Pacific Street Bear’s Garden, Park Slope, Green With Envy Tour, II.1

Posted on 2008-08-05 by admin

Green With Envy Tour Two at the Pacific Street Brooklyn Bear’s Garden

Saturday, July 26, Tour Two of the Green With Envy tour of Brooklyn Community Garden’s kicked off where it started two weeks earlier: at the Brooklyn Bear’s Garden at Pacific Street.

We’re building raised beds at the Flatbush Community Garden, so I was paying more attention to details of their construction at different gardens on this tour.

Amazing how quickly things change. Two weeks before, I didn’t notice this cabbage. The fingerprints show how irresistible it must be to touch.

I didn’t get any good shots of this “Office Al Fresco” on the first tour. Very organized.

The inside of the door shows photos of all the gardeners.

I love these exuberant Trumpet Vines (Campsis radicans) growing in several of the gardens. It’s one of my favorite native vines, but there are few places where it can be grown effectively under cultivation, especially in compressed urban settings. It gets to be a huge in both height and mass, requiring a large, sturdy, long-lived structure to support it. Also, it’s a bit of a thug and throws up runners everywhere, so weeding and cultivation of the ground around it must be considered before placing it. I also see this growing over backyard fences into the B/Q subway cut, which is as good a placement as any!

Oak-Leaf Hydrangea (Hydrangea quercifolia), one of my favorite native shrubs. Again, the species is too large for most urban gardens. Several “dwarf” cultivars are available.

The Zinnias continue their psychedelic bloom.

Tour Brooklyn community gardens this Saturday, July 26

Posted on 2008-07-24 by admin

El jardin esta abierto / The garden is open

This is a reminder that the second leg of the Green With Envy Tour of Brooklyn community gardens is this Saturday, July 26. Tour Two kicks off at 10am from the Brooklyn Bear’s Pacific Street Garden, in the triangle at the intersection of Flatbush Avenue and Pacific Street in Park Slope, near the Atlantic Avenue station.

This is an opportunity to hear about the history of Brooklyn’s community gardens, speak with gardeners at each of the gardens, and learn how they organize and operate.

I posted 160 photos from Tour One two weeks ago. Tour Two promises to be just as extensive and interesting.

Pacific Street Brooklyn Bear’s Garden at Flatbush Avenue
St. Marks Avenue Blk. Assn. Community Garden btwn Carlton & Vanderbilt
Prospect Heights Community Farm, St. Marks btwn Vanderbilt & Underhill
Fulton Revival Garden, Vanderbilt at Gates
Hollenback Community Garden, Washington btwn Gates & Greene
Classon Ful-gate Community Garden, Classon btwn Fulton & Gates
Clifton Place Community Garden, Grand btwn Clifton & Greene
Pratt/Clinton Hill Community Garden, Hall St at DeKalb
The Greene Garden, DeKalb at Portland
Carlton Avenue Brooklyn Bear’s Garden between Fulton & Greene

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Green With Envy, Tour One, Final Stops 9 and 10

Posted on 2008-07-21 by admin

Green With Tour at the Gil Hodges Memorial Garden, Gowanus, Brooklyn.

The last two gardens we visited on the Green With Envy Tour, Tour One, on Saturday, July 12, were the Gil Hodges Memorial Garden in Gowanus and the Greenspace at the corner of President Street and 5th Avenue in Park Slope. Not too many photos from either of these. It was the end of the tour, nearly 5 hours after we had started, in the hottest part of the day. I was exhausted and needed to get home, cool down, and crash.

We do it all again this Saturday starting at 10am. Details below.

President Street Greenspace, Park Slope, Brooklyn

Signs

Te amo, Gil Hodges Garden

EL JARDIN ESTA ABIERTO (THE GARDEN IS OPEN), President Street Greenspace

Glam

Canna leaf, Gil Hodges Garden

Black Grass, Gil Hodges Garden

Zinnia, President Street Greenspace

Tour Two, Saturday, July 26

Pacific Street Brooklyn Bear’s Garden at Flatbush Avenue
St. Marks Avenue Blk. Assn. Community Garden btwn Carlton & Vanderbilt
Prospect Heights Community Farm, St. Marks btwn Vanderbilt & Underhill
Fulton Revival Garden, Vanderbilt at Gates
Hollenback Community Garden, Washington btwn Gates & Greene
Classon Ful-gate Community Garden, Classon btwn Fulton & Gates
Clifton Place Community Garden, Grand btwn Clifton & Greene
Pratt/Clinton Hill Community Garden, Hall St at DeKalb
The Greene Garden, DeKalb at Portland
Carlton Avenue Brooklyn Bear’s Garden between Fulton & Greene

Look for more “GWE” Tours coming up this fall in Bed Stuy and East NY, once again sponsored by the new (and still forming) Brooklyn Community Gardeners’ Coalition. There’ll also be a bike tour in August sponsored by the Brooklyn Queens Land Trust! Lots of opportunities to see Brooklyn’s beautiful gardens!

Gardens of Union, Park Slope, Green With Envy Tour, I.8

Posted on 2008-07-19 by admin

Green With Envy Tour at the Garden of Union, Park Slope, Brooklyn.

The Gardens of Union in Park Slope comprise two gardens nearly side-by-side: The large, active Garden of Union, and the smaller, contemplative Annie’s Garden two lots up the block. Both gardens are part of the NYC Department of Parks and Recreation:

The Garden of Union lies on Union Street, but the name derives as much from its character as its location. The property is composed of two gardens separated by an apartment building. The smaller, located at 540 Union Street, is known as Annie’s Garden for Annie Thomson (b. 1919), the woman whose determination, energy, and spirit was largely responsible for making the garden come to life. Annie’s Garden opened in 1987. The main space, the Garden of Union, is located at 634-36 Union Street and has been operating since 1979. Both areas are maintained by Parks and garden members, most of whom reside in Park Slope. Other volunteers come from all over Brooklyn, from Howard Beach to Carroll Gardens to Sunset Park.

The Garden of Union and Annie’s Garden are community gardens with well-developed plantings of vegetables and flowers. The bulk of the land in the main garden is devoted to vegetables, and much attention is paid to the ornamental qualities of vegetables. Flowers and herbs are also integrated with the vegetable plantings. The garden regularly yields more produce than the members can use, and much of the vegetables are often given away to members of the community and a local soup kitchen.
– Parks Sign

Grotto at the rock garden.

Lily pool.

This mullein is visible in both of the first two photos above. It towered about 8 feet above us.

Composting

This gardening community is well-known for its active community composting program. The composting area was a highlight of the tour.

Here’s the industrial scale composting operation. The plastic tubes are perforated to draw air and oxygen into the base of the compost pile.

More awesomeness is this combination triple-bin compost system and grape arbor.

Annie’s Garden

Walking from the entrance to the rear of the garden.

At the rear of the garden are these ying/yang beds.

Looking back toward the street entrance.

Glam Shots

Lunaria Pods, Annie’s Garden

Death Valley, Annie’s Garden

Harvest wreath hanging inside the door of the tool shed in the Garden of Union.

Hydrangea quercifolia, Oak-leaf Hydrangea, with harvesting basket.

Grapes on the composting arbor.

Rhubarb

Water lily.

Hollyhock.

These beautiful beetles were buzzing and crawling around some squash plants. Probably not good for the squash, but I was intrigued. Anyone know what these are?

Lincoln-Berkeley Community Garden, Park Slope, Green With Envy Tour, I.7

Posted on 2008-07-19 by admin

Into the home stretch of Tour One of the Green With Envy Tour of Brooklyn community gardens, we visited the Lincoln-Berkeley Community Garden. I’m afraid I don’t have many photos of this garden. We’d been walking for 3 and 1/2 hours over several miles on a hot, humid day. I was getting tired, and cranky.

But here are a few photos.

I liked the placard on the sidewalk at the entrance to the garden.

Here’s the main path leading from the entrance to the rear of the garden.

Some Hosta near the entrance would looking good.

Baltic Street Community Garden, Park Slope, Green With Envy Tour, I.6

Posted on 2008-07-18 by admin

One of the gardeners shows off his bed.

I lived in Park Slope for 13 years before moving to Flatbush. The Baltic Street Garden, facing busy 4th Avenue, is a garden I knew of but never got to visit while I lived there. Driving along 4th Avenue during the summer, it’s hard to miss. The two-story Campsis radicans, the native Trumpet Vine, qualifies this as a 50 mile-per-hour garden.

The interior of the garden used to be screened from the street by hedges. Although you can now see the garden from the sidewalk and street, it’s a different experience viewing it from the inside.

The plots are large, raised beds. Gardeners grow a wide variety of vegetables, fruits, herbs and ornamentals.

Awesome.

Some glam shots.

Peaches were falling off this tree. Perfect fuzz.

Even the “necessaries” were photogenic.

I got a kick out of this sign just inside the entrance. That’s just how I feel. They missed a view of my “love to hate” though. What would you add to their list?

Warren-St Marks Community Garden, Park Slope, Green With Envy, I.5

Posted on 2008-07-17 by admin

We’re now halfway through the Green With Envy Tour One from last Saturday. We cross the thoroughfare of 4th Avenue, leaving Boerum Hill and entering my old neighborhood of Park Slope.

The Warren-St Mark’s Garden spans Warren Street and St. Mark’s Place between 4th and 5th Avenues in Park Slope. The contrasts with the gardens we visited in Boerum Hill were striking. First, there was just so much space, and more openness and sunlight. Second, food was being grown here.

Of course, my eyes were still drawn more to the ornamental plantings.

This big, yellow Asteraceae demanded attention. I didn’t recognize it. I thought at first it was a Heliopsis. The flowers remind me more of a Coreopsis, but I’ve never seen one so huge as this. This specimen was about 6 feet tall. Anyone know what it is?

I also admired the subtle beauty of the Horsetails in the foreground above.

The composting area is off to one side at the middle of the garden, near Big Yellow, peeking in at the lower right. The big bag contains sawdust for folks to throw in when they’re adding vegetables.

There’s a nice area of stadium seating toward the St. Mark’s end of the garden. They show movies there, using the side of an adjacent building as the screen.

Links

Warren St. Mark’s Community Garden (Web site and blog)
Warren St. Mark’s Community Garden (Yahoo Group, requires membership)

Boerum Hill, July 12, 2008

Posted on 2008-07-16 by admin

Buddy 50 Windowbox, 381 Pacific Street, Boerum Hill, Brooklyn

The Green With Envy Tour One of community gardens last Saturday was a walking tour. Lots, and lots, of walking, Five hours of walking interspersed by standing around, and occasionally sitting, in the beautiful gardens.

It was also a street-side introduction to Boerum Hill, a neighborhood with which I’m not familiar. Here’s some things which caught my eye, including some gardens which were not officially on the tour.

“Flags” (T-shirts, actually), 485 Pacific Street

Gardens, North Pacific Playground, Boerum Hill

At first glance this building seems out of place, but take a closer look. The brick and wood relate to the dominant materials on the block. The detailed brick lintel across the width of the ground floor echoes details of its neighbors. The windows reflect the street trees and sky.

Fellow Flickrites luluinnyc and mayotic and I were all intrigued by this unusual building at 385 Pacific Street.

The frieze above the door – I thought it was a wood carving, but on closer inspection it could be terra-cotta – reads “Cuyler Church.”

It really was built as a church building. It has a fascinating history. It served an “immigrant” community of Mohawk ironworkers and their families that settled in this neighborhood starting in the 1930s. In Spring 2001 it was added to the National Register of Historic Places.

The former Cuyler Presbyterian Church is located in the Boerum Hill neighborhood of northwestern Brooklyn, Kings County, New York. Designed by Staten Island architect Edward A. Sargent, the building is an example of High Victorian Eclectic design with elements of both Gothic and Romanesque styles of architecture. The Cuyler Presbyterian Church began as an extension of Lafayette Avenue Presbyterian Church to support its growing programs. The chapel was built one-half mile away from the Lafayette Church in the North Gowanus neighborhood (now called Boerum Hill).
– Cuyler Presbyterian Church

Here’s GRDN, a gardening store in Boerum Hill which I’ve been wanting to visit. It’s on the same block as the Hoyt Street Community Garden, but time did not allow me anything but the briefest entry into the front of the shop. I drooled over the hand-thrown Guy Wolfe pots. I want to go back.

Another beautiful building, this is the Brooklyn Inn, a local watering hole since the mid-1800s, at 148 Hoyt Street.

Rubbernecking at the Gowanus Community Garden, only time to admire it as we walked by.

Another lovely windowbox, this one at 218 Bergen Street.

Finally, here’s a different view of the Buddy 50 scooter and windowbox that opened the post. They were each so perfect and beautiful.

Hoyt Street Garden, Boerum Hill, Green With Envy Tour, I.2
Wyckoff-Bond Community Garden, Boerum Hill, Green With Envy Tour, I.3
David Foulke Memorial Garden, Boerum Hill, Green With Envy Tour, I.4

Links

Boerum Hill Association

Some recent and current blooms in my garden

Posted on 2008-07-07 by admin

Hemerocallis, Daylily, June 21, 2008

Just some quick photos of plants recently or currently blooming in my garden. The first few were taken two weeks aga.

Daylilies

I don’t “collect” daylilies, at least not the way I try to collect Hosta or native plants. We inherited a few with the gardens when we bought the house. For that reason, I consider them to be “passalong” plants: dependable, sturdy, hardy, tolerant of neglect, vigorous, and so on. I gave away several clumps this Spring. I’ll have more to give away over time.

Hemerocallis, Daylily, June 21, 2008

Native Plants

Ascelpias incarnata, Swamp Milkweed, June 21, 2008

Echinacea pallida, Pale Coneflower, June 21, 2008. This photo was used to illustrate “Coneflowers: America’s Prairie Treasures”, by Barbara Perry Lawton, in the Summer 2009 edition of the Brooklyn Botanic Garden’s “Plants & Gardens News.”

The Shady Path

In this short section of the shady path on the north side of the house, I have my two big-leaved monsters: Rodgersia pinnata, on the right, and Kirengeshoma palmata, on the left. The Rodgersia has a lot of drought damage from our heat wave a few weeks ago, but it’s off-frame of this photo. I’m keeping a close watch on the Kirengeshoma, as it also crisps up at the slightest hint of drought. There are buds on it now, which mature very slowly into waxy yellow bells. It benefits here from its location next to my neighbor’s mixed border, which gets watered by soaker hose.

Both of these plants are several years old, possibly even a decade. I’ve lost track of when I purchased them. They’re slow-growing, but continue to increase in size every year, despite never being divided in all that time. They are well worth the wait.

I used to keep the Kirengeshoma in a large container, which I could never water enough. It’s much happier in the ground. Both of these plants would prefer constant moisture. I have long-term plans to build a rain garden in the shady part of the front yard. When the time comes, both of these plants will be very happy there.

Nestled between them in the foreground is a small, yellow-leaved, purple-flowering Hosta. I’ve lost the id for this. I think it might be ‘Little Aurora.’ Any Hosta aficionados out there who can weigh in on what this might be?

Heirloom Canna

Last to share with you today is the Heirloom Canna ‘Mme. Paul Caseneuve’ blooming in a large, glazed container in the front yard. This is the same specimen that I grew for the first time last year. I overwintered it in the same container in an unheated, but enclosed, section of the front porch. I’m surprised it came back.

It doesn’t look as pink as I remember it from last year. The color is more apricot/salmony this year. At least it’s got the same bronze foliage.

Green With Envy Tour of Brooklyn Community Gardens, July 12 and 26

Posted on 2008-07-04 by admin

On Saturday, July 12 and 26, visit Community Gardens in Park Slope, Boerum Hill, Fort Greene, Clinton Hill, and Prospect Heights. On both guided tours, you can join us for a 10am breakfast at the Pacific Street Bear’s Garden on Flatbush Ave, then walk, bike, or drive the routes below. More info: 718-636-4273.

Special thanks to the Brooklyn Community Gardeners’ Coalition, GreenThumb, and Brooklyn Botanic Garden’s GreenBridge.

Tour One, Saturday, July 12

Pacific Street Bear’s Garden at Flatbush Avenue, Park Slope
Hoyt Street Community Garden at Atlantic Avenue, Boerum Hill
Wyckoff-Bond Community Garden, Boerum Hill
David R. Foulke Memorial Garden, Bergen Street between Nevins & Bond Streets, Boerum Hill
Warren St. Marks Community Garden between 4th & 5th Avenues, Park Slope
Baltic Street Community Garden at 4th Avenue, Park Slope
Lincoln-Berkeley Community Garden, Lincoln between 5th & 6th Avenues, Park Slope
Gardens of Union, Union between 4th & 5th Avenues, Park Slope
Gil Hodges Garden, Carroll between 3rd & 4th Avenues, Gowanus
GreenSpace at President Street, corner of 5th Avenue, Park Slope

Tour Two, Saturday, July 26

Pacific Street Brooklyn Bear’s Garden at Flatbush Avenue
St. Marks Avenue Blk. Assn. Community Garden btwn Carlton & Vanderbilt
Prospect Heights Community Farm, St. Marks btwn Vanderbilt & Underhill
Fulton Revival Garden, Vanderbilt at Gates
Hollenback Community Garden, Washington btwn Gates & Greene
Classon Ful-gate Community Garden, Classon btwn Fulton & Gates
Clifton Place Community Garden, Grand btwn Clifton & Greene
Pratt/Clinton Hill Community Garden, Hall St at DeKalb
The Greene Garden, DeKalb at Portland
Carlton Avenue Brooklyn Bear’s Garden between Fulton & Greene

Brooklyn Bears Community Garden, February 13, 2008

Flatbush Gardener

Urban Habitat Gardening with Native Plants

Tag Archives: Gardens

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