Kokedama Flora

11/10/2024

06/14/2024

With Koffman Southern Tier Incubator – I just got recognized as one of their top fans! 🎉

06/11/2024

Getting the garden ready for summer solstice.
The longest days of the year require celebrating. There will be garden tours and seed planting sessions.

06/11/2024

With Greater Binghamton Chamber of Commerce – I just got recognized as one of their top fans! 🎉

06/09/2024

With Donna Lupardo – I just got recognized as one of their top fans! 🎉

06/08/2024

I have been so busy gardening I just scrolled through my page and see very few updates.

Stay tuned for more!

06/06/2024

Flowers and herbs and grasses from the, now renamed as, “The Low Impact” garden at the Otsiningo gardens.
I am continually listening to the plants and flowers to learn from them what is needed most in the garden. With many terms assigned to gardening, trends, and techniques, I’m not sure that “no till” actually encompasses everything that is going on in the space. The garden is a low impact in that the rows are carefully selected and only within the rows is there any kind of tilling or disturbing of the earth. The carefully laid out pathways, have been seeded and transplanted with both native and low growing plants, such as a variety of blooming clovers and mallows. Many grasses were transplanted from across the Otsiningo garden this very early spring. Unfortunately, there is not a large variety of grasses that naturally occur in the low impact garden space. It was important for me to bring in this variety of grasses in order to compete with so many of the other more invasive native plants that have found a home in the low impact area. This is why you see in the bouquet of variety of flowering grasses, mallow and clovers.
Lately there’s been a mix of a lot of heat and a lot of rain so a lot of w**d whacking has been needed.
How are things growing in your garden? Are you finding that things are different this year as compared to past years?

05/24/2024

Say what now!?!? Ok

Your reminder to add Binghamton Farmers Market in the park to your calendar for Sunday, June 2nd...and every Sunday after that through October🤸🏼‍♀️🎉

We're so excited to be located at Rec Park on the beautiful West Side to share fresh produce, meats, baked goods and more from locally owned farms and small businesses🌱🥕

🍅Binghamton Farmers Market
🌻Sundays at 11am-2pm
☀️Rec Park in Binghamton

02/27/2024

Today has been an absolute joy in the no- til garden space at the VINES:Volunteers Improving Neighborhood Environments Otsiningo Park gardens.
This front patch that might easily be mistaken for last seasons leaves is so so much more. If you notice I have ended my hand tilling with the last row before the accumulated leaf mulch.
Where these leaves sit, last year bloomed hundreds of cosmos for more than four months. Cosmos, especially when treated as a cutting flowers, will produce blooms until the last hard frost. Last year our hard frost came in late November. Needless to say the honey bees that started on our native blooming flowers made a quick diet change when the cosmos wouldn’t quit this year.
We watched buzzing bees of all sorts until the last frost.
I learned this year that in very shallow nests just under ground hidden beneath leaf mulch rest the queen bees for the following years hive. THE QUEEN! This is not lost on me and my plans for a sanctuary for pollinators in the no-til space.
This area of beautiful leaf mulch and sleeping QUEEN BEES is safe until May 15.
In our area we are safe to plant the most tender plants by June. This year is proving itself to be very warm very early.
A lot of what is happening in the no-til garden now is very experimental.
After 7 seasons growing from one 20x20 space to more than 5 over the years, combined with my 3 seasons practing no-til on private land I have learned that all work in the garden is rewarded. It may take a season or two to get there.
I learned that the rows I turned over today that had been set last season were a joy to work this year.
Along with our QUEEN BEES we had planted a row of garlic in this area. We celebrated the confirmation of going no-til last fall and planted many bulbs. I can’t wait to share their reveal with you.This year there will be a few surprises come May in this area.

02/26/2024

Phew!
Hey everybody, I want to share a photo of the first planted rows, in the first full season no-til garden area at the VINES:Volunteers Improving Neighborhood Environments Otsiningo community garden.
This will be my 8th season at this end of the garden and by my second season I knew I wanted to push for a no-til option!
With weather like this you know I’m in that dirt setting the seeds for community market flowers galore this year!
So far there are 12 planted rows. Companion planted Double Sun Sunflowers with a variety of climbing peas and low growing seeds of chamomile, forget me nots and lettuces complete each row. Each row planned to harbor just right growing conditions for each species.

11/10/2023

Difficult times should not stop anyone from enjoying the holidays at Roberson! Grab a Pay it Forward pass, and enjoy free admission, no questions asked. A holiday tradition you can keep stress free.