What NYRP Staff Are Loving This Winter

Winter is a season of rest and rejuvenation for humans and nature alike. While our gardens go into hibernation, NYRP staff take the time to reflect, plan, and dream for the year ahead. Here are our staff’s recommendations for books to read, podcasts to listen to, things to experiment with, and places to visit this winter. 

What We’re Listening To

“Emergence Magazine’s podcast has so many excellent episodes. I recently enjoyed one focused on the eco-cultural revitalization of the Klamath River, which is my home ecosystem and river.”
—Genevieve Harding, Urban Agriculture Manager 

Plant People: A Podcast from NYBG
—DK Kinard, Director of Community Engagement 

“@leviobrien_trees on Instagram is a great resource for learning about tree and shrub identification. He shares new content almost every day.”
—Ryan Lawrence, Forest Restoration Project Manager 

What We’re Reading

Marine Pollution: What Everyone Needs to Know, Dr. Judith S. Weis; and The Dawn of Everything: a New History of Humanity, David Graeber and David Wengrow
—Jason Smith, Director of Northern Manhattan Parks

“I am currently reading Marine Pollution in preparation for our environmental science seminar with the author, Dr. Weis, on January 31. While not a cheerful book, it is especially timely: as whales, seals, and dolphins return to New York Harbor, it is important to reckon with how we can better steward the ocean and build on the progress made since the passage of the Clean Water Act. 

I am also totally loving The Dawn of Everything, by David Graeber and David Wengrow. This giant retelling of human prehistory celebrates political agency and cultural diversity, offering compelling explorations of early cities and the many ways agriculture developed. In particular, it highlights how urban agriculture has long existed in playful, creative forms not typically associated with authoritarian hierarchies—much like the work of our Urban Agriculture team today. It’s a long read, but well worth it.”

The Serviceberry: Abundance and Reciprocity in the Natural World, Robin Wall Kimmerer
—Billy Pries, Brooklyn Zone Gardener 

Forest Euphoria: The Abounding Queerness of Nature, Patricia Ononiwu Kaishian
—Genevieve Harding, Urban Agriculture Manager 

The Overstory, Richard Powers
—Robyn Rehak, Chief Advancement Officer 

Silent Spring, Rachel Carson; as well as Parable of the Sower and Parable of the Talents by Octavia E. Butler
—Neishja Ransom, Community Garden Engagement Coordinator 

Honeybee Democracy, Thomas D. Seeley; Soil: The Story of a Black Mother’s Garden, Camille T. Dungy; Jubilee: Recipes from Two Centuries of African American Cooking, Toni Tipton-Martin; and The Old Farmer’s Almanac Vegetable Gardener’s Handbook
—DK Kinard, Director of Community Engagement 

What We’re Experimenting With

“Inspired by our friends at Red Hook Farms, this winter I experimented with dehydrating our turmeric harvest and processing it into powder—it has been a game changer!! I’m excited to try it with some of our frozen ginger harvest as well.”
—Genevieve Harding, Urban Agriculture Manager 

“This year, I collected as many different native tree seeds as I could from Highbridge Park, planted them in trays of soil, and placed them in a caged area in our yard to overwinter. Most native seeds in our region require a period of cold before they germinate, and this method prevents squirrels and raccoons from eating them. We’ll see what comes up in the spring!”
—Ryan Lawrence, Forest Restoration Project Manager 

“This year, I’d like to experiment with ornamental and demonstrative plantings of ‘the Three Sisters,’ a Native American agricultural method that combines maize (for me, Hopi blue corn), beans that grow up the corn and fix nitrogen in the soil (I’m using purple sugar snap peas), and squash, whose broad, low leaves help retain soil moisture as a kind of green mulch (acorn squash). I’m also considering including Hopi red dye amaranth, creating a planting I call ‘Three Sisters and a Red-Headed Stepchild.’”
—Billy Pries, Brooklyn Zone Gardener 

“I’m experimenting with making my own yogurt, which I enjoy because it allows me to customize flavors and sugar levels to my liking. More broadly, I enjoy cooking from scratch as a way to reclaim knowledge and health. So far, I’ve used leftover Greek yogurt as a starter, but I plan to try creating a culture from scratch using jalapeños, which reportedly produces a different flavor profile and a longer-lasting culture. Recipe to come.”
—Neishja Ransom, Community Garden Engagement Coordinator 

What We’re Checking Out Around Town 

“I recommend visiting the NYPL Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, both the Ruth Asawa and Wifredo Lam exhibitions at the Museum of Modern Art, and the reopening of the Studio Museum in Harlem.”
—DK Kinard, Director of Community Engagement 

“For artists and nature enthusiasts alike, I recommend the free exhibition An Ecology of Quilts: The Natural History of American Textiles at the American Folk Art Museum (on view through March 1). As the museum notes, the quilts in this exhibition—and textiles more broadly—‘represent an intricately woven web of environmental resources, craft and scientific knowledge, global movement, and creative collaboration. Quilts survive as powerful material metaphors for human relationships and entanglements within the natural world.’ The vibrancy of some of these naturally dyed quilts, more than 250 years old, is remarkable. Go soak them up.”
—Lauren Wilson, Senior Director of Marketing and Communications