The Holliston Garden Club is holding its 4th Garden tour on June 1 and 2, 2013. Saturday hours are 10 – 4, Sunday hours are 12 – 4. The tour will include 6 lovely local gardens.Tickets are $15 and may be ordered through the club’s website: hollistongardenclub.org.
Naomi Cappuccino of the Department of Biology, Carleton University, Ottawa, Ontario, has called our attention to her new website, Lily Leaf Beetle Tracker, at http://lilybeetletracker.weebly.com/. The primary goal of this site is to map the North American distribution of the lily leaf beetle. The site has a Google map that we hope to populate with input from lily growers everywhere (there’s a form for uploading both the location of beetle sightings and photos). In addition, the site will provide news about a biological control effort based in Ottawa, as well as a page where readers can share their own tips for controlling the beetle.
A half-day workshop beginning early Friday morning, May 24, will explore methods of seeing and of photographing, aimed at improving the way you photograph flowers and gardens. We will learn the proper use of the camera, the true value of the tripod, how to set up a shot and evaluate light using the meter and the eyes. We will explore depth of field, color, light modification and more. Describe order in the chaos, manage changing light, find and convey the emotion and energy in the scene you see.
The instructor for this Massachusetts Horticultural Society workshop is none other than past Garden Club of the Back Bay speaker Rich Pomerantz, author, speaker, teacher, and owner of Rich Pomerantz Photography. Register on line at www.masshort.org.
Cost – $95.00 for members, $125.00 for non-members.
Explore the hidden gardens and public green spaces of Charlestown at the Gardens for Charlestown Garden Tour. On Saturday, June 15th from 10:00-3:00 meet the gardeners of this historic neighborhood and view twelve delightful and varied private gardens. Also, learn about our premiere public open spaces as the Friends of Harvard Mall talk about their historic park, while the Friends of City Square Park, the newest park created as part of the “Big Digâ€, provide light refreshments. View the Gardens for Charlestown community garden, which boasts creative urban gardening in small spaces. Proceeds of this tour support the Gardens for Charlestown, which is a 63 plot community garden and open space. Gardens for Charlestown is a non-profit, all-volunteer garden and green space organization established in 1976. For more information visit http://www.gardensforcharlestown.com.
Tickets are $20.00 each and will be on sale the day of the tour at the Gardens for Charlestown. The tour begins at the Gardens for Charlestown community garden which is located at the intersection of Main and Bunker Hill Streets near Sullivan Square. The Sullivan Square Orange Line MBTA Station is a short walk away, and both the #92 and #93 buses which leave from Downtown Crossing and Haymarket Stations stop at the garden. Street parking is also available.
Landscape architect David Valbracht turned to botanical illustration to develop a better method for identifying trees. A guest researcher at the Arboretum, David gathers plant samples from his studies in the collections and arranges them in his studio as they grew in life. These “tree portraits†emphasize drawing as a method to develop observation and identification skills, and at the same allow for personal expression. Now through June 9 at the Arnold Arboretum Hunnewell Building lecture hall at 125 Arborway is his exhibition Learning from Leaves. The exhibition centerpiece is a thirty-foot mural illustrating over 100 species of trees, grouped according to the Arboretum’s landscape plan. Valbracht studied landscape architecture at Harvard University, botanical art at the Wellesley College Botanical Garden, and is currently attending the Academy of Realist Art, Boston. He and Maggie Redfern, Visitor Education Assistant, will lead a guided tour of the landscape on Sunday, May 19, beginning at 2 pm. The activity is free, but in case of inclement weather, call 617-384-5209.
Join Garden Club of the Back Bay Past President Margaret Pokorny, who is also, incidentally, the Chair of the Commonwealth Avenue Mall Committee and a member of the Board of Directors of the Neighborhood Association of the Back Bay, on Wednesday, May 22, beginning at 6:30 pm, for a lecture and discussion about the replanting, preservation, and maintenance of “The Grandest Boulevard.” The event will take place at the French Cultural Center, 53 Marlborough Street, and is free and open to the public. Contact 617-247-3961 or email info@nabbonline.com for more information. The evening is presented by NABB.
Weston Nurseries, 93 East Main Street (Route 135) in Hopkinton will present Beth Wilkinson, Editor of The Newton Conservators Newsletter, on Saturday, May 25, beginning at 10 am, in a lecture entitled Native Plants for Bio-Diversity: Your Garden Has a Job to Do! The event is free. Image from www.hilltowntreeandgarden.com. For directions, call 508-435-3414 or visit www.westonnurseries.com.
The famed Concord spokesman for individualism and self-reliance, Ralph Waldo Emerson, once wrote: When I go into a good garden, I think, if it were mine, I should never go out of it. This year the Concord Museum is celebrating 24 years of going into good gardens on the annual Garden Tour.
The Museum’s Guild of Volunteers has organized this pre-eminent garden tour, an unequalled opportunity both to share in the delights of beautiful and historic private gardens in the Concord area and to support the Museum’s Education Programs which annually serve 7,000 students from all over Massachusetts and the nation.
The Museum’s Garden Tour has become a New England tradition for garden lovers from near and far. The Garden Tour will take place on two days, Friday and Saturday, May 31 and June 1, rain or shine. Each of the eight private gardens reflects the individual interests and passions of the owners and their families and will inspire both new gardeners designing their first perennial bed and accomplished landscapers with acres of garden rooms.
The tour of Concord-area gardens is self-guided and self-paced, beginning each day at 9:00 a.m. and continuing until 4:00 p.m. Garden-goers should arrive at the Museum, located on the Cambridge Turnpike at Lexington Road in Concord, to pick up their maps prior to starting out. Tickets are good for either or both days, but each garden may only be visited once.
For ticket information and prices, visit www.concordmuseum.org or call the Concord Museum at 978-369-9763, ext. 216.
The Spring Garden Tour at Waters Edge, 32 Sargeant Drive, Northeast Harbor, Maine (the WP Stewart Estate) features the spectacular blooms of spring in one of the premier, oceanfront gardens in Northeast Harbor, Maine. Take in expansive views across Somes Sound and of the mountains in Acadia National Park. Tickets are $15. Each year the tour proceeds benefit a different local charity – this year the Mount Desert Island YMCA is the host. The gates are open from 9am – 3pm. Yoga will be offered in the garden from 8am – 9am for $25, which also includes the garden tour ticket. Limited space in yoga class. To purchase tickets in advance, contact the Mount Desert Island YMCA at 207-288-3511. For more information, contact Kim O’Brien at kim@mdiymca.org. The tour will be held on two successive Saturdays, June 1 and June 8, rain or shine.
Thousands of rhododendrons in more than 100 varieties cover Heritage Museum & Gardens’ 100 acres with spectacular blooms during this week-long event. Enjoy a peaceful walk surrounded by walls of flowers, learn more about these gorgeous plants from horticultural experts, explore Heritage’s connection to noted rhododendron hybridizers Charles Dexter and Jack Cowles, challenge yourself to a rhododendron scavenger hunt, and participate in other family activities, Saturday, May 18 through Sunday, May 26, in Sandwich, Massachusetts. On Saturday, May 18 from 9 – 1, Paul Blackmore will lead a Rhododendron Photography Workshop (additional fee and advance registration required.) Also, on Sunday, May 19, there will be a rhododendron propagation workshop from 10 – 11:30 at the Heald Center, and from 2 – 3, a panel discussion, outdoors, weather permitting. For complete information visit www.heritagemuseumandgardens.org.
