Session A: Urban Agroforestry
FOOD FORESTS – BUILDING EDIBLE COMMUNITY LANDSCAPES –
Gary Wyatt University of Minnesota Extension – Recognizes our quality educational and interpretive signage at the Rahma Edible Food Forest Garden during this year’s conference
Many of you were instrumental in the design, development, and management of Rahma Food Forest Garden over the years, come out for a tour to see how things stand. And learn how you can help with the next phase of development as we work to stabilize the understory beneath our canopy.
https://www.facebook.com/events/764065274091605
If you can, become a supporting member at www.patreon.com/alchemicalnursery
Scan this QR Code with your Smart Phone to sign up for our garden site harvest notifications through the growing seasons!
Joint fundraiser for The Alchemical Nursery Project (ANP) and the Syracuse Refugee Agriculture Program (SyRAP)
Come learn how to make traditional miso from Kayo Green in a fun Zoom class! What is Miso? Miso is a fermented soybean paste that is popular in Japan and throughout Asia. The rich savory flavor can be used in soups, marinades, salad dressings, and even some desserts. Hosted by Frank Cetera of the Alchemical Nursery Project and Lucy Spence of Syracuse RISE.
$25 donation to view and participate in Live & Interactive Zoom Class. >> Unlimited People
$10 add-on for ½ pint of white miso in mason jar (available in 12 weeks after virtual event when fermentation is complete, pickup only) >> Limit 16 people
$15 add-on kit of soybeans and koji to make your own miso (available after the virtual event, scheduled pick-up only >> Limit 16 people
REGISTER TODAY AT https://the-alchemical-nursery-project-inc.square.site/
That’s right, just in time for holiday gift giving. What better gift than the gift of greenery. Our Spring Perennial and Native Plant Sale is entering it’s 5th year and it gets bigger and better each year (in partnership with the Bread and Roses Collective).
Our plants are sourced from our community growing sites right in the City of Syracuse, from the Rahma Food Forest on the Southside, the 610 Gifford Street Community Garden in the Near Westside, and volunteers’ own homesites in a variety of locations.
To see a list of what we had to offer this past Spring of 2020, visit our plant sale inventory sheet (note, this list will be updated for the 2021 plant sale and is subject to change).
Gift cards can be redeemed for anything on our available list starting on April 1st 2021. So give a gift today that will extend out mission, vision, and plants plants plants to more people in and around Syracuse and Onondaga County!
You can purchase gift cards form our Square e-commerce site at https://squareup.com/gift/CAB9FQXG8VXT6/order
To take advantage of the discount promotions ($5 off a $20 purchase, or $10 off a $35 purchase) for being a supporting member through our Patreon account, first visit: https://www.patreon.com/alchemicalnursery and sign up for the $2.00 or higher monthly donation level.
NOTE: Gift cards only redeemable for Alchemical Nursery Project inventory items (Code ANP).
We had a fun fifth year at 610 Gifford St in 2020, and it’s time to clean up, organize, and prepare for 2021. If you want to pick one day to visit and lend a hand this fall, this coming Saturday October 24th is it, 11:00 am start time.
Here’s our Fall To-Do List in pictures:
Constant vigilance with the bindweed. Concentrating this week on the strawberry beds.
Nothing doing here, just a note that we repurposed the former potato bed with some kale seedlings and some black currant cuttings we hope will root that we salvaged from one of the black currant bushes that was damaged by a falling tree branch during last week’s storm.
Harvesting of the highbush cranberry.
Hard to see, but would like to dig out the coneflower from the middle of this bed and transplant somewhere near the front of the site.
This former radish and herb bed will become the new potato bed, we have taters to plant on Saturday.
Clean up of the corn and squash bed.
This perennial bed will be cleaned up and receive a major batch of new asparagus crowns to expand this crop. With care to also select for the raspberry that have moved into this bed.
Pull the mint from this middle bed.
Another shot of the asparagus bed from the other side.
The rhubarb bed will also be a bit reorganized. Two of the rhubarb are growing too close together. We will dig up divide and plant out with better spacing in the same bed.
Another shot of the rhubarb bed.
The potatoes for planting. Fall potato plantings requires they be placed a few inches below ground and it is not necessary to chit (cut and dry) them first.
The asparagus crowns that Frank dug from Brady Farm, they were giving them away as they renovate the bed the asparagus were in for a different crop.
“For residents in food deserts, community gardens can offer inexpensive access to high-quality produce.
“If you can save $20 on your food costs, that can be significant for some families who are in a lower income bracket,” said Frank Cetera, who operates the Edible Forest Snack Garden on South Salina Street.
Cetera saw increased interest in community gardening after the pandemic began. Many people, such as Lane, were simply looking for an outlet and a reason to leave the house.
The Salina Street garden, which allows any Syracuse resident to pick food from the plants growing there, is open 24/7, Cetera said.
“Good food, organically-grown food, is not cheap,” Cetera said. “You can spend a couple dollars just on a small container of raspberries, but we have many berries available for picking at our gardens so every little bit helps.”
Cetera is also the president of the Alchemistry Nursery Project, which promotes urban agriculture in Syracuse. Through conferencing sessions, he and other members of the project have offered advice on gardening and answered questions about how people can start gardens at home, he said.
“Some people who are more susceptible to coronavirus may not want to come into a garden space even if it is outdoors because there are a lot of people in that space,” Cetera said. “So we help them in their own homes by sending (raised beds) out and giving them seeds and so forth.””
Read the full story at http://dailyorange.com/2020/09/syracuse-gardens-offer-residents-sense-community-pandemic/
Our Fall/Winter/Spring fundraising campaign this year will be to raise a pool of funds to use as stipends for paid labor of community members doing stewardship and maintenance work on our community growing and public harvest sites.
Matching starts at 8 AM on Tuesday, DONATE on GIVING TUESDAY as close to 8 AM or after in order to have the best chance for your gift to be matched 100% by Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/donate/172183821265202/
One of our challenges through the years has been recruiting enough volunteers to maintain and steward our project sites. As our project sites grow, that challenge is even greater and more important. Alchemical Nursery started public forest gardening in 2012 with the creation of the Rahma Edible Food Forest Snack Garden in the Southside at 3100 South Salina St in partnership with the Rahma Free Health Clinic. In 2013 we moved our home offices to the Bitternut Homestead on Otisco St, where we manage the propagation and potting for our annual Spring native, edible perennial plants fundraising sale in partnership with the Bread and Roses Collective. In 2015, we developed the 610 Gifford Street Community Garden on a leased Land Bank property. In 2018 we began stewarding the Gifford Shonnard Meadow Orchard to preserve peach trees, apple trees, and black currant bushes that had been abandoned. And now in 2021 we are launching The Depot Tool Share, Bike Kitchen, and Seed Library at 713 Marcellus St, in addition to geographically-distributed COVID19 relief efforts including our Raised Beds for Food Sovereignty mutual aid campaign.
Our project sites are located in two of the poorest census tracts in the city. Syracuse’s census tract 30, the Near Westside, has a median household income of only $12,823; census tract 58, part of the Southside, has a median household income of only $26,364 (https://datausa.io/profile/geo/syracuse-ny/#economy). In order to bolster the resiliency of these communities, we must bring resources into them. And so we ask for your help in developing our “ANP Paid Garden Stewards Program” by donating to the campaign that will create a pool of money that will be:
We hold no naive notions that we will be able to hire full-time staff in the next year. Nonetheless we know that for many people (for example previously incarcerated persons re-entering the workforce, students needing part-time work, or people working in low-wage jobs seeking to supplement their income with fulfilling hands-on work), the need is great and we hope to provide:
Please help by contributing to the Paid Garden Stewards Program
Our goal is to raise $11,683.20 which will provide for employment of one or more individuals from April through October for a total of 600 stewardship hours at one or more of our project sites. This will be our biggest campaign raise of funds from our supporters and members in the history of our activism, but after 10 years of operations and resilience, we can take this next step with you. This will move us forward in a proactive vision of a garden city that provides right livelihood in ecological landscaping and food production The challenge is to convert more of your personal charitable budget to land-based educational and work assets that gives people work towards right livelihood, while growing greater momentum over time, for people who are struggling in our community.
BUDGET BREAKDOWN
BASE GOAL: 20 hours/week for 30 weeks (from April-October) at $16/hour living wage rate = $9,600 gross wage payments. Plus 8% wage taxes ($768). Plus 6.7% workers comp NYS Insurance Fund rate for class code 0042 Landscape Gardening ($643.20). Total cost = $11,011.20.
STRETCH GOAL: Our stretch goal for any monies raised above and beyond this initial amount will be used for engaging the services of a professional payroll/human resources agency, rather than our Board volunteer time, to provide an employee handbook, handle check writing, and provide tax and insurance oversight for our employees.
Matching starts at 8 AM on Tuesday, DONATE on GIVING TUESDAY as close to 8 AM or after in order to have the best chance for your gift to be matched 100% by Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/donate/172183821265202/
We have a special email list for those who are actively involved in steward work at our project sites. It is a weekly update on progress and next steps, event scheduling, and other odds and ends. If you would like to be included, please email info@alchemicalnursery.org with your request. Here is a sample of the emails from the past couple weeks:
Very Quickie Update This Week, hope to see you in person soon if I haven’t lately:
