October 15, 2019, 7:00 – 8:30 pm
Rhythmix Cultural Works, 2513 Blanding Avenue, Alameda
Did you know your head is as heavy as a bowling ball? (your poor neck!) Or that losing 1 pound means 4 pounds of weight off your knees-a 4 to 1 ratio?
Come hear about how ergonomics can make your gardening less painful and extend your time in the garden, both now and in the future. Join The Alameda Backyard Growers on Oct 15 to hear more.
The goals of the presentation include:
- Understand how garden activities affect your body ergonomics and wear and and tear on your joints
- Learn to correct gardening activity for better body mechanics
- Demonstrate best ergonomic practices
Our Speaker, Joan Sarlatte, worked as a nurse practitioner caring for injured workers, many of whose injuries related to repetitive jobs. She became interested in ergonomics as a way to retrain your body toward better working practices. Now retired, Joan graduated in the Master Gardener class of 2018, and is interested in helping gardeners learn to work with less discomfort and fewer injuries.
November 19, 2019, 7:00 – 8:30 pm
Rhythmix Cultural Works, 2513 Blanding Avenue, Alameda
We see the winter holidays as a time of abundance, family, and sharing. Unfortunately, when it comes to food, this season is also the most wasteful. The average American household throws out 25% of the food they purchase, equivalent to about $1,600 a year for the average family of four. Wasting food has broad implications, but reducing wasted food is one of the easiest ways to impact climate change. By preventing food waste from being generated in the first place, you are eliminating the green house gasses associated with disposal of that wasted food.
ABG has invited Maricelle Cardenas of StopWaste to share what she has learned about the problem of wasted food and simple ways to change how we shop, prepare, store, and serve food this holiday season and all year round. Learn how to save money and reduce the amount of food we throw away in our homes.
For more information, tools, and tips, visit StopFoodWaste.org.
Our Speaker
Maricelle Cardenas is a community educator with a background in waste, environmental, and social issues. She has supported various projects at StopWaste and is currently working on an exciting campaign focused on helping residents of Alameda County reduce wasted food.
On Monday, January 13, ABG will present a movie night at Rhythmix, 2513 Blanding Ave. in the city of Alameda , co-hosted by StopWaste! Free popcorn!
Please bring your own container for water to reduce waste.
Trevor Probert of StopWaste will lead a Carbon Farming discussion after the movie.
Our movie, ‘Symphony of the Soil‘ is an artistic exploration of the miraculous “living skin of the earth.” By understanding the elaborate relationships between soil, water, the atmosphere, plants and animals, we come to appreciate the complex and dynamic nature of this precious resource. The film examines our human relationship with soil, the use and misuse of soil in agriculture, deforestation and development, and the latest scientific research on soil’s key role in ameliorating the most challenging environmental problems of our time, including climate change. Filmed on four continents and featuring esteemed scientists and working farmers and ranchers, Symphony of the Soil is an intriguing presentation that highlights possibilities of healthy soil creating healthy plants creating healthy humans living on a healthy planet.
Trevor Probert is a Program Services Specialist at StopWaste and resident of Alameda.
Trevor Probert is a Program Services Specialist at StopWaste and resident of Alameda. He teaches StopWaste’s public workshops on composting, gardening for soil health, and carbon farming. Trevor works with urban farms and community gardens to set up on-site composting systems. He has worked as an elementary school garden teacher, classroom teacher, and landscape contractor, and has bachelor degrees in Geography and Environmental Science and a master’s degree in Education.
Join Alameda Backyard Growers speaker Birgitt Evans for an informative and hands-on seed starting workshop.
About this Event
Starting vegetables from seed can save money and will give you access to thousands of vegetable varieties not available as transplants. We discuss which seeds are best planted directly in the ground and how and when to start them. We will move on to seed that are best started indoors and how to plant them and considerations such as the importance of cleanliness, seed starting mixes, which containers you can use, how many seeds to plant and how deeply, seed viability and hybrid vs. open pollinated seeds, watering, fertilizing, providing light and heat for your seedlings and hardening off seedlings before transplanting them out into the garden. Students will then plant several 6-packs of seeds to take home with them. Resource lists will be provided to attendees.
About the Speaker: Birgitt Evans has grown her own food on a large scale for the past 30 years and created a successful garden and nursery business. She is passionate about growing and raising food and seeks to encourage and educate others so they can also share the benefits of fresh, healthy, homegrown food. She grows vegetables in four different Alameda County gardens and starts 90% of her plants from seed. She has been an Alameda County Master Gardener since 1999 and was on the advisory board for 14 years, including three terms as president. She has been on the board of Alameda Backyard Growers since its inception and is currently the Treasurer.
Space is limited for this event. Tickets available here.
Photo by Lori Eanes. Birgitt Evans demonstrates the delicate work of transplanting fall crops from the six packs where they germinate into larger containers or garden beds.
ABG regrets to announce that the March 17, 7PM meeting at Rhythmix is CANCELLED.
In light of the new event restrictions and government mandates about maintaining at least 6ft of distance between event participants, Rhythmix has cancelled all Rhythmix activities, events, meetings and classes through the end of March, including our March 17th meeting.
Alameda Backyard Growers will be in touch regarding future events
Learn about the perils of pesticide use with Andrew Sutherland, SF Bay Area Urban IPM Advisor, University of California (Davis) Division of Agriculture and Natural Resources.
Our first Virtual Monthly Education Meeting!
Backyard Permaculture: Regenerative design for food and herbal medicine production
April 21, 7 to 8:30 pm Via Zoom.
Click here to view their presentation.
Program
7:00-7:10 People get oriented on Zoom
7:10-8:00 Presentation
8:00-8:30 We answer questions from the audience (and of course folks can sign off at 8 if the are feeling complete)
We will introduce Permaculture, and then dive deeper into applying Permaculture principles into regenerative backyard design and local food production. We hope to inspire a dialogue about these topics in the context of COVID-19 and the climate crisis. We will cover topics such as veggies beds, water (re)use, fruit trees, chickens, backyard herbal medicines and more! The Backyard Permaculture Guild is a select group of Permaculture experts that collaborate to design, implement, and maintain permaculture inspired backyards.
Professional bios
Nina Gordon-Kirsch believes that building community around shared local resources and tending to the earth are some of the most effective tools for climate resiliency. She earned her Permaculture Design Certificate at Occidental Arts and Ecology center, after which she envisioned the Backyard Permaculture Guild (BPG)! Nina is the BPG water woman – installing Laundry-to-Landscape (L2L) greywater systems and envisioning rainwater catchment designs. She apprenticed with Greywater Action in Oakland for 3 years before becoming trained as a CA Professional Greywater Installer. When not installing greywater systems, she spends her time educating folks on where their water comes from and how to restore human relationships with the land, waters, and other humans. Moving forward, she’ll be following the call of the Waters and backpacking her way from Oakland to the Headwaters of the Mokelumne River, where EBMUD sources our East Bay tap water from. Sign up here to follow her journey!
Helen Cowart grew up on a Christmas tree farm in central Vermont and has been chopping firewood and pruning trees since she was a kid. After graduating with a BA in Environmental Studies from Vassar College she found herself continually wanting to be working hard in the dirt outdoors (not in an office!). She worked on small, organic, vegetable and flower farms for several years and then founded a few farm projects. Finding herself drawn to the synthesis of design aesthetics and outdoor work with plants she founded Solscape Ecological Design in 2015. Helen has been designing and tending native plant gardens, veggie gardens, pruning fruit trees ever since. She joined the Backyard Permaculture Guild in 2019 to share knowledge and inspiration with a group of like-minded earth tenders. She is also studying forestry and land management and has a passion for returning healthy fire to local landscapes. In her spare time Helen is a primitive skills enthusiast, mythologist and artist.
Alejandra Vargas-Johnson (Ale) completed her permaculture design course in Chile in 2010. She lived in Brazil between 2014-2018 where she helped organize agroecological events for rural, working class communities. She currently works for a non-profit health care reform think-tank and gardens in Alameda and Oakland with Nina and her mom Holly Johnson, ABG Board Member.
ABG Announces Our 2020 Earth Day (Spacial Distancing) Plant Sale!
10AM – 1PM Saturday April 25th. Location will be emailed to attendees.
Every year at Earth Day, we sell hundreds of tomato plants and people come back for them year after year. This year, with more gardeners and fewer seedlings, we have added basil, squash, cucumbers and a few greens to the mix, moved the sale to a private residence and added spacial distancing in the form of time slots to keep the crowds down. But we still have our wonderful tomato plants and other veggies to get you through the summer!
How it Works:
1) Click on this Eventbrite link and select a time slot. The earliest slots will have the best selection, so fill those first. We will email you the location when you sign up.
2) Send one (healthy) person per household, wash hands first and wear a mask.
3) Check out the LIST OF PLANTS we have available and note what you want (with second choices), so you can just pick them up and pay when you get to the sale. (Note: there are limits on how many of each plant you can buy so everyone can have some.)
4) Bring either exact change or a check made out to Alameda Backyard Growers along with a pen so you can fill in the final amount. Any cash you leave in excess of your plant total is a tax deductible contribution to ABG and we promise to use it wisely!
Container Gardening with Natives
with Jeff Bridge, General Manager of Ploughshares Nursery
Tuesday, May 19, 6:30 to 7:30 pm (note change in time)
Via Zoom. To attend, register here: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/container-gardening-with-natives-a-virtual-meeting-with-jeff-bridge-tickets-104498225004
Once you register, you’ll be emailed the Zoom link and instructions. Limited to 100 participants.
Live from Ploughshares Nursery, Jeff Bridge will discuss what various native plants need when in a container and their role in the environment. He’ll demonstrate how fun and attractive native plants in containers can be.
Alameda Backyard Growers invites you to attend a
Self-guided Tour of Italo’s Garden
Tuesday, June 23 2020
Italo’s Garden (ABGC)1900 3rd Street, Alameda, CA, 94501
6:30-7:15pm 20 people/tickets
7:15-8:00pm 20 people/tickets
More information on the ABGC Garden
In 2012 the Alameda Boys & Girls Club had a vision to transform a neighboring ¼ acre urban lot into a thriving healthy foods and habitat garden that would support the nutritional health and develop the ecological literacy of Club youth. In summer of 2013 the Club hired its first Seed to Table Director, Kristen Getler. Italo Calpestri, together with other Board Members and ABGC staff, began fundraising and reaching out to community partners like GoDaddy to enlist in help with projects such as building and filling the raised beds. His background as an architect and experience on the board was instrumental to the garden’s successful and accessible installation. A keystone of the Club’s Health and Wellness Initiative, the garden provides a living, outdoor classroom where youth steward the garden using organic practices to grow annual and perennial food crops. A complementary culinary education program teaches our youth how to prepare the garden-fresh produce into healthy-foods recipes they are able to share with their families. Current Seed to Table Director Gretchen Doering took over in March 2015 and continued the installation of fifteen additional planter beds, a bioswale, greenhouse and outdoor classroom. The garden continues to grow with support from local Eagle Scout projects, the Alameda Garden Club, Alameda Backyard Growers, invaluable volunteers, and other generous donors.
Click here for a downloadable map of the garden tour.
Click here for the downloadable Alameda Boys & Girls Club – Italo’s Garden Master Plant Descriptions
Click here for a downloadable list of plants in Italo’s Garden.
Eric Kos and Italo Calpestri look on while Marla Koss and Gretchen Doering teach kids how to plant a fig tree.
Join us Tuesday, August 18 at 7:00 pm for a virtual potluck on Zoom in the comfort of your own home. This August ABG meeting will be a “Garden Show/Tell and Ask” where we all get to relax, enjoy our own snacks and compare notes with friends.
If you wish, please email us a photo by August 16 of one of your garden successes or challenges that you’d like to talk about. Send it to abg.grow.food@gmail.com.
Then, during the meeting we’ll invite you to share a gardening story, a photo, ask some gardening questions and enjoy visiting with fellow Alameda backyard gardeners.