October 8, 2024
Expert gardening advice available at Ag Progress Days Yard and Garden Area

College PARK, Pa. — Need guidance on plant or pest difficulties? A crew of Penn Point out University of Agricultural Sciences specialists will be offered for consultation in the Property and Backyard Area through Ag Development Days, Aug. 9-11.

Specialists incorporate Penn Condition Extension Grasp Gardeners, extension educators, and specialists in horticulture, plant pathology and entomology. Learn Gardeners from throughout the point out will dispense information to gardening fanatics at the “Ask a Learn Gardener” booth. There also will be displays on container gardening, seed saving, building raised beds, winter season sowing, flower arranging and tomato grafting. 

Grasp Gardeners from Centre County will direct excursions of the 14-yr-old demonstration backyard at the web site. They will reply thoughts and share tactics for escalating various herbaceous and woody vegetation.

The flowers and plantings in the backyard garden appeal to and nourish substantial numbers of indigenous bees, butterflies and other pollinators. With pollinators in jeopardy, Penn State Learn Gardeners teamed up with horticulture faculty customers to develop and nurture the gardens — positioned at the stop of 11th Road at the display web site — to demonstrate that supplying pollinators with food items and habitat can be wonderful. 

To aid assistance and make these advantageous insects, the Penn Condition Master Gardener Plan continues to offer the Pollinator-Welcoming Garden Certification system, which teaches home owners and gardeners to certify their landscapes as pollinator pleasant. 

The certification incorporates this kind of ways as planting a year-round native back garden of various and considerable vegetation while delivering meals, a drinking water source and shelter for the pollinators. Individuals who full the 4-action certification system, which carries a $10 price, will be qualified to invest in a pollinator-welcoming signal for their property.

The Property and Yard Space also will emphasize the positive aspects of growing vegetation in significant tunnels, which are greenhouse-like buildings that generally permit growers to modify the development natural environment and prolong the developing time. 

“The large tunnel will concentrate on educating the group on lower flowers, an raising location of interest for residence gardeners and business growers,” mentioned Andy Faust, Master Gardener space coordinator. “In addition, a butterfly tent will be open up for everyone to go to and study about our pollinators and the plants that draw in them.”

Situated adjacent to the raised backyard beds will be an observation beehive, where authorities from Penn Condition Extension and the Pennsylvania Point out Beekeepers Affiliation will be out there to focus on beekeeping and native bees. Website visitors can see posters explaining Penn Point out exploration on pollinator problems, and future beekeepers can get data on Extension’s innovative on the web course, Beekeeping 101.

Users of the López-Uribe lab in Penn State’s Entomology Division also will offer information about Pennsylvania’s wild bees. Visitors can observe preserved crop pollinators and master about the bee biodiversity that is recorded in Pennsylvania.
 
For the additional curious and adventurous attendee who’d like to gain a deeper comprehending of beekeeping, a compact bee garden — where readers can view a beekeeper open hives and converse about the honey bees’ day by day routines — will be positioned up the hill from the honey bee demonstration area.

At the vegetable tent, the potato plot will attribute several potato types developing in the soil and freshly dug tubers. Created for potato farmers and yard gardeners alike, people are inspired to bring their potato-rising issues. The tent will display screen some of the potato versions grown in Pennsylvania, like some new varieties. 

The next 30-moment presentations are scheduled at the Yard and Garden Spot:

Tuesday, Aug. 9 

10 a.m.: Flower Arranging
Midday: Seed-Saving Basics 
1 p.m.: Natural Heritage of Chocolate
2 p.m.: Propagation Demonstration 
3 pm.: Container Gardening

Wednesday, Aug. 10 

10 a.m.: Tomato Grafting Demonstration
11 a.m.: For the Love of Garlic
1 p.m.: Winter Sowing 
2 p.m.: Let’s Start with Soil
3 p.m.: Tomato Grafting Demonstration
4 p.m.: Flower Arranging

Thursday, Aug. 11 

10 a.m.: Flower Arranging
11 a.m.: How to Build a Elevated Mattress
1 p.m.: Let’s Commence with Soil

Sponsored by Penn State’s College or university of Agricultural Sciences, Ag Development Days is held at the Russell E. Larson Agricultural Research Heart at Rock Springs, situated 9 miles southwest of Point out Higher education on Route 45. Several hours are 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Aug. 9 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. Aug. 10 and 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Aug. 11. Admission and parking are absolutely free.

For much more facts, stop by the Ag Development Times website. Twitter customers can locate and share info about the occasion by using the hashtag #agprogressdays, and the occasion also can be discovered on Facebook (@AgProgressDays).