Sprinkling-Seeds

Welcome – Lets green the city!

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About the Project

Not everyone has a greenspace of their own – especially in NYC. Backyards are rare and yet we still want a way to cultivate little mini ecosystems in the city. This project aims to let anyone from anywhere in the city take part in greenspace management. By planting native wildflowers in overlooked areas across NYC we’re hoping to achieve a few research and human-benefit goals. Below we list some of the research aims of the project, as well as our hope for wider community engagement.

This research project comes from the Lab of Urban Plant Ecology at Cornell University, where we are interested in questions of how to support urban biodiversity. We’ve developed a seed mix of native wildflowers that we think may be able to colonize stressful urban habitats. This includes areas like vacant lots, roadside verges and other overlooked habitats that could benefit from the infusion of native species.

Species descriptions and images below.

We’re now handing out hundreds of seeds with a mix of supplements included to help the seeds establish across the city.

We want you to help us get these seeds in the ground, and tell us when and where. The goal is to then follow the success of the planting over the year(s) and see if we’re able to introduce these native species into the city. Hopefully you can help us with this, and participate in the scientific process.

We’ve commissed six local artists to make artwork for our seed mixes, and we’re hosting events around town to explain the project and hand out seed packets. Follow our Instagram to learn more, or email us to organize an event!

Research Questions & Hypotheses

We have a series of questions we aim to answer with this project. Broadly, what is the efficacy of guerilla gardening? What species can colonize stressful urban environments without much oversight? What types of urban spaces are best suited for sowing in our native wildflowers? What pollinators visit these plants? How do these grassroot efforts influence human-nature interactions?

We hypothesize that there will be important species x environment interactions, such that subsets of our seed mix will thrive in very specific mixes and we’re hoping this work will identify those interactions to improve our efficiency. Additionally, we predict that people participating in the project will increase their engagement with local greenspaces and hopefully create a positive feedback loop of native plant gardening in the city.
We will be collecting these data in the coming years (as long as you tell us where your planting is), but we hope you will too

Sowing Instructions

Sprinkle the seeds and watch them grow!

A little bit more nuanced than that, but still we hope this mix is well suited to grow up without too much care.

Each seed packet has enough seed for a 5 foot x 5 foot area.

After sprinkling (sowing) the seeds, they would benefit from a watering, or being rained on that day, but its not absolutely necessary.

Species will pop up in the spring, and some will flower in the first year, but more will flower in the second year. Patience is a virtue as they say..

If you have any growth from your site months after sowing – please send us updates!
P.S. – Huge thanks to Cullen P for helping out with the website backend and data curation world.