Civic Beautification
BGC Gleaning Project
During World War II, the Club’s focus shifted from home gardening to gardening for the war effort. Members of the club were urged to act as neighborhood advisors and get people to “raise vegetables and, whenever possible, rabbits and poultry."
Inspired by this concept, the Civic Beautification Interest Group started a 'victory garden for others' effort in 2024. (We consider civic beautification to include anything at the intersection of plants and benefiting others.) One specific initiative entails harvesting excess fruit from folks in the community - officially termed “gleaning”. When the project was kicked off in October 2024 with a batch of pears from one of our member’s newly inherited yard, we hoped to donate 100 pounds of food. But with an abundance of apples, pineapple guavas, persimmons, and lemons generously donated by both members of the club as well as others in the broader community, we blew away what was an ambitious goal and we donated 150 pounds in just over 2.5 months!
If you know of any folks who have more fruit than they can eat, give away, or even just want to minimize fruit drop for unwanted critters - please send them our way! It really works out beautifully all around!
First batch donated in October - pears from a member's garden
The batch of persimmons came from this beautiful tree. (The top 1/4 could not be reached with an orchard ladder.)
What a nice looking haul - ready to unload at the Berkeley Friends Church for the Berkeley Food Pantry
Apples, apples, and more apples from a community member
Apples and pineapple guavas - super tasty!
This batch of hachiya persimmons from a BGC member was almost 50lbs!
Some ginormous lemons (donated by a BGC member)
Berkeley Arts Magnet School
Saturday, January 27, 2024
The sun was out and we were able to plant raised beds at the Berkeley Arts Magnet School on Lincoln Street. Many thanks to our Civic Beautification Committee for coming with garden gloves and trowels in hand!
We planted 4+ raised beds with 35 plants: plants for making dyes, plants for a ‘sensory’ garden and pollinator plants. We will continue to maintain the raised beds and plant additional CA native Monarch butterfly pollinator plants in spring. This is all in coordination with BUSD planting coordinator, known to her students as ’Miss Cat’, who not only enabled us to do this, but provided us with encouragement, snacks, tea and a valuable link to the school district.
Many thanks to all who participated, and especially to Adrienne for the initial idea and connections with Miss Cat, and for Ben doing the chop and drop of the existing vegetation to prepare the beds, going nursery shopping (East Bay Nursery, Oaktown Nursery, and Annie’s Annuals) and doing the majority of the compost/soil top dressing preparing the beds for planting. Also thanks to East Bay Nursery for giving us, at a very deep discount, the 15 cubic feet of compost.