Sunday, February 14, 2016 Bats and Bees Program

What a lovely time we had at our Garden Club Program on Sunday. A warm-hearted thank you to Chelsea for presenting a wonderful program on Bats and Bees and teaching us to make the Beeswax Cotton Food Covers. 

The program began with a slide show on bats including the sounds they make. In our area the small brown bat or tr-colored bat is most prevalent.help They eat large quantities of mosquitoes and even stinkbugs! Bat boxes are a helpful roosting space and may be successful if they feel safe in it. Gardening for bats included a list of plants which bats enjoy. More information can be found at: http://dnr2.maryland.gov/wildlife/Pages/plants_wildlife/bats/nhpbatfield.aspx. 

The cotton beeswax covers were made by sprinkling beeswax pellets mixed with a bit of jojoba oil onto a 8or 12 inch square of pinked cotton fabic, then pressing it with an iron between two pieces of parchment paper. These covers will mold to the top of a bowl or can be folded around a sandwich or chunk of cheese.

Here are a few pictures:

 

The garden club is planning a trip to go to Glenstone Modern Art Museum and lunch at Founding Fathers on February 26th. The car pool will leave the museum at 10am. Another trip on May 21 will be to the Ladew Topiary Garden.

Attendance 24, refreshments by Claire Bode, door prize, a pink heather plant was won by Amy Cohen. 

The Museum Garden Club is preparing for our annual Plant Booth at the Strawberry Festival in June. We would like to reach out to all our gardening friends in the community and ask you to join us.

It’s time to start the seedlings that will be sold at the Booth.  Starting seeds now can also be so uplifting as we wait for temperatures to rise!  We are asking you to grow any vegetable, herb, annual flower and native seedling or plant and share them with the Garden Club.    Along with seedlings, we accept donations of perennials, shrubs, or small trees. 

When weeding and dividing plants, pot up extras to sell, especially perennials.

 We also need containers, less than 12 inches in length, and decorations for the Fairy Gardens which will be made by children of all ages at our Craft Table. Decorations can be any small object or figurine.  Be creative as you look for these objects. A good example is that we need Champaign corks and their wires to use as table and chairs.