Rooftop Open Hours

Core El Centro welcomes everyone to come and visit the Rooftop garden. There is a lot  to see, like the growing strawberries and the chamomile that is literately everywhere. The Rooftop is open Monday during the farmers market thru Saturday at noon. There is always someone in the Rooftop working on the garden.
There is always sometime new in the rooftop; plants are always sprouting.

Rooftop Hours    

The rooftop is open 6 days a week.

Monday- 4:00-8:00 pm

Tuesday- 9:00-11:00 am

Wednesday- 9:00-12 pm

Thursday- 4:00-6:00 pm

Friday-5:00-7:00 pm

Saturday-10:00-12:00 pm

The rooftop is alive with vivid colors and 50 shades of green. The aura of the rooftop will give you the peace and quiet you been looking for. With a great view of the city you will fall in love with the rooftop. Come and bring your friends there is always something growing in the garden.

Core El Centro Rooftop Garden is located @ 130 S. Bruce St, 5th floor 

  Rooftop? 

Rooftop.

Written by Jackie (Garden Intern)

City Livin' 

Did you think you would ever find chickens in the city? As of July of 2011, you can own chickens in Milwaukee! We are grateful for the chickens that reside at Pete's Community Garden and the life they bring to the area. Below are some helpful tips when caring for chickens!

When choosing a breed, take into account Milwaukee's chilly winters. Some cold climate breeds include: 

• Plymouth Rocks
• Wyandottes
• Chanteclers
• Orpingtons
• Langshans
• Sussexes

Plymouth and Wyandottes are also great egg laying breeds as well. Owning chickens will provide you with the freshest eggs possible. Fresh eggs have a stronger taste and a more orange colored yolk.

Your chickens must have a place to live! Chicken coups must be large enough to give each chicken at least 16 square feet and must cleaned often. Also, be sure to secure the chickens inside the coup at night so that they are protected from predators.

Chickens will eat just about anything. I know they thought some of the things we planted tasted pretty good. In addition to the complete organic feed we give them, they really enjoy fruits and vegetables. It is also very important to make sure they have enough water. Especially when the summer weather gets hot!

Have any further questions about chicken permits or care? Visit the Milwaukee page at http://city.milwaukee.gov/chicken#.VY2pYUbSoTA, the My Pet Chicken guide at http://www.mypetchicken.com/backyard-chickens/chicken-care/guide-toc.aspx or stop by the garden during our open hours and we'll be happy to answer them. 

Early Harvest

May is the perfect time to start planting seed but it is also time of harvesting some leafy greens. Your joking right? Not Necessarily!

Started the season fairly early with the use of a cold frame. We sowed arugula seeds was in late February to early-March and have we have already harvested the arugula twice this year.

Using a cold frame you can start sowing seeds earlier in the year and have the advantage of harvesting early. Or extend the end of the season by a few weeks in November. Similarly you can also cover some plant, like Kale, over the winter in a cold frame for it to seed in the spring of next year. Either way it becomes a great tool to have.

Here is a link on how we built our own cold frame from scrap parts and some hardware:
How to Build a Cool Frame

P.S. To use it for overwintering plants, make sure to take into consideration of the height of the plants.

Weather Station on CORE's Rooftop

     Figure 1 shows that the data we collected from our weather station correlates with what was collected at Michelle International Airport’s data. There is a small dissimilarity in temperature but too small of a difference.

     In general when looking at temperature, 5 floors makes little difference to no difference compared to ground level.

     During the summer months it seems that the rooftop was windy but we didn’t know now much. The highest wind speed we got to this year was 15.2 miles per hour and an average high of 11.3 miles per hour during the year. We grow some very tough produce on the roof with that kind of speed!

month/year	Nov 2013			Dec 2013			Jan 2014			Feb 2014
	max	min	average	max	min	average	max	min	average	max	min	average
Outdoor Temp. (F)	46.9	11.7	26.7	51.8	-5.8	23.3	48.7	-14.8	15.7	52.2	-2.9	18.6
Wind (m/h)	7.6	0.0	2.7	13.0	0.0	3.3	15.2	0.0	4.0	13.6	0.0	3.7
Windchill (F)	44.8	7.9	25.748	50.4	-9.4	21.21	48.7	-38.4	11.902	52.2	-10.5	15.688

month/year	March 2014			April 2014			May 2014			June 2014
	max	min	average	max	min	average	max	min	average	max	min	average
Outdoor Temp. (F)	61.0	2.8	30.7	75.6	23.4	44.4	88.3	37.8	56.3	88.7	51.8	63.7
Wind (m/h)	13.0	0.0	3.5	15.2	0.0	3.4	13.6	0.0	3.0	10.7	0.0	2.5
Windchill (F)	61	-0.9	28.503	75.6	20.5	42.639	88	29.5	55.412	88.7	43.7	63.365

month/year	July 2014			Aug 2014			Sept 2014			Oct 2014
	max	min	average	max	min	average	max	min	average	max	min	average
Outdoor Temp. (F)	91.0	54.3	69.7	91.2	55.8	70.2	87.6	44.8	66.3	70.2	34.9	51.2
Wind (m/h)	11.4	0.0	2.7	9.2	0.0	2.4	9.8	0.0	2.2	15.2	0.0	2.9
Windchill (F)	91	54.3	69.414	91.2	55.8	69.979	87.6	36	66.022	70.2	32	50.22

Figure 1 Source: wunderground.com