I began the week by working on my poster and NYC insect field guide, and thinking about ways to design the guide so that it will be accessible for NYC growers. On Thursday I visited an urban farm in Woodside, Queens with my supervisor, where I got to meet two other CCE interns working on the “Agriculture in the City” project, Sammi and Kendra. It was great to meet them, learn about their project, and help out on the farm. The farm was in a beautiful location right above the overpass and next to apartment complexes, and used hexagon-shaped raised beds. I learned that the majority of farms in the city have to use raised beds as the ground soil is almost entirely contaminated with lead. I worked with the other interns to fill and carry buckets of water across the street to water the plants, as the farm had a split design where half of it was on one side of the street and the other half was on the other side of the street.
Here are some pictures of the location:
We also deposited compost around the plants and helped to pull weeds. On Friday I again met with Sammi and Kendra at New Roots Community farm in the Bronx. At New Roots we harvested cabbage, removed the outer leaves and many slugs, and then handed the cabbage out to community members that came to collect the harvested food. Here is Kendra holding a cabbage we harvested:
Here are some more pictures of the cabbage we harvested:
We also deposited compost on and weeded the cucumber plants, and cut down larger weeds with clippers around the rim of the farm to allow more sunlight to reach the farm.