Here is a rundown of what's happening on the Garden Tour!The People's Plot Community Garden at West Asheville Park - 198 Vermont Ave - Asheville DSA members manage this community garden along with Bountiful Cities. The Asheville Edibles Program makes it possible for us to grow food on city owned property. Steve Goff of Brined and Cured and Tastee Diner will be dishing up veggie centric tastes.
****Pick up your tasting tickets HERE! Lucy S. Herring Elementary - Herring Ave Entrance - A beautiful school garden managed by Bountiful Cities for many years will feature famed Chef Camille Cogswell and her delicious food, and pollinator activities with Bee City USA and Asheville Greenworks. Sunny Point Cafe Garden - 626 Haywood Rd - Tastings from Sunny Point Café will feature their own house grown produce. This beautiful garden produces hundreds of pounds of food for the café every year. Take a stroll around the garden and do the scavenger hunt while you are there. Peace Garden and Market - 47 Bryant St - View an amazing mixture of artwork and gardens in this thriving community garden. While you are there check out Safi Martin and DeWayne Barton's farmstand. OWL Bakery will provide seasonal tartlets and Everyday Gourmet will be sharing Watermelon Gazpacho. Hall Fletcher Elementary - 60 Ridgelawn - The HOP Ice cream created delicious flavors just for us and using mint from our gardens. Come and get some at this Bountiful Cities managed school garden. The Aquaponics set up will be on display and Sow True Seed will be there to talk all things seeds. Elder and Sage Community Garden - 37 Page Ave - Featuring tastings from Stony Hill Bistro and a cooking demo from Spicewalla Chef Bre Emmons, this garden is a great example of container gardening in the midst of tall buildings and a parking lot. Elder and Sage Community Gardeners take good care of the space and passers by often stop in to enjoy. Bounitful Cities Pearson Garden - 408 Pearson Dr - East Fork Pottery will be dishing up some delicious food on their beautiful dishes. Seed saving activities and a Raffle will give you lots to do in the garden. Plants from the Bountiful Cities Nursery will also be for sale. Singer and Songwriter David Dye will be playing music. Parking is tricky, so biking is encouraged!
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Save the Date! Saturday July 30th The Urban Garden Tour and Tasting is FREE event open to everyone! Seven local food producing gardens will open their gates for visitors, educational activities and tours. There is no cost to visit the gardens. Local chefs will be preparing small bites for sampling and local (nonalcoholic) drinks will be available. Find out more and register below to join the tour and to purchase food and beverage tickets. To sample at every garden tickets are $25 in advance. You will receive a punch card at the first garden site you go to. Register for Urban Garden Tour with Bountiful Cities  Join us at Herb Fest this weekend! Bountiful Cities Windfall Collective Nursery will be selling at Asheville Herb Fest April 29th -May 1st. We will have a wide selection of edible, medicinal, native and pollinator plants. If you can't make it out to Herb Fest we have plants available to the community throughout the season. Feel free to reach out to Lynx at [email protected] with any questions or direct requests. See below for more plant sales coming up on May 5th and 6th! Find more info. on our EVENTS page. FEAST News FEAST students at FDNSC are studying spices. Each student in the program chooses a spice, creates a powerpoint to present, and finds a recipe that utilizes that spice to make a dish for the class! Here 5th and 8th graders are making banana pancakes with Spicewalla cinnamon and Mother Earth Food bananas! Plant Sales to Benefit our School Gardens May 5th, 6th, and beyond! The Lucy S Herring Elementary Peace Garden will have a plant sale to support FEAST programming on May 5th 8-4pm. After the sale concludes, we will continue to sell any remaining homegrown herb and veggie starts through self-service and honor system payment. All proceeds go directly to the school garden, which is managed in partnership with Bountiful Cities. Visit the Facebook Event for more information. The Hall Fletcher Elementary FEAST Garden will also hold a plant sale on Thursday May 5th AND Friday May 6th 2:30-5pm AND we need volunteers! Sign up HERE! Want more details? Reach out to [email protected] Bountiful Cities Community Garden Network Free Workshops and Events To register for this event click HERE.
No artistic experience needed! Bring a Sketch Book if you have one, if not materials will be provided. Translation and Childcare provided upon request. Link to Facebook Event The Bountiful Cities Community Garden Network is pleased to present free workshops each month in conjunction with The City of Asheville. For more information about this workshop go to our Facebook Page or check out our events on our Bountiful Cities Website. You can also contact our Community Garden Network Coordinators Isa Whitaker [email protected] or Lydia George [email protected] Hot Springs Elementary School Garden ROCK-a-thon
How many pounds of rocks can each grade remove from the garden area in a five minute period? Students will take on the challenge May 13th and 20th. We know they’re going to ROCK at it! 100% of the proceeds will go directly to supporting next year’s garden classes at HSES. Here children learn:
Sponsor Name Sponsor email address and phone number Grade You'll Sponsor $ Per Pound of Rocks Example: Jane Doe [email protected] (828) 206-1111 First Grade $0.50 *No donor will be charged for more than 40 pounds of rocks. For example if you pledge $0.50/pound, the most you will be asked to donate is $20. How to Donate Email us the above chart information to [email protected] or text Natalie Hesed, the Garden Coordinator, at (828) 206-1487. We will contact you with final rock tallies and donation amounts after the event is completed! You can then donate online or by check. You can also choose to donate a flat amount instead of pledging. You can donate any time now through May 20 using the online method or a check. All donations will go through Bountiful Cities, the nonprofit sponsor for the garden program. All contributions are tax deductible. Online donations can be made April 26-May 20, 2022 at the following link: https://www.paypal.com/fundraiser/charity/173226. Credit cards accepted. No fees are charged to you or us! Checks can be made out to “Bountiful Cities”. Be sure to write “HSES” in the memo! They can be mailed to Bountiful Cities PO Box 898 Asheville, NC 28802 Thank you for your generous support of the HSES garden program! This garden is supported by the Community Foundation of WNC Human Services Grant What FEAST Math Class looks like...Why would you need math in the garden? Ms. Jordan's FEAST students find out quickly that skills traditionally learned sitting at a desk are useful in the garden and FUN! These 4th graders are playing the Square Foot Gardening Game while planning where to plant vegetables, and the 5th graders are calculating the volume of the wheelbarrow and the surface area the mulch will cover! Want to support Bountiful Cities/FEAST educational efforts? The Lucy Herring Elementary Peace Garden in West Asheville needs ~20 bales of straw (ideally not sprayed with glyphosate)! If 20 people each bought a bale and dropped it off, we would be set for the rest of the growing season. We would also welcome loose straw, so if you know of a source and/or can help deliver, please reach out to [email protected] Bountiful Cities Community Garden Network FREE Workshops To RSVP for this kid friendly event click HERE. The Bountiful Cities Community Garden Network is pleased to present free workshops each month in conjunction with The City of Asheville. For more information about this workshop go to our Facebook Page or check out our events on our Bountiful Cities Website. You can also contact our Community Garden Network Coordinators Isa Whitaker [email protected] or Lydia George [email protected] Workshops Presented in Collaboration with The City of Asheville Thank YOU Student Volunteers! Thanks to students from Odyssey High School and University of Tennesse for coming out to our Pearson Garden last week to learn, plant, and build! They helped pot up plants that will get donated to community gardens (see below for more detials on getting plants!) and they helped build infrastructure for the greenhouse! Would YOU like to Volunteer?If you would like to sign up to get regular updates about our volunteer opportunities please contact [email protected] or fill out this FORM. You can also attend one of our weekly garden workday events: Pearson Garden and Nursery Garden workdays Wednesdays from 3-5pm. Located at 408 Pearson Dr. in Montford. Please click this link to sign up. Contact [email protected] for more information. Hall Fletcher Elementary School FEAST Garden Wednesdays 2:45-4:00pm, 60 Ridgelawn Rd. Please click this link to sign up. Contact [email protected] for more information. Lucy Herring Elementary School Peace Garden (formerly Vance Elementary School) in West Asheville. Workdays Tuesdays 2:45-3:45. The garden will again be closed to the public from 8 AM- 2:30 pm so that classes can use the garden for outdoor learning. Please contact [email protected] for questions and to RSVP. We Need Help Building a Block Foundation for our GreenhouseDo you have skills? Or do you want to learn more about Greenhouses and Construction? Please contact [email protected] if you have experience building or would like to learn! In the coming months we will be constructing a donated greenhouse at our Pearson Garden and this is an opportunity to learn and share. Hello and GoodbyeWelcome to Kelly Applegate the new Bountiful Cities FEAST program assistant! Kelly has been organic gardening and farming for 9+ years and is currently a non-traditional student at Warren Wilson studying Environmental Education. Garden education is a passion of Kelly’s and she is so excited to be a part of FEAST’s meaningful and community impacting work! It is with sadness and congratulations that we say goodbye to Whisper Moore. Whisper is an INFJ advocate on the Myers Briggs and as such enjoys bringing the vision of others to fruition. She is a mother of two little girls who enjoy camping and hiking to waterfalls as a family. As an herbalist, Whisper enjoys making tinctures and tea blends as well as plant identification. As she move on from Bountiful Cities to the Campaign for Southern Equality we know she will continue to spread her good work! Bountiful Cities Plant SalesSpring is upon us, and Windfall Collective Nursery has a wide selection of edible, medicinal, native and pollinator plants getting up to size! We'll have plants available to the community starting mid-April, here is a list of our inventory for the spring as well as upcoming perennials. We'll also have the webstore updated with our current inventory soon, including an option to pre-order. Feel free to reach out to Lynx at [email protected] with any questions or direct requests. If you're part of the community gardens and haven't gotten a chance to use your gift card yet, be sure to visit our donation inventory here and fill out this form to put in an order with us. We'll continue to have new varieties throughout the season, and are happy to take specific requests of plants not currently in our inventory. We look forward to growing with you this season! FEAST School Plant Sales Save the Date for the Herring Elementary Peace Garden Plant Sale! We will have a big plant sale on May 5 from 8-4, followed by a donation-based self-service sale with any remaining plants until all are gone. This year we are partnering with First Step Farms, as well as selling home-grown veggie and herb starts. All proceeds will go towards the FEAST Program and Peace Garden at Lucy S Herring Elementary School. Hot Springs Elementary FEAST Garden   We are so glad to support FEAST programming in Madison County! It's exciting to see cooking and gardening education happening. This photo is from their first workday of the growing season, and the community support is obvious! This project is funded by the Community Foundation of WNC, Human Services Grant Progam.
You spoke and we listened. After years of planning and community assessments the Bountiful Cities Apprenticeship Program launched March 14th of this year with three apprentices. For this pilot year we are focusing on hammering out the curriculum and gathering our instructors as well as the sites that the apprentices will visit to gain those hands-on experiences and skills.
Apprentices started the year attending the Come to the Table Conference hosted by Rural Advancement Foundation International. That opened up some good discussion on the ideas of “Land Hunger,” food security, and the USDA’s hand in how food systems function. Land Hunger was a term used to describe the drive freedmen had to acquire land that they had heretofore been barred from. They would squat on the land and take any means necessary to acquire it. Land is integral to growing food. Access to land is one of the number one barriers that new emerging farmers continue to face. It is how wealth has been built in the country for generations. Land is also how we determine rights, voting, and the like via districting. And with more and more farm land being developed and turned into subdivisions, farmers and those who want a secure food future are becoming more land hungry. This brings us to the idea of Food Security. One speaker defined food security as, “All people, at all times, having physical and economic access to sufficient, safe and nutritious food that meets their dietary needs and food preference for an active and healthy lifestyle.” This is a very in depth concept of the term and brings into question how many individuals can truly say they are food secure? With this definition of food security the numbers for food insecurity are staggering. The apprenticeship program is designed to help foster more food security in our community not only by giving community members the skills needed to grow food in their areas, but also to share these skills throughout the community. Finally, the USDA is shaping our food systems through subsidies for certain crops. But they also provide grants and insurance for farmers. It is a very complicated and complex issue and is too much to get into right now. Hopefully, with our apprentices learning about these complex systems they can help envision ideas for change in the future. If you are a community member or organization involved in food systems and would like to share what you do with our apprentices, please reach out to [email protected] By Lydia George
With spring around the corner growers are beginning to plan their crops for the coming year. Here are some 101 tips for starting seeds this season! There are two main ways to start seeds, the first is into seed trays, and the second is to sow them directly into the soil. There are pros and cons to both styles that I will lay out for you. Starting seeds in trays is great because you can get a jump on the season and have crops for harvesting earlier in the year! Many farmers and gardeners will start seeds as early as February for hardier early spring varieties, and now is a great time of year for planting summer crops in trays, so that by May you will have larger plants to put in your garden. The hard thing about using seed trays is that you will need to make sure that the conditions in the pot are never too moist or too dry, and you need to continue to size up the pots as the plant grows and eventually move the plant to your garden bed. This process of numerous transplants can be hard on a baby plant and can take a toll on their health for their entire life cycle. The best way to avoid detrimental effects to your potted seedlings is to make sure that you never transplant during sunny days. The sunshine will be too much for the baby plant and they could easily wilt or dry up. It is best to make the transplant on cloudy or rainy days if that is an option, or in the evening so that the plants have all night to adjust to their new environment. Make sure to keep the plants well watered and tended to during the first 2 weeks after transplanting. Sowing seeds directly into the soil will allow for stronger, more resilient plants that will need less tending during their life cycle because they are becoming established in the same place from the moment they sprout, the way nature intended them to grow. That being said, for direct sowing seeds you often have to wait till the frost is over, which means there will be a longer wait to harvest than with plants you start indoors in trays. Directly sown seeds are also more at risk of other environmental conditions like birds, rabbits, deer and insects who may find your baby plants to be a delicious and much needed snack. These seeds also could be put at risk of a late frost or other weather conditions. This means that you may end up with less plants than seeds you put in the ground, and should plant extra accordingly. There are also homemade organic sprays you can use to deter pests and products like row cover you can use for elemental protection. A good gardener will often use a mix of directly sown crops and ones that were prestarted in trays. Whatever you choose to do, as long as you tend to your seedlings with care they will surely flourish! Check out our new Events Calendar to see all our upcoming gardening workdays and events.   In this hands-on workshop we will learn about and help construct an AERATED compost system. This type of system can produce beautiful pathogen free and weed seed free soil in a short period of time. This workshop is limited to 20 participants. Please sign up in advance here to attend: https://docs.google.com/.../1-mSU0Hq1t94g2kBV1abo.../edit...
These workshops presented in conjunction with The City of Asheville.  Pearson's New Growing Space! Bountiful Cities has been gifted a beautiful glass greenhouse from the Sovereign Oaks Community in Asheville. We will be relocating it and installing it in our Pearson Garden and Nursery in Montford. At this garden we grow out plants to share through our Community Garden Network. Free plant starts enable communities to get a jump start on the growing season and grow as much food as possible. We need your help! Moving and reconstructing a greenhouse is an exciting and expensive project. Please support us as we support the community. Donate to our Greenhouse at Pearson Project and get involved in growing food, and building climate resiliency for our community.  FEAST student doing "homework" with potatoes from the FEAST garden. Photo credit: Kirsten Moburg-Davis This month in the Bountiful Cities FEAST program, Fourth graders at Lucy Herring Elementary completed a nearly year-long project following the cycle of the potato. These potatoes represent a lot of firsts for this group of kids. Back in April as 3rd graders, they planted these potatoes during their first in-person FEAST class after a year of virtual learning. Then back in September, they harvested these potatoes during their first FEAST class as 4th graders. And during their first FEAST class of 2022, they packed them into paper bags with some rosemary, sage, and garlic also grown in the garden and excitedly brought them home to cook for dinner. School COVID policies may prevent us from cooking in FEAST classes, but it won't keep us from getting kids excited about growing and cooking vegetables at home! |
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