“2,000 tulips. Pick a bouquet,” reads the sign on Route 32A. Another sign, painted with bright butterflies and flowers, says: “Welcome! Saugerties Organic Gardens, a nonprofit community agricultural organization.” Mali Peterbridge and Frank Clark had been driving past the signs twice a day since moving from Saugerties to Palenville. Intrigued, like many of the garden’s […]
Gardening
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Saugerties
Saugerties Seed Library Flourishes as Community Participation Sets a Record
The Saugerties Seed Library is drawing record participation in its third year, with patrons at the Saugerties Public Library taking home 400 seed packets in March for everything from flowers to okra. The initiative, aimed at fostering community through gardening, education, and the sharing of seeds and knowledge, is led by library assistant Justyna Staccio. […]
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Overlook
Annual Garden Day Classes Set for April 11 at SUNY Ulster
Garden Day, an annual day of gardening classes presented by Cornell Cooperative Extension of Ulster County, will return Saturday, April 11, at SUNY Ulster in Stone Ridge, with several instructors from Saugerties, West Hurley, and nearby communities helping lead the program. This year’s theme is “Create and Cultivate.” The keynote speaker, Kim Eierman, will present […]
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Overlook
Indigenous Crops That Shaped What We Eat Today
Schoolchildren often learn the familiar story of the Pilgrim settlers and the Wampanoag man Squanto (whose real name was likely Tisquantum), who taught them how to grow corn. Maize, better known as corn, was unknown to the Pilgrims. Around 9,000 years ago in Mexico, the wild teosinte plant was domesticated and developed into an ancestor […]
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Overlook
The Fruit Trees That Need Winter
Many fruit trees need winter’s cold in order to flower and fruit well in the growing season. New York State is known for its excellent apples, a fruit tree with a particularly high chilling requirement. Pears, cherries, peaches, plums, apricots, and other fruit trees must also experience a minimum number of chilling hours over the […]
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Overlook
Winter’s Hidden Gifts for Gardeners
Winter has officially arrived, and with it the familiar sense that the gardening year has gone dormant. Nights have dipped well below freezing, snow has already appeared, and most beds look settled in for the long pause before spring. But beneath the surface, winter is quietly doing some of its most important work. This is, […]
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Woodstock
New to the Area: The $64 Tomato and Other Lessons
I am new to Woodstock. New to the glorious Hudson Valley, new to its rhythms, and very new to gardening. I’ve lived in cities most of my life—New York, DC, Paris, Rome, Tel Aviv, Dhaka, Baghdad, Rabat—thanks to a Foreign Service career and other meanderings. The only thing I’ve ever grown successfully was basil in […]
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Hurley
It’s Domesday for Two Local Gardeners Betting on Geodesics
A former New York City real estate agent and a retired medical center engineer say the future of gardening is here—and it’s round. Joe’l Moss and Harold Castellano, who met when Castellano visited her property while serving as Hurley’s building inspector, have turned to geodesic domes—half-sphere structures invented for a German planetarium more than a […]
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Overlook
`Moon Gardens’ Bloom as Gardeners Cultivate Nocturnal Pollinators
An alarming quiet has replaced the familiar buzzing from pollen to petals as populations of honey bees and other pollinators rapidly decline. Nothing, it seems, can bring them back, not even colorful, nectar-rich flowers that greet the morning sun with open petals and should lure bees and butterflies. In response, and perhaps in quiet defiance, […]
