CGC Updates: Spring 2024
We’ve hit the ground running this spring! Here’s what we’ve been up to since our last update.
Arboretum Status
Hauck Botanic Garden is officially an ArbNet Level 1 Accredited Arboretum! ArbNet accreditation will allow the CGC to continue its role as leaders in Cincinnati’s network of public gardens. The ability to share resources and practices with the international arboretum community means our gardens and programs can continue to grow in a way that reflects our values and our mission. As our work in conservation and, specifically, urban forest restoration expands, ArbNet accreditation gives us the opportunity to collaborate with and learn from other professional organizations with common goals. Check out our register listing here!
CGDT & MGT
We had 27 graduates of our 11-week Community Garden Development Training (CGDT) and 9 graduates of our new 6-week Market Garden Training (MGT)! Graduates of both programs are equipped to participate meaningfully in our local food system, either by running a community garden (CGDT) or by producing food for farmer’s markets, restaurants and more (MGT). We can’t wait to see what graduates build with their new skills!
The Green Teens Challenge
Our first full school year of the Green Teens Challenge has officially come to an end. Over the course of eight months, we made 74 classroom visits across ten schools and one homeschool group! Participating in 26 different challenges, these students submitted just under 300 entries—from tree field guides and naturally dyed clothing to local water quality assessments and waste audits. The hard work and creativity of these students cannot be understated, and we’re so excited to celebrate them later this month at a special awards ceremony.
Plant Propagation
Our native plant propagation is off and running for the season! This year, we’ll be growing more than 30 species of native plants, all from seed. Last season, volunteers helped us build a hoop house to protect our native plants throughout the season. This year, we’ve expanded our growing space in our Green Learning Station, where we start our native plants before moving them into the hoop house.
This season, we’ll also be launching pollinator kits, which will include plants, a design and maintenance plan for a selection of native pollinator plants. Keep your eyes out in early summer for these packages!
It’s not just native plants we’re growing, though. Thanks to superstar volunteer Jill Bader, we also have over a thousand CGC-grown plant starts ready to go for GrowFest. They include many unique varieties of okra, eggplant, peppers and tomatoes plus a collection of amaranths, collards and other leafy greens. Jill also selected some sweet fruited plants in the Solonaceae family, including tamarillo, ground cherry and litchi tomato. Rounding out the selections, we’ll have some interesting herb varieties as well as some non-heirloom varieties that have been bred for container gardening.
Volunteers
We’re only four months in, but what an amazing year 2024 has already been for our CGC volunteers! All told, so far in 2024, we’ve held 25 workdays and events attended by 140 volunteers who have completed a total of almost 713 hours.
We started the year early with a workday in January at the Camp Washington Community Garden, where we braved the freezing temps and even a little hail.
In February, we had nicer weather in the Parker Woods Montessori Community Garden and Orchard and a chilly Treeforestation workday in Walnut Woods of Evanston.
During March, things started heating up at the CGC both metaphorically and meteorologically with a total of 11 workdays on our grounds and throughout the community!
By April, we were in full swing, with community garden workdays to prep for this season’s plantings, regular workdays at our Hauck home and a beautiful weather day for Treeforestation at Walnut Woods.
It’s not just workdays, either. Volunteers support the CGC in many ways, from participating in internships to helping to run our education programs to staffing our front desk.
And of course, we had to show our volunteers some love and appreciation for all the hard work they’ve already accomplished this year. In March, we held our annual Spring Volunteer Kick-Off party and garden tour, and last week during National Volunteer Week, along with introducing our new CGC volunteer tote bags, we held a happy hour with tasty brews from our friends at 50 West.
Want to be part of volunteering here at the CGC? GrowFest is this Saturday, and we still have a few spots to fill. Check them out here!
A New Field Study for Teens
High school field studies are thriving at the CGC! This season we’re focused on urban agriculture with a newly developed field study. Student rotate between three stations: learning how to build hydroponic buckets to grow food, designing sustainable gardens inspired by our beautiful grounds, and diagnosing plants based on observed symptoms. If you’re interested in volunteering to help teach, we would love to have you! Reach out to Mary Dudley: mdudley@civicgardencenter.org.
Classes Galore
So far in the first four months of 2024, we’ve held 45 public-facing classes—and that’s not including ongoing programs and series like CGDT, MGT, Growing Our Teachers and Cincinnati Conservation Stewards programming! We love seeing new and familiar faces learning together (and even doing Goat Yoga side by side). We have several things on the calendar in May, including Perfect Pollinator Planters with our awesome new Horticulturist, Julie.
If you enjoy what we teach, be sure to check out the GrowFest schedule. Our staff and guest presenters will be hosting panels, running demos and teaching about a variety of topics related to urban agriculture. And it’s all free!
Interns & Our New Horticulturist
We’ve had the pleasure of having some great interns and other help around the CGC recently:
Jack is a Cincinnati State Horticulture student who’s been working closely with our Horticulturist this spring. Jack is a lover of all things gardening and jumps at the chance to do even the dirtiest jobs. We’re looking forward to his return this summer as our Urban Agriculture intern.
Hager is a med student graduating from UC this May, and she chose to complete her capstone with us! Through poor weather, damping off, germination setbacks and difficulty finding credible information, she researched, designed and grew herbs for a medicinal and culinary herb garden that will be installed on the roof of our Green Learning Station in the coming weeks.
The four Zoo Academy interns we’ve had so far this year have helped take care of numerous indoor plants and our vermicompost bin, created videos for Green Teens Challenges, facilitated Compost Kids field trips and Green Teens field studies and even helped create a handbook for future interns. We’re grateful to work with these talented students and help them gain experience in their desired fields of interest.
And in February, our new Horticulturist, Julie, joined our team! If you haven’t met her yet, you will as she works more and more with volunteers on our grounds and begins to teach more classes. You can check out her bio here.
Looking Ahead
GrowFest!!
We’re less than a week out from GrowFest, the new iteration of THE Plant Sale, from 9am-3pm on May 4, and we could not be more excited to share this event with you. Drawing from the success of our Fall Native Plant Festival, we’re incorporating some new elements into a familiar event: free info sessions and demonstrations, food trucks, live music, Plant Sitters and more. We’ll still have the beloved bake sale and Green Flea as well as plenty of herbs, veggies, natives and pollinator-friendly perennials for your garden. We encourage you to check out the GrowFest page for all the details (including parking options, thanks to Children’s Hospital!).
HUB Garden Classes
Our summer HUB Garden Classes will be back in 2024 for a third year! These free classes take place in community gardens throughout our network and cover all kinds of topics related to growing food. Watch for the schedule to be announced soon.
Wrapping Up the Green Teens Challenge
We’re looking forward to celebrating the Green Teens Challenge participants later this month at an award ceremony held here at the CGC. The event will also give students from different schools a chance to meet and build community. Though the Challenge is over for the 2023-24 school year, our Green Teens team is busy reviewing the challenges from the past season to gear up some new ones! We hope to partner with more schools and organizations for the 2024-25 year to really highlight the talent our Green Teens have. Stay green, teens!
Food Forest
We’ve drawn up plans for a Native Food Forest on our grounds, highlighting both well-known favorites and a few forgotten delicacies that were once essential parts of the American food system. Our Food Forest will be located just below our traditional Vegetable Garden and up the hill from our Butterfly Garden, bridging the gap between the cultivated and the wild. Want to help us prepare the space and install the plants that will one day feed both visitors to our park and our local wildlife? Join us on Saturday, May 18!
Save the Date for the Fall Native Plant Festival!
Mark your calendar: Our Fall Native Plant Festival will be back in 2024 on the first Saturday after Labor Day (September 7). We’ll be bringing back the food, drinks, educational sessions, festival vibe and—of course—PLANTS! Keep an eye out; we’ll share details as they become available.