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Local Green Thumb Calls for a 'Plant-and-Mushroom Lovers' Social Group

By Nikhita Venugopal | September 4, 2013 8:43am | Updated on September 4, 2013 9:07am
 Lily Kinner, a Columbia Waterfront local, is hoping to start a gardening group to share tips and tricks between plant lovers in the neighborhood.
Lily Kinner
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COLUMBIA WATERFRONT DISTRICT — A neighborhood plant-and-mushroom lover is looking to create a group to share tips and tricks on growing a beautiful garden.

As the fall planting season begins, Lily Kinner’s goal is to have a “lush, green, leaf-bursting conservatory-esque environment” in her apartment, plan a second garden for her stoop and “to learn more about mushrooms,” she said, in a notice at a community garden.

“I’ve always killed the plants I have,” said Kinner, 29, whose interest in gardening began last summer.

Since moving to Brooklyn in March, Kinner’s plants have had more room to grow than in her previous (and smaller) Manhattan apartment, she said.

“It’s been nourishing,” she said. “The ability to grow things is life-affirming.”

Kinner, who works in retail, has been successfully growing an array of spider plants, basil and nasturtiums, but is looking to expand her garden with tomatoes, cucumber, squash, beans, peas and even lavender.

But on her green path, she’s stumbled on some gardening snags that she hopes to discuss with local green thumbs, she said.

Her store-bought compost is shriveling and killing some of her plants and while Kinner has tried growing mushrooms, they didn’t blossom as she had planned.

Through the group, Kinner hopes to share stories of gardening experiments and come together “just to hang out and talk about plants.”

To reach Lily Kinner, email her at kinnerlily@gmail.com.