It seems like the whole town of Greenfield has been making New Year’s Resolutions to work energetically with trees and plants to make this a more beautiful and more environmentally sensitive town. The Greenfield Tree Committee has been at work since it was founded in 1998 by Carolyn MacLellan. In 2002 Greenfield was designated as a “Tree City” by the Arbor Day Foundation, a distinction renewed every year since. Nancy Hazard has been involved with the Tree Committee…

Emily Dickinson (1830-1883) and Collingwood Cherry Ingram (1880-1981) were both gardeners, but lived at different times with very different gardens. Two new books, Emily Dickinson’s Gardening Life by Marta McDowell(Timber Press $24.95) and Sakura Obsession: The Incredible Story of The Planthunter Who Saved Japan’s Cherry Blossoms by Naoko Abe (Knopf $27.95) take us into different worlds.

I am a reader but garden books never had a big place in my life until our family was preparing to leave New York City for the wilds of Heath. By happenstance I was given Onward and Upward in the Garden (1979) by Katharine S. White with an introduction by her husband E.B. White. I had tended vegetable gardens, but never gave a thought to flower gardens. However, that is where Mrs. White’s heart lay. The very first…

Last week the Historic Deerfield Annual Christmas Wreath Workshop was held at the Deerfield Community Center. The room was alive with energy, Christmas carols and cookies. The air was filled with the scent of evergreen trees. Piles of holly berries, kumquats, teasels, pine cones were everywhere. For years volunteers of every age have descended on the Community Center to make merry and create beautiful Christmas wreaths. Tinka Lunt told me that twenty years ago Scott Creelman, a member…

Why mast years? This year a heavy crop of acorns is falling on the ground. Just look under any oak tree, or walk across the campus at Greenfield Community College. These acorns are the most visible crop of tree seeds which are also called ‘mast.’

  Squanto, of the Pautuxet tribe, was a part of my childhood Thanksgivings. Squanto (Tisquantum) was captured by English explorers in 1605 and spent a number of years in England and learned to speak English. He also found his way back to the Plymouth Bay area in 1619 and learned that his own tribe had all died from disease. Massasoit, the sachem of the Wampanoags, and Samoset who had learned a bit of English from fishermen, decided that…

With the gift giving season drawing near I want to spread the word about new books that would please gardeners of every sort. In my house books are the one gift we know will delight. The Half-Hour Allotment by Lia Leendertz When The Half-Hour Allotment book showed up in my mailbox I was delighted to think of a system that would teach me to work an allotted half-hour at a time. How understanding such a system would be…