

Join us on Sunday January 29th from 6 pm – 8 pm
for our Annual Potluck and Angel Card Ceremony
at the Bitternut Homestead, 717 Otisco St Syracuse, NY 13204.

We’ll share food, enjoy a burning fire, pull Angel Cards, create art, and catch up. Vegan food is preferable for sharing. BYOB.

Share and RSVP on the Facebook page for this event if you can, and in any case, feel free to come and bring good company!

Rahma Stewardship Team Scheduling

Getting a permaculture forest garden through the first stage of succession takes work. Trees take time for their canopies to emerge, and there is rigorous competition as intended cover crops try to spread and establish themselves. All that means Rahma Forest Garden needs extra care and maintenance as it perseveres toward a more stable state: freeing up trees, pulling out obvious overgrowth of weeds, pruning and clearing trails and growing space to help people and plants thrive there.

We’re growing a Stewardship Team to look after Rahma Forest Garden. The team schedule is on Google Drive and can be accessed at the following link. Please feel free to sign up for a participation or leadership slot, or make note of a time you’ll be going to steward the garden!

Rahma Stewardship Team Schedule ( https://goo.gl/xOAWv3 )

Right now, the Rahma Stewardship Team is mostly Alchemical Nursery board members and regular volunteers, and we’d like to expand the team and involve more local community members. Being an Alchemical Nursery, part of our long-term goal is to pass on mature and fruitful projects to local communities once we’ve nursed the seeds into sprouts and cared for sprouts so they grow up as hearty creatures! Right now, Rahma is a little bit beyond the sprout stage and needs attention and support, as well as a shift in stewardship toward long-term, local care and enjoyment. As Alchemical Nursery we strive to facilitate that through plant propagation for the public, training volunteers, raising community awareness about permaculture lifestyles & landscapes in Syracuse, and hosting educational workshops for a diversity of youth & adults. All that takes time, resources, and most importantly: volunteers! We invite anyone with interest in learning more or getting more involved to reach out to us and come to the forest garden!