The Civic Garden Center of Greater Cincinnati will sell thousands of native plants across 64 species at its Fall Native Plant Festival on Sept. 12. The sale runs 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. at Hauck Botanic Garden in Walnut Hills.
The plants come from the center's ReRooted propagation program, which focuses on straight species native to southwest Ohio. Volunteers planted almost 10,000 seeds earlier this year, according to the CGC's spring update. The program sources local genotypes so the plants are adapted to the region's climate and soils.
The sale is first come, first served.
Gardeners who want to guarantee their selection can preorder one of five curated pocket garden kits, each containing 15 CGC-grown native plants. The presale closes Friday morning, Sept. 11.
Beyond the CGC's own booth, 12 regional nurseries and vendors will sell plants at the festival: Bean Native Nursery, Green Living By Design, Home Grown Habitats, Junebug's Natives, Native Roots, Natives in Harmony, Shaker Trace Nursery, Tikkun Farm, Tree-Yo Permaculture, Verdigris Plant Farm, Walnut Hills Bio Eco Club and Wild Heart Gardens. The vendor list comes from the center's summer newsletter.
The festival also includes live music, food and drinks, arts and crafts vendors, kids' activities and partner organizations, according to the CGC's festival page.
Hyde Park and Oakley are still recovering from July 17 flash flooding that dumped between five and six inches of rain on the East Side in about an hour, according to WVXU. Oakley logged 33 emergency incident calls during the storm and Hyde Park logged 20, according to the Cincinnati Enquirer. Metropolitan Sewer District officials described it as a 1,000-year storm.
"Neither torrential rain nor stifling heat could stop our summer programming across the board!" the CGC's Erin Sigmund wrote in the center's Sept. 5 newsletter.
Volunteer shifts for the festival are still available. The Civic Garden Center is at 2715 Reading Road, on the corner of William Howard Taft and Reading Road, just south of UC Health.
Upcoming
- Saturday, Sept. 12: Fall Native Plant Festival, 9 a.m.–3 p.m., Hauck Botanic Garden, 2715 Reading Road
- Friday, Sept. 11: Presale deadline for pocket garden kits (order through the CGC website)
