Greenfield Bee Fest with Bee Spaces Awards

  • Post published:06/12/2018
  • Post comments:9 Comments

This past Saturday Greenfield celebrated the 10th Annual Bee Fest at the 250 year old Second Congregational Church. The seventh minister of the church in the mid-19800s was Lorenzo Langstroth who, in his spare time, invented the modern moveable frame bee hive. The Bee Fest provides the occasion to remember and celebrate Langstroth and the way he changed bee keeping. There were lots of outdoor activities for the children who were learning about bees, most especially not to…

Trees, Caterpillars and Butterflies in the Backyard

  • Post published:02/19/2018
  • Post comments:2 Comments

I have trees, caterpillars and butterflies and other pollinators in my backyard. Trees provide us with many environmental services. The obvious benefit is cooling shade. When we visited friends in Sacremento we learned that the Sacremento Municipal Utility District (SMUD) was putting trees on residential properties to cool the houses and lower the cost of power. Other benefits are not so obvious. They filter our air, take in carbon and breathe out oxygen. They filter water to protect…

Bee Fest Awards Excellent Pollinator Gardens

  • Post published:06/17/2017
  • Post comments:6 Comments

The world needs more pollinator gardens. The Bee Fest organized by the Second Congregational Church and the Franklin County Bee Keepers Association last week included talks by bee experts Lynn-Adler  and Susannah Lerman, researchers at the University of Massachusetts and Kim Flottum the editor of Bee Culture Magazine. All gave us information about problems facing pollinators and how we can help. Susannah Lerman told us about her research which showed that mowing a non-herbicide/pesticide and un-fertilized lawn every…

After Pollinators and Wildflowers Comes a Cocktail Hour

  • Post published:04/17/2016
  • Post comments:1 Comment

It doesn’t seem so very long ago that no one gave a thought to pollinators. People were afraid of bees and stings, but they never thought about the hundreds of bee species that kept vegetable and fruit farms producing. Perhaps that was because so much of our food came from far off places like California where we were never aware of what farms, farmers and crops needed. Nowadays, with people we are more sensible of the benefits of…

Greenfield Bee Fest #5

  • Post published:06/02/2015
  • Post comments:0 Comments

The Fifth Annual Bee Fest will be held at the Second Congregational Church on Bank Row in Greenfield on Saturday, June 6 at 10 am.  The event includes the Langstroth Lecture from 10-11 m - honoring the Reverend Lorenzo Langstroth who once served at the church and who discovered 'bee space' and created the modern bee hive with movable frames. There will also be activities for children including a Honey Bee Tea Party and  a Bee Parade through…

Thinking About Our Gardens

  • Post published:11/22/2014
  • Post comments:3 Comments

  As I‘ve worked  to put my gardens to bed this fall I’ve also been thinking about gardens and how they came to take this form, and how any garden takes form. Some people plan a garden in one fell swoop. Or have someone do it for them. But I think for most of us we begin slowly and one step follows another. Which is a good thing because we learn about our site, and about ourselves as…

School Gardens – Innovation and Discovery School

  • Post published:11/02/2014
  • Post comments:1 Comment

  When I arrived last Thursday afternoon the scene at the school gardens of the  Discovery School at Four Corners were enjoying controlled chaos. Several teachers were staying after school to divide and pot up perennials from the butterfly garden. “Is this Echinacea or a rudbeckia?” one teacher asked and her spade bit into the center of the clump. “Don’t pot the dill! It an annual,” another shouted. “Are you sure these are all bee balm?” another asked…

If You Want Pollinators Grow Herbs

  • Post published:08/05/2014
  • Post comments:4 Comments

When I planted my herb garden I was not in search of pollinators. However, I have found that several of my herbs are pollinator magnets. You may have to take my word for the presence of several bees in the thyme. There are so many, and they move so fast, along with a few tiny butterflies/moths that I just point the camera and hope that I captured one or two. This thyme grows at the edge of the…

20-30 Something Garden Guide by Dee Nash

  • Post published:06/07/2014
  • Post comments:4 Comments

When did you start gardening? I was 25 and we had moved into our first house on Maple Street in Canton, Connecticut. It was a big old Victorian with a large front yard shaded by the maples that marched up and down both sides of the street. It had almost no backyard, just an 8 foot wide cement patio between the house and a steep weedy bank. My first plantings were marigolds planted on either side of the…

Walk on the Wildside with Sue Bridge

  • Post published:08/31/2013
  • Post comments:1 Comment

How would you plan your retirement if you had already received a degree from Wellesley College, earned a further degree in Russian and Middle Eastern Studies, hitchhiked to Morocco, lived in Paris, worked for the United Nations, as well as in the cable TV world, and for the Christian Science Monitor newspaper? Sue Bridge, with the urging of a Northampton friend, bought eight acres of hilly land in Conway. For the past seven years her retirement project has…