The Kew Gardens CSA Food Scrap Drop-Off is open from 8:30am to NOON on Sundays in the Kew Gardens Cinemas Park, on Austin St. off of Lefferts Blvd. all year long.
Thx to Queens Botanical Garden, Big Reuse, the Kew Gardens Cinemas, and our KG neighbors.
We are volunteer-driven. Would you like to help out? We have a group of dedicated volunteers whose faces you probably know if you are a regular scrapper at our site—Chris B., Chris K.,Hope, Jason, Linda, Kevin, Marilyn, Ron and Scarlett. If you would like to help either ongoing through the season or as a onesie, speak to us at the site and we will fill in our calendar together. We have openings for one-hour shifts and we are very flexible.
In the News: Thank you Queens Courier and Carlotta Mohamed for this wonderful piece on our FSDO.
In the event of inclement weather, we will post open/closed information at the top of this page and also on the Kew Gardens CSA Fb page, Twitter and Instagram. Or call 718 971 3001.
Please pick up the informative materials on the QBG table and sign up for the monthly newsletter. The QBG website has useful info and why not become a member of Queens Botanical Garden? Join. We also like their Instagram page: qbgcompost
Frequently Asked Questions:
Question: I store my scraps in a compostable bag which I purchase. Why can’t I drop that bag into the bin along with my scraps?
Answer: We discourage that practice because while it is a good move, the compost bags will break down more slowly than the food scraps and so are not appropriate for this project. But thx anyway and we encourage the use of those bags for storage.
Question: Where does the compost go after it leaves the KG site?
Answer: The bins go to a facility in Long Island City for processing.
Question: Can we bring bags of leaves?
Answer: Some. While bagging leaves for pickup and composting is a good, green practice, we cannot accept a large number of bags of leaves at our FSDO, because doing so does not fall within our mission to collect food scraps. However it is true that yard waste is good for the pile and so we recommend you speak to us first.
Question: How can we contact you?
Answer: The Kew Gardens CSA is the host for the FSDO at the Cinemas Park on Sundays. You can email us at kewgardenscsa@gmail.com or call 718 971 3001.
Question: Do you give away compost?
Answer: Yes, we do. In collaboration with the Queens Botanical Garden we will distribute small bags of compost every so often (Quarterly?). We will post dates of forthcoming compost givebacks.
Question: I need compost for my backyard gardening. Can you supply large bags?
Answer: Please refer to the GET COMPOST page on the nyc.gov website. The bottom of the page has info about the NYC Compost Project partners who can help orgs and individuals get compost.
Question: The city allows meat in its brown bin curbside composting program, Why do you not accept meat?
Answer: The city takes the food scraps that it picks up to a large, industrial-size facility that burns and quickly breaks down the organic waste (including meat) to produce methane. The food scraps dropped off at community composting sites go to mid-size facilities that “work the pile” over time, breaking down the scraps to produce compost.
Kew Gardens CSA 