All Kinds of Volunteers Needed!

Unlike most other community gardens, RING does not give out plots
and expect individuals to maintain those plots.  RING has always been
a botanical garden, with everyone working together with a common vision
of the whole garden.  RING relies heavily on volunteers for carrying out the
ongoing garden maintenance, garden sitting, events, publicity, artistic endeavors,
and special projects that add up to create the garden. Click on a link in the table below
to see all the ways you can get involved in your neighborhood garden.

To see the perks you get for volunteering, click here . . .

We really need your help with . . .

Types of Volunteer Opportunities

WHAT: The plants in the garden need caring individuals in order to stay alive and thrive. We can provide training in planting, watering, weeding, composting, pruning, and anything else you might want to learn. Please help us care for our garden in good times and bad. Come out Saturday mornings or Tuesday evenings and give the garden a hand.

WHERE: In the garden.

WHEN: RING’s garden is now open to the public on Saturday mornings (10-noon at least) and also on Thursday evenings from 6:30 till dusk, weather permitting. RING's gardening coordinators will be on hand during each of these time slots to supervise and teach gardening.

HOW: If you have a yen to help water, weed, compost, or prune, Maggie will usually be on hand to teach garden maintenance to newcomers on Saturday mornings and Arthur will be there on Tuesday evenings (that's in 2001), weather permitting. So stop on by!

WHAT: Garden sitters and/or greeters are needed to maintain our advertised minimum 10 hours per week of  Open Hours. Would you like to spend quality time in a garden of trees, shrubs, flowers, waterfalls, birds and butterflies? RING needs neighborhood residents who would like to be garden sitters. Garden sitters give themselves a feast for the eyes, and also help RING to make itself better known to neighborhood residents. Garden sitters are responsible for opening the garden during two-hour time slots of our public open hours, greeting and giving out RING newsletters and membership information to those who enter, and just being there to ensure the plantings are safe.

The purpose of the garden-sitters project is to keep the garden open and accessible to all community residents as much as possible without the risk of losing valuable plants and/or equipment. Volunteer garden sitters may relax, read, meditate, or play acoustic music during their shifts. The only requirements are to keep the gate open and the welcome sign out, and pass out literature. Volunteer gardeners who have attended RING's gardening workshops may also prune bushes, weed, cut grass, water and maintain the fish pond and solar-powered waterfall.

So bring yourself! Bring a Newspaper! Bring friends!

WHEN: Teams of neighborhood residents are forming now to open the garden on a weekly basis a few evenings a week. The following schedule was approved by the board and team leaders assigned (for contact info, see same schedule at top of page):

• Saturdays and Sundays 11 a.m. -1 p.m.

• Mondays through Fridays 8-9 a.m.

• Tuesdays 6:30 p.m. – dusk

• Wednesdays 6 p.m. – dusk

• Fridays 12-2 p.m.

WHERE: In the garden.

HOW: Small groups of friends can also volunteer as a team to cover a particular day and time block - e.g. the Weds. evening time block.  If brochures can be handed to visitors and needed gardening tasks could be accomplished, so much the better.  If you have a specific time you can usually or sometimes come to the garden every week, and would like to volunteer, please email Maggie. Even those volunteers who might only be able to spare two hours per month are appreciated as a member of a team. This is also an opportunity for neighborhood organizations, such as Co-op boards and Tenants Associations, and church and school groups to volunteer to cover a time slot (one of the above slots or other times)

Someone in the group will need a key to the garden. To sign up and get a key, just join RING!

Our desire to have a stunning sign over the entrance with the name of our garden was realized Spring, 1996. Annette, head of RING’s Arts and Events Committee, has, with the help of volunteer Greg Nachtman, diligently completed the layout and applied gold paint to the beautiful stained oak board. We unveiled the new sign at our 1996 Spring Planting and Yard Sale.

WHAT: In 2001 new Arts Co-Chair, Liz, went to Materials for the Arts and Home Depot and got materials to make 3 new large sandwich board signs, one for each entrance, with "Garden Open" in several languages.  We are in desperate need of a few new signs to ask parents to keep their children from falling into the pond, and one listing volunteering tasks needed at the moment, among others.  Liz also started our very successful annual "Art in the Garden" show.

WHERE: In your arts studio of choice!  

HOW: If you would like to help, design or paint, please email Liz.

WHAT: Do you like to write? RING needs volunteers to help publicize the garden, via articles submitted to newspapers, emailing, phoning, blogging, and through liaisons with community groups. (You need not take on all these varied media; volunteer for what you feel comfortable with. When we issue our own newsletters, flyers, and brochures, we need people to help us distribute them around the neighborhood (to business, to neighborhood residents, and on the street.

WHERE: At home or at your desktop publishing station, and around your neighborhood if you distribute.

HOW: If you can help in any of these areas, please email Maggie.

WHAT: Besides the potluck dinners once a week in the summer, RING also holds two annual flea markets (the next one will be May 3rd, 2008), plant sales, and festivals we already do. Some gardens downtown have 100 events a year.  We could too.  Think up an event.  Help publicize, serve as master of ceremonies, clean up.

WHERE: Plan at home, come to the garden for the event!

HOW: If you would like to help with any of our usual events, or if you would like to plan or coordinate a new event in the garden (for example, involving children’s activities, music or arts, etc...), please give our Events Coordinator a call: 212-304-0255.

WHAT: We have installed 6 solar collectors (4 on the big pole, 2 on the arbor) with two of these installed 14 feet above the garden (above the arbor), 3 gel cell batteries, a controller, a timer system that automates when the waterfalls are on (plus a switch so that anyone can turn the falls on at a moment's notice), a solar-powered pump, and filters (vortex and biofilter) to create several lovely waterfalls, in conjunction with our main, 800+ gallon pond. In 2000 the streambed rocks and plantings were put in place.

Arthur and his merry band of landscapers are now mainly involved with plugging any leaks that occur, optimizing the solar collectors, and expanding and troubleshooting the garden watering system.  Maggie adds carefully chosen goldfish from time to time, along with some white minnows that school whenever the falls are on.   The waterlillies recovered from the move and started blooming in June, 2001.

WHERE: In the Garden.

HOW: For more information, or to volunteer, call Arthur Sherry (212-569-2629) or email Arthur.

HISTORY:  The whole project took off once we decided to ask the parks Department to provide some soil for the project rather than bringing it from nearby sources (1997). The hill grew quickly, and the waterfall committee sculpted the earth and prepared the stream bed. Many thanks to Steve, Josh and Pedro for their participation.  During the Reconstruction project in 1999 Arthur borrowed a jackhammer and compressor, and dug down four feet so that our goldfish could survive the winter (as was the case at the 6BC garden).  He hired a concrete truck, poured concrete for the foundation and laid a substantial rubber liner. 

WHAT: RING has a tall evergreen that we hang with lights for Christmas. We hang the lights on a Saturday morning, and gather on a Sunday evening for Christmas and Hanukah caroling.

WHERE: In the Garden

WHEN: Usually the first weekend in December.

HOW: If you would like to help with hanging the lights, please email Maggie.

WHAT: Making sure the garden plants get the water they need. At RING, when Mother Nature does not provide enough, watering is made easier most of the year because we have a ground hydrant near the water fountain near the Seaman entrance.  However, we need people to come to the Garden and turn the sprinklers on.

WHERE: In the Garden.

HOW: Connected to this ground hydrant is a hose that connects to various lines that Arthur designed and laid some years ago.  If you follow the hoses, you see one goes up and over the arbor.  You shouldn't need to touch the ground hydrant or the main connectors on either side of the arbor unless, for some reason, they've all been turned off.  

It's important to remember that we only have enough water pressure to operate at most about 3 hoses / sprinklers at one time, so if time is limited, prioritize your watering, and water those areas that need it most first!   You can tell what plants are in most need if some are withering.  The other important fact of life with the ground hydrant is that the City turns it off in October and back on in April (usually).  We continue to try to get this period extended.  If water is needed during the off-season, it has to be brought in from outside since the DEP has magnetically capped the fire hydrant at the Dyckman/Seaman corner.

For further information, click here . .  .

WHAT: Bring your scraps, dead flowers, etc. to be composted. While you are there, please help out by sifting some compost and spreading it on the flower beds. And, if you are feeling energetic, you can turn the compost as well.

WHERE: In the Garden

WHEN: Any time the Garden is open. (Or any time at all for those with a key.)

HOW: There are compost bins located by the entrance. Make sure that you place only compostable materials in the bins!

WHAT: RING is spearheading a drive to put a two-way bikeway separated from traffic on Riverside and Dyckman Streets by a green hedge and trees.  This would connect the Harlem River to the Hudson River greenways which end here.  Five RINGers presented at the Community Board on this already.  We need both English and Spanish-speakers to get letters from and/or petition signed by businesses, tenants associations/coop-boards, and Inwood residents.  NYC Dept. of Transportation is now prioritizing which greenways to proceed with and all they need is to hear from the local stakeholders.  For a more detailed description, click here . . .

WHERE: Out and around in your neighborhood and at meetings.

HOW: Maggie is coordinating this effort, but can't do it alone. If you would like help or to see our drawings and talking points, as well as get links to the two blogs on this topic in Streetsblog and Inwoodite, please Email her to let her know.

WHAT: Perhaps you've had a lot of training and/or experience in horticulture and know a bit about the RING garden, or you would like to learn and then help out by being the "go-to" person when new garden volunteers have questions.   We would like to have several more experts to guide other volunteers.

WHERE: In the Garden, and perhaps at home answering volunteer questions.

HOW: Please Email Maggie to let her know what date(s) are convenient for you to coordinate.

WHAT: We need someone to maintain the e-mail list, keeping it current and accurate.

WHERE: From your preferred desktop or laptop internet connection

HOW: Please Email Maggie to let her get you started.

WHAT: RING has an attractive, 3-color brochure. We want to get this into the hands of as many people likely to visit the garden as possible. We need one or more volunteers to take stacks of brochures once or twice a month to various distribution points in Inwood, and keep count of the number distributed at each location. (Adding additional points would by helpful.)

WHERE: The following are the distribution points, followed by the number of brochures placed there over a 10-month period:

Parkview Diner - 620
McDonald's - 560
UPS Store - 170
NY Public Library - 140
NY Presbyterian Hospital Broadway Practice - 120
Laundromat @ Payson & Dyckman - 100
Duane Reade on Dyckman - 90
Dyckman Pharmacy @ Dyckman & Vermilyea - 90
Town Drug & Surgical (Broadway near Cummimng) - 40
Dyckman Deli - 40
New Leaf Cafe  (Fort Tryon Park) - 40

HOW: Please Email veteran distributor Eleanore Anderson to let her get you started.

WHAT: With milder weather and more daylight hours approaching, if we could have a weekly potluck dinner at RING during the season, that would do wonders to open up the garden more and get it well-known in the neighborhood.  We need coordinators to help us publicize them, to be there when potluck dinners are scheduled, to bring out the plates, glasses, run across to buy things we need, and to  clean up. You could volunteer to coordinate as many or few as you like.

WHERE: In the Garden, and perhaps at home phoning and emailing.

HOW: Please Email Maggie to let her assign you.

We Always want to expand our volunteer base, and you as a RING volunteer benefit!   Here are the freebies you can get on request if you volunteer at least 10 hours this year — gardening, garden sitting, publicity, or any RING volunteer activity:

* Free Current Year RING membership — including free key to the gate OR

* Free space at one Flea Market

We are trying to line up some other perks and often have free food and/or beverages for volunteers when they work in the garden. .

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