Communities Take Root: Add an Orchard to Your Garden
The Fruit Tree Planting Foundation and Dreyer‘s Fruit Bars are planting orchards across the country in a collaborative program called Communities Take Root (CTR). Through this exciting program, communities compete in a nation-wide vote to win a complete community orchard.
The first 125 qualified applicants for 2011 will be in the running to win a free orchard, including free community workshops on planting, pruning and caring for fruit trees.
In 2010, ten communities in California won orchards for public parks, community gardens, food banks, homeless shelters, and community centers. To see information about this year’s winners, check out the Communities Take Root website. Download and submit the application here.
Monarch Larva Monitoring Project
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Butterflies are important neighbors to have in our gardens.They help plants produce seeds by pollinating flowere.
Monarch butterflies are considered by many people to be the most beautiful of all butterflies, and are called the “king” of the butterflies, hence the name “monarch”. All butterflies go through a life cycle that transforms their bodies. Read more about the amazing transformation of the Monarch here.
The Monarch butterfly is sometimes called the "milkweed butterfly" because its larvae eat the plant. In fact, milkweed is the only thing the larvae can eat!
But monarchs are losing places to find food and lay their eggs. Scientists are trying to learn more about what is happening to them.
You can help! The Monarch Larva Monitoring Project (MLMP) is a citizen science project involving volunteers from across the United States and Canada. You can sign up to monitor patches of milkweed weekly to count monarch eggs and larvae, and assess milkweed density. This data will help scientists determine the distribution and abundance patterns of monarch butterflies in North America.
It's a Tough Time for Bees
Just ask the bees!
Bees are now using forms of communal transportation (trucks) to get to work. They are getting trucked to pollinate the plants that we depend on for food. (Leaders: for more background info, click here to read Beeline to Extinction")
Bees are disappearing all over the country. They call it CCD (Colony Collapse Disorder) which simply means that beekeepers are find their hives have honey, larvae, and the queen in them, but no BEES and no trail left behind to tell what happened to them. Read more...
Gardening With Kids
What could be more fun?
Exploring the outdoors with a bunch of kids. Many of us would not mind going back to a time when it was safe (at least safe-er) to roam the great outdoors and discover amazing new things each and every time you went went exploring with your friends.
Well, the amazing things are still out there to see ....
- bugs that light up at night
- gorgeous butterflies that unfurl huge nose-like structures (proboscis) into beautiful flowers in order to sip up the energy plants so generously provide in nectar
- green bugs that look like aliens from other planets that appear to be praying as they search for bugs to eat in the garden
- slithering mollusks (slugs) that drag themselves along the sidewalk leaving a slimy wake
- sunflowers that turn throughout the day following the path of the sun
- leaves....all kins of leaves...every shape and size, furry, velvety, spiney, smooth, shiny, dull, red, green, yellow and purple....each one grabbing photons from sunshine and transforming the energy they capture and transforming it for the rest of us to power ourselves
- and free snacks!!!! nuts, berries, sunflower seeds, tomatoes...all sorts of delicious treats
This and much, much more is out there, but are many children looking? Their eyes seem to be averted toward televisions, computer screens, video games, and shopping centers.
Gardening gives us all a chance to get out and "get back to our roots." Take the opportunity to garden with a child. Your life, and that of the child, will be forever richer because of it!
Some Ideas:
