This month, the 15th Annual Growing Gardens Community Plant Sale will give you the opportunity to start or improve your sustainable and organic home garden. The event, which takes place during the first three weekends of May, can provide you with all the tools needed to cultivate an organic vegetable or herb patch. In addition to encouraging you to build your own garden, the plant sale is also a good time to consider how you can maintain a bee safe yard.
Springtime is when many homeowners become more active in their gardens and with their landscape maintenance. This season, you can learn how to grow plants or preserve your yard without the use of harmful pesticides. Local organizations like Growing Gardens and Bee Safe Boulder offer helpful resources for those determined to create healthier and safer gardens and lawns.
The North Boulder neighborhood of Melody-Catalpa was the first to take the official bee safe pledge, with residents agreeing to cultivate pesticide-free and pollinator-friendly plots in their community. Regardless of where you live in the city, you can commit to eco-friendly gardening and landscaping practices, too. By avoiding the use of harsh ‘neonic’ insecticides (Neonicotinoids is a relatively new class of insecticides that share a common mode of action that affect the central nervous system of insects, resulting in paralysis and death. They include imidacloprid, acetamiprid, clothianidin, dinotefuran, nithiazine, thiacloprid and thiamethoxam), you can make your personal outdoor space safe for bees and other pollinators that help plants grow. These harmful ingredients are found in routinely purchased products like Grass Seed and Roundup, since many plants are treated with them during germination. Make sure you read the labels of gardening and lawn products that you purchase and ask retailers to be certain that you’re avoiding these chemicals.
In addition to enriching your garden and developing a healthier environment for all living species, there’s also the potential of increasing your property’s value with a bee safe space. In an environmentally conscious city like Boulder, buyers will be attracted to houses with flourishing organic gardens and lawns. Investing in eco-friendly landscaping habits is likely to payoff financially for you in the future, when you decide to put your house on the market.
If you are considering taking the bee safe pledge or investing in alternative, non-poisonous products for your household, then Growing Gardens can help you develop an organic garden. The non-profit organization is dedicated to teaching sustainable urban agriculture practices with educational workshops designed for adults and children.
Growing Garden’s annual sale gives local residents a chance to purchase organic plants grown in its community greenhouse. From 8-4pm on the first three weekends of May (2nd – 3rd, 9th – 10th, and 16th – 17th), you can head over to the Hawthorne Garden (at 1630 Hawthorne Blvd) for a variety of seasonal fruits, vegetables, and herbs, as well as an assortment of perennial flowers. Plants for sale include: heirloom tomatoes, peppers, eggplants, cucumbers, beans, peas, fennel, basil, dill, mint, berries, and roses. With its wide selection, the Growing Garden’s plant sale can inspire you to develop an organic and sustainable garden that is both healthy for the environment and beneficial to your home’s overall real estate value.