Wonderbee Gardens

07/06/2023

Come learn how to blend your own herbal teas!

17/05/2023

Horse Chestnut (Aesulus hippocastanum) flowers are in bloom!

24/04/2023

So excited about participating in Goodwin Conservation Center's Master Naturalist Program! We identified greater celandine and celandine poppy, found some tadpoles and salamander egg masses, and discussed the number of invasive insects destroying our native trees. We also went off on our own for an hour to sit with nature and observe. I found an intriguing little yellow flowered plant which I couldn't identify but I know it's a type of sedge.

24/04/2023

There's life at the cemetery.

07/07/2022

Home made deer repellent. Looks good, but it probably smells extraordinarily bad. As long as you are putting it on plants a little distance from the house then it should be fine. Thanks to Jenny at Knox, Inc for sharing this video. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YPfNllFCoM4

This homemade repellent keeps deer from eating the new growth on my camellias.. Cheap/easy to make.. Does not harm/burn plant.. Should be effective for any p...

04/07/2022

Aren't these guys two cuties! They were helping me pick roses for my rose petal gycerite a few weeks back.

04/07/2022

Check out this elegant elderflower shrub. The umbels are huge!! There will be tons of berries in no time!

04/07/2022

This year I am selling culinary and medicinal herbs (fresh as well as in tea blends and tinctures, etc) at local farmers markets. I love the farmers market environment and making herbal products is a joy.

04/08/2021

DATE CORRECTED!

03/08/2021

First Mushroom foray with the CVMS on Sunday--awesome weather and at an AMAZING location! I never knew about Winding Trails (private park). Check out all the crazy 'shrooms. The grey shaggy one is called Old Man of the Woods (Strobilomyces strobilaceus). Also I didn't know that all Amanitas are not red capped.

19/07/2021

https://www.almanac.com/weeds-indicator-plants?fbclid=IwAR2mthK7MJEAEpmEtUw9JBeULAksemEQfFnKNHT_pqBOOogZTlYZhq6U5y8

Did you know that weeds can tell you a lot about your soil? Learn how to use weeds as a natural soil test so you can improve your soil!

14/07/2021

Oh NO not the birds too! A mystery disease is killing our songbirds. Please read this short article on how to clean your feeders and baths and what to look out for: https://www.ctaudubon.org/2021/07/something-is-killing-birds-to-the-south-taking-in-your-bird-feeders-now-might-help-to-keep-it-from-spreading/

July 6, 2021 — An unknown affliction has been killing songbirds in southern, mid-Atlantic states, and mid-west states. Although it seems as if it hasn’t reached Connecticut yet, it’s time to take precautions. The Connecticut Audubon Society has been monitoring reports and consulting with other...

01/07/2021

https://returntonow.net/2020/10/12/forest-garden-with-500-kinds-of-food-requires-only-a-few-hours-of-work-per-month/?fbclid=IwAR1_KhLJUZgMsefyAGwR###Sy5YUVKk-CDe07NQElP3pqK5EVc7yo1tVP-0

This man’s forest garden produces tons of food, while practically tending itself! Historically, farms and forests have been at odds. Conventional wisdom says we have to cut down the forest to make way for agriculture. But a growing movement called agro-forestry “capitalizes” on the free servic...

30/06/2021

I love Nancy and Natureworks in Northford. I did get a chance to work with her for a season about a decade ago and it was fantastic experience. Lots of hard landscaping work but lots of beautiful gardens. Here she is talking about annuals for shade. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MTpHG28mxYE

30/06/2021

Quick before its too late!! BE BRAVE!! CUT BACK THOSE ASTERS AND MUM HALFWAY DOWN! You don't want to have to stake them later to keep them from flopping.
https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=10157975021571269

24/06/2021

Flowers! Flowers! Flowers! Roses, globe allium, New Guinea Impatiens and foxtail lily. What a lovely combo!

24/06/2021

Not into Impatiens? Try annual vinca (Catharanthus roseus). They take a little bit to get going, but once they do--oh boy do they fill up an area! They come in shades of pink and white, and some times you may even see some blue/lavender colored ones. Happy planting!

24/06/2021

If you are looking for disease resistant, easy maintenance all season blooming rose shrubs, Knock Out Roses are a registered trademarked group of roses that fit the bill. They're so easy municipalities plant them in traffic median. Add fertilizer in the spring for even more flowers!

23/06/2021

This is a Gazania. It is an annual that one of my clients loved to plant in her front door flower bed. Its bright, requires pretty much zero maintenance and attracts butterflies. One summer I noticed that a few of them weren't looking so hot, so I investigated further. When I tried to deadhead and remove dead leaves off a few, whole plants would pop out of the ground with the slightest tug on a leaf. Crown rot. Also there was a whitish coloration to the leaves. These were a sure sign of fungal infection. These annuals prefer well draining soils and dry conditions, but the soil they were growing in was very damp. Not only that but, as I discovered, there were two or three plants all grouped together very closely.

Often, when a grower seeds trays of annuals, they expect that not all the seeds will germinate, so they put more than one seed in a cell to make sure that cell grows at least one plant. If a cell is empty the garden center consumer will not likely buy a six pack with one or two empty cells. If a six pack has an extra seedling well all the better, a consumer thinks. However when two or three seedlings are growing in a single cell, they compete for water and nutrients. That's fine for the short time they may spend on the garden center tables, but after a few weeks this forces the plant to go to seed and senesce faster. After a few weeks, most seedlings reach a point of no return--even if one were to plant them in a roomy garden bed with healthy, moist soil, they would still simply just go to seed and die after just a few flowers.

Back to my clients garden. They were healthy and strong when she bought them, however when she planted them she didn't pull apart the two or three seedlings that were growing together in one cell. Which means they were still competing for nutrients and growing space. The crowded conditions lacked airflow and moisture lingered on the leaves to the point where they developed fungus and started to rot all the way down to the crowns.

This anecdote illustrates just how important it is to separate annuals seedlings and space them appropriately (depending on the species) when planting them. This will help them to grow full, flower adequately, and stay healthy for the whole season. Happy planting!

29/05/2021

A beautiful combination of grasses, daisy fleabane and buttercups. What joy!

13/05/2021

Rosa rugosa, beach rose. So beautiful and the fragrance is divine!

13/05/2021

Volunteering at Knox Parks helping to put together planters for the city. Putting together planters is easy and almost instantly rewarding. In the background, Knox farmers (including me), are growing vegetable and herb seedlings for our first planting season in the program.

07/05/2021

First time being asked to talk to a group about my herbal experiences. I think it will be fun. I will bring mango lassi with tumeric and a touch of cardamon. I'm so honored and excited!

15/04/2021

So it begins! This year I am participating in Knox Park's 3 year Incubator Farm program so that I serve my clients better with planning and maintaining their vegetable gardens.

I already have a couple seasons working on farms, and several years experience maintaining my own plots in Knox's community gardens. At home I grow fruits and vegetables in containers because it is so shady and most of the sunlight only hits paved areas or stone walls. This year I want to be more deliberate and organized around crop planning, and the Knox farm program provides just the kind of support I need to deepen my food growing skill set.

The open field at Knox is in an urban center where winds blow in all manner of plastic bags and bits. Over the next couple of weeks I will sift the rocks and plastic waste out of the soil, foot by foot, planting as I go until I get to the end of my 90' farm row. The likelihood is low that I will get to sift all of it, but I can put aside the sifter and just turn the soil with the shovel rather quickly when I start running out of time.

Soil samples have already been received and the soil is good, with very low background levels of lead. Unfortunately lead is present at varying levels in most soil urban and suburban.

Seeds are germinating in the adjacent greenhouse: leeks, onions, tomatoes, peppers, okra, basil and other herbs. Two unusual vegetables I will be growing are New Zealand spinach and Mexican sour gherkin cucumbers. The latter is per the request of my husband who read that it tastes like a cross between a lime and a cucumber--both things he enjoys in a summer gin and tonic. The New Zealand spinach was grown at a farm I worked at and I really like it much better than our common spinach.

Next post will be pics of my seedling babies! I will track what germinated and what did not, and maybe if I can fit it in, plant melon seeds!

05/04/2021

Cottage vs country gardens
https://www.gardendesignexposed.com/country_gardens.html

Country Gardens and Cottage Gardens are often considered as one style, but there are some unique elements to the two styles. Learn the difference!

30/03/2021

🤣🤣🤣

29/03/2021

Hello fellow gardeners! If you grow fresh produce and end up with more than you can eat, donate it to your local food pantry. Go to out Ample Harvest tho find your local food pantries, and check out this Ted Talk by the creator of Ample Harvest. https://ampleharvest.org/tedxmanhattan/

TEDxManhattan "Changing the Way We Eat" took place at the Times Center in New York City.

28/03/2021

Did you know that most of the flower cultivars you buy in mainstream nurseries are infertile (lacking pollen) and therefore not helpful to bees and other pollinators? Did you know that certain cultivars are even poisonous to local insect or animal species? The dark purple leaves of Ninebark are actually poisonous to some species. And double echinacea flowers have no pollent. http://www.xerces.org/blog/cultivar-conundrum

What are cultivars, and do they have the same benefits to pollinators as non-cultivars? The answer depends—not all cultivars are created equally.

28/03/2021

An article with great links by local landscape designer Kathy Connolly https://www.zip06.com/living/20210224/planning-now-to-help-pollinators-all-year

Let’s talk about skunk cabbage.Around the last week in February, these funky blossoms smell mighty good to particular flies. Those flies offer something to the skunk cabbage, too. They are pollinators; their visits assure skunk cabbage will live to bloom another year.Indeed,

24/03/2021

Seed planting a little late, but better than never! Growing food and herbs at Knox Parks this year 😀