queens library | HarborLAB

Forest Hills tree giveaway. Photo by Erik Baard. Tulip tree saplings in the foreground.

Seven HarborLAB volunteers helped make the Forest Hills Tree GIveaway organized by Michael Perlman at the Forest Hills Jewish Center and MacDonald Park on October 13 a great success. Help get more trees planted in western Queens with the Queens Public Library! Both events were coordinated with campaign leaders New York Restoration Project and MillionTreesNYC.

If you’d like to join our team in supporting the western Queens tree giveaway, please email volunteer@harborlab.org with the subject line “Broadway LIbrary Trees.” It also helps to join through our Facebook event. Please indicate if you’d like to work the entire event, or the first shift (noon-2PM) or the second shift (2PM-4PM). The program runs from 1PM-3PM.

This is a MillionTreesNYC event coordinated by New York Restoration Project and its local partner, Queens Library at Broadway/ Greening Queens Library. HarborLAB volunteers will follow their directions. Our help was requested by Greening Queens Library.

Here’s the link to register for your tree, or to register a tree for the HarborLAB launch site: http://treegiveaways.com/qnlib. Here’s a general page for NYRP-coordinated tree giveaways in all five boroughs.

Trees and other plants reduce combined sewage overflows, which raise pathogen levels in local waterways. Let’s do all we can as advocates and greeners to make Hallets Cove and other NYC inlets safer, especially for kids. The ability of these trees to absorb CO2 also reduces ocean acidification, perhaps the world’s greatest looming threat to food supplies and ecosystems.

HarborLAB enjoyed great success helping the Forest Hills tree giveaway. Let’s do it again! This is also a great opportunity for HarborLAB to earn salt-tolerant fruiting trees for our launch! We have shadbush (aka service berry) trees for our launch now, and will add persimmon. Maybe some tulip trees, which were the trunks of choice for the first canoes of this harbor?

The Forest Hills tree giveaway’s cutest volunteers (Harpo the pooch puts it over the top). Photo by Erik Baard.

HarborLAB was a hit at the packed Western Queens Green Resources Fair! It was a happy, busy gathering at the Queens Library Broadway branch in Astoria, with lots of kids and fellow environmental groups like Transportation Alternatives, Recycle-a-Bicycle, GrowNYC, Green Guerillas, Bucky Buckaw, Smiling Hog’s Head Ranch urban farm, and neighborhood groups like Green Shores NYC.

Organizer Lynne Serpe calls out another raffle round.

HarborLAB’s table was staffed by volunteers Danushi Fernando, Erik Baard, and Ricardo Grass. We displayed and explained navigation lights, safety signal strobes, current and tide charts, a children’s life vest, and other materials. We especially emphasized our coming New York City-based children’s programs in safer and cleaners waters than can be found in western Queens (an issue we continue to address — Hallets Cove is physically the most suitable spot but quite frequently has unacceptably high bacteria counts) and autumn’s inauguration of Catskill Watershed Wonder Tours. The latter will let kids experientially learn about their drinking water sources by kayaking and canoeing on the Neversink Reservoir.

Over the shoulder view of volunteer Danushi Fernando teaching kids about safety lights for navigation and emergency signalling.

Mental note: Like crows, kids really go for the shiny stuff! 😉 Maybe we’ll raffle lights next year!

A family at the Transportation Alternative display. We shared a table. Paddlers and pedalers unite!

The entire event was a huge success. One dramatic moment was when a young boy began to choke on his candy. Unfortunately, his mother began slapping his back to help him, which can do more harm than good. Proper first aid education is vital, especially given that choking is a leading cause of death in kids under fives years old. Erik rushed the boy and his mother to the next room because he happened to know that Queens Library event staff member Chiamaka “Chi Chi” Onyejiukwa (who has volunteered for future HarborLAB events) is also a nurse. As luck would have it, interrupting the back slapping allowed the boy to clear his throat just as Chi Chi swung into action. The boy cried for a bit, clearly traumatized, but we were all comforted that a nurse was on hand for an event with kids — these kinds of things can happen anywhere, anytime.

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HarborLAB Helps Tree Giveaways!

Western Queens Green Resources Fair