Archive | March 2016

Fun Activities for Home – Indoor Spring Blooms

Mar31

Spring Blooms Indoors

Before the weather turns, get your clippers out and cut branches from your spring flowering shrubs to bring in and force to bloom.

Here are just a few shrubs you can try this with:   Redbud, Flowering Quince, Flowering Dogwood, Hawthorn, Forsythia, Honeysuckle, Apple and Crabapple,  European Pussy Willow, Spirea, and Lilac

What do you do?
1. With pruning shears or a sharp knife cut branches that have numerous flower buds.

2. After you bring the branches inside, split open stem bottom with sharp scissors about 1 inch or gently mash with a hammer.

3. Place in a vase of warm (not hot!) water away from direct sunlight, and keep cool at night.

What should you see? 

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GORGEOUS!

 

Fun Activities for Home – Feed the Birds

Mar31

March Fun Activity

Don’t be fooled by the relatively warm weather…we still have a lot of time to spend indoors planning our spring plantings! In the meantime, enjoy the wildlife and natural beauty of winter. Insert picture?

What did you do with your recently retired Christmas tree? If you have a plastic stand, put the tree outdoors by your bird feeders, a safe place for birds to perch between visits to the feeder.(insert picture)?

Recipe of the Month

Feeding the Birds:  Cornbread Seed Cakes

Cornbread see cakes are a particular favorite and can be make in a jiffy.  Buy an additional package of your favorite cornbread mix.  Add 1 cup of birdseed and an additional egg. Bake as usual, cut into squares, and put pieces on your platform feeder, on the ground (to share with squirrels), or on your birdbath.

March 21st Program: Learn about bees!

Mar1

Creating Forage and Nesting Habitat for Native Bees

Bedford NH Garden Club

Monthly Meeting Program
March 21st, 2016

9:30 am Social, 10:00 Meeting, 10:30 Program

Monthly the Bedford NH Garden Club provides educational programs. This month we will be learning about bees!  Come join us for a fascinating program on the hundred of species of native bees in New Hampshire. Amy Papineau, UNH Cooperative Extension Field Specialist will discuss the roles and importance of native bees in New Hampshire’s natural ecosystems and agriculture and will discuss what you can do to support native bees on your property by protecting, creating, and enhancing forage and nesting habitat.