Somerville Garden Club

Rainwater Harvesting for Urban Gardeners

Josh Briggs will be speaking to the club about rainwater harvesting. This talk will focus on small scale rainwater harvesting systems appropriate for urban gardeners, from simple gravity systems to more sophisticated systems with pumps, controls and monitoring elements. Josh will briefly cover basic design principles, materials, and construction techniques for durable, low-maintenance rainwater harvesting systems. Josh will also touch on recent local projects he has designed and built featuring solar-powered pump systems, rainwater sheds, and bicycle powered water pumps.

All Somerville Garden Club meetings are free and open to the public. Meetings are usually held the second Wednesday of each month at the Tufts Administration Building, (TAB), 167 Holland Street, second floor, wheelchair accessible. Parking is available, and the building is a ten-minute walk from the Davis Square MBTA stop.

Jeff and Ann Marie Harrington were at the meeting this past Wednesday, and their plant sale was mentioned. Here are more details about their plant sale:

Harrington’s Seedlings will be holding our annual Plant Sale on Sat. May 11th & Sat. May 18th from 8am – 2pm.

We also will be at the Somerville Union Square Farmer’s Market on June 1st.

We have many different varieties of vegetable seedlings available such as Sungold Cherry Tomatoes (Best Seller), Rutgers Tomatoes, Super Sonic Tomatoes, & Ace 55 Tomatoes to name a few. As for Peppers, we have Cayenne Purple, Yellow, Orange, Jalepeno & Habanero Peppers. We also have squashes, pumpkins & some sugar peas.

All Plants are $3/each. For a small backyard in Somerville, we have ALOT of seedlings. We love having people come by and visit our greenhouses. Lots of people become inspired & realize they too can grow lots of plants in the small space they have. If you find that you can not come by on dates above, please email us so we can set up a time that is convenient for you.

Where: 39 Ibbetson Street in Somerville
Email: JeffVermonter@aol.com

This recipe comes to us courtesy of Ann Steinberg, who demonstrated one way to make May wine to attendees at last night’s meeting.

30 sprigs (1.5in) of sweet woodruff at bloom time (remove flowers, wash)
8oz powdered sugar
1 cup cognac or brandy
1 bottle Moselle or Rhine wine

Combine all above ingredients. Let stand overnight. Strain out sweet woodruff and refrigerate “essence”.

To make May wine, combine in punch bowl or pitcher

1 part essence (from above)
2 parts Champagne
3 parts Moselle or Rhine wine

Float strawberries and sweet woodruff in May wine. Garnish each wine glass with more woodruff.

Thanks to all of the presenters – it seemed like everyone had a great time!

[UPDATE: This depaving event has been moved to May 12. The post has been edited with the date change.]

Depave Somerville is holding a depaving event on May 12. They have lots of different ways to contribute to the event (see the sign up link for more details).

The idea behind depaving is to add more permeable surfaces to Somerville, which would allow more water to seep into the ground, rather than overtaxing the sewer system, or flooding basements. Additional benefits are that you would then be able to plant that formerly paved area, adding greenery to our city.

Where: Steve Langdon’s house at 44 Bartlett St. (between Macoun Sq. & Winter Hill)

When: Sunday, May 12 from 12:30 to 3:00pm

Sign up here: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/viewform?formkey=dFFZbE1OS05XblFXYl9EQUc2UzVKcmc6MQ

See the TEDxSomerville DePAVE the WAY video for more information:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BlTG0Y_zknc

Check out the time-lapse Depaving Maple Avenue video:
http://somerville.patch.com/articles/residents-rip-up-18000-pounds-of-asphalt#video-2291440