Hello Plant Friends!

Cincinnati, Ohio  has been hit with a few heat advisories and several torrential rain showers, but the Over-the-Rhine People’s Garden (OTRPG) is not worse for the wear.  Oddly, this Mother Nature weather recipe seemed to be just what the garden needed because everything looking so lush and bountiful. Enjoy checking out some of the highlights and happenings from this month.

Many of our gardeners have re-planted food plots with a second succession of plants, and are looking forward to a late summer harvest.  Garden volunteers, neighborhood children, and the Civic Garden Center’s summer interns had fun designing and planting a pollinator garden.  A pollinator  garden helps revive the health of bees, butterflies, birds, bats and other pollinators.  The flowers chosen for this garden are: Mammoth Sunflowers, Mexican Marigolds, Poppies, and Milkweed.  This activity was  part of the free nature camp offered each Tuesday all summer from 2:00P.M.- 4:00P.M.  Each week we have been exploring a different part of the plant life cycle, and we share a snack prepared from the garden.  Hope to see you and your family in the garden!

Garden Coordinator Christina and her husband Jeff are enjoying the beginning stages of flower farming.  They have been working hard tending to their market garden. Carefully weeding between rows, watering daily, and lots of sunshine have done the trick.  The result–beautiful blooming flowers!

The community cabbage patch has been providing us with just what our bodies need.  Cabbage is packed with vitamins and is a very low calorie vegetable.  Try adding it to stir-fry or fermenting it!

The photo below shows the beautiful view of OTRPG as we were wrapping up  our awesome our work day today.  Everyone left feeling very blessed and grateful to have this community garden space in our city.  One gardener, 4th grader at St. Francis Seraph School, asked if she could stay and grow her own food in the garden forever.  It’s always so rewarding to see the impact this program makes on the children who live near OTRPG.  Thank you for all the training and support Grow Appalachia!

 

We appreciate you checking in on us here in Over-the-Rhine People’s Garden! We will be back again next month to share recipes, flower design tips and much more.  Until then, garden onward friends!