Next Steps With Seedlings Started In March, Community Gardening In General

Thanks for the inquiries about this!

First, please know that the garden committee core members are working on a proposal for management and the BOD to try get more CVEarthlab members limited access to the garden for essential daily tasks such as watering and monitoring for animal activity or other problems.  We need to make sure we have thoughful plans and safe systems in place for sanitizing shared tools, the hose, padlocks, etc, before we ask for this privilege. (The play area, where the garden is located, remains closed.)

Hardening Off Seedlings Before Transplant in May and June

While seedlings started at the indoor workshop won’t be ready for transplant before May, you can start thinking about stepping up your baby plants to bigger containers (if needed) and a hardening off plan, which involves gradually exposing the seedlings to outdoor conditions over a 7-10 day period.  (Please see these previous posts regarding hardening off.  https://cvearthlab.com/2016/05/18/preparing-tomatoes-plants-for-transplanting/ ; https://cvearthlab.com/2019/05/21/garden-qa-session-wed-6-7pm/ ) While it is tempting to take shortcuts, the tedious hardening off process is a very important one.  Essentially, you will “toughen up” plants so that by the time you transplant them, they will be strong enough to survive outdoor life.

Incoming Flowers and Herb Starts

It is not official, but we are hoping to be able to pick up our order from the GrowNYC plant sale for community gardens on May 1.  If this happens, we will also need to coordinate a supervised system to care for and transplant the 100+ herbs and flowers that arrive on that date.

Making Community Gardening Work With Social Distancing, Other Restrictions 

Traditionally, we hold outdoor sessions on Wednesdays evenings in May to help new gardeners learn to care for and transplant plants; thanks for your patience while we sort out an alternative. (See last year’s schedule here)  I suspect we may be able to do something like this but in staggered, very small groups, after we establish and implement all of the new safety precautions that will be required.

If you’d like to work on the proposal for modified community gardening at CV, with special precautions for safety and social distancing during the pandemic, here are some resources:

• NY Restoration Project
• Purdue U Guide to Community Gardening During Pandemic 
• Greenthumb Access to Community Garden While Parks Are Closed Due to COVID-19

Many thanks!  -Denise