Bill Benner and Butterfly Gardens

  • Post published:03/07/2015
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Bill Benner, veterinarian, birder, and butterfly gardener, is a man with many strings to his bow, but they all play tunes of the natural world and its fragility. He will be talking about the natural world, climate change and the impact it has on our own part of Massachusetts at GreenfieldCommunity College’s Senior Symposium on Tuesday, March 10 from 2-4 pm. As a young man Benner attended CornellUniversity because of their ornithology lab. “I just wanted to study…

Greenfield’s Winter Fare – February 21, 2015

  • Post published:02/19/2015
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Greenfield's Winter Fare is more than a Farmer's Market. Last month I attended the first  Winter Farmers Market of the year, held at the Greenfield Middle School. I came home with two heavy bags full of apples, winter squash, watermelon radish, golden beets, bread and frozen ground lamb.  And wonderful bread from El Jardin bakery.  Walking into that space was like walking into Ali Baba's cave full of jewels. A little brighter, but with so much wealth spread…

Thinking About Our Gardens

  • Post published:11/22/2014
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  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…

Pondering Pickles and Other Preservation Techniques

  • Post published:09/16/2014
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  Harvest season is upon us. This is the reward of summer-long labors. I’ve been talking to neighbors who are canning dilly beans and corn, making peach jam and drying herbs. One neighbor is seeing what she can rescue from the late blight that is hitting many tomato patches in the area. Harvest time can be hectic when so much produce is coming in at the same time. I don’t do much canning any more. I depend more…

If You Want Pollinators Grow Herbs

  • Post published:08/05/2014
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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…

Cabbage, Cauliflower, Other Crucifers and Cutworms

  • Post published:06/12/2014
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Cabbage, caulifower and other crucifers seem to attract cutworms. There are thousands of varieties of cutworms that can overwinter in the garden for two years before metamorphizing into a moth. They are tiny, hard to see and often live just below the surface of the soil where they are invisible until you walk out in the morning to see that your cabbage seedlings are either wilting (because they are not yet thoroughly cut through) or lying  in a…

20-30 Something Garden Guide by Dee Nash

  • Post published:06/07/2014
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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…

New England Wildflower Society Plant Swap

  • Post published:05/27/2014
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As a member of the New England Wildflower Society I have been invited to the Plant Swap at Nasami Farm in Whately at 9 am on Saturday, May 31.  While the invitation said bringing native plants was encouraged, it was not necessary. Invasive plants would be sent away ignominiously! At least one identified plant is required to participate. By bringing 6 plants I can bring home six new plants. I bought my original Waldsteinia fragarioides at Nasami some…

Earth Day – April 22, 2014

  • Post published:04/22/2014
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  How can we celebrate Earth Day every day? We can grow a garden. Forget the lawn; grow veggies and herbs and berries, trees and flowers. Gardens, ornamental and edible can feed lots of pollinators and other bugs that need different kinds of foliage to nibble on, so that they can be eaten by birds and other wild creatures. Plants are pretty low on the food chain so that makes them especially important. Edible plants feed us healthy…

Cellars and Cave Tour with the Heath Agricultural Society

  • Post published:03/11/2014
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The Heath Agricultural Society gave us all a chance to  go exploring the cellars and caves of our neighbors  this past Saturday. Root cellars, cider cellars and a cheese cave. Who could resist this opportunity? Over 50 people signed up for this tour, many of them from towns beyond Heath. Even Springfield! I took one group around beginning with Sheila Litchfield who first explained the basics of cheesemaking. Chemistry. Bacteria. Sheila is a nurse so she knows all…