APRIL 2025 UPDATES & EVENTS Concord Garden Club
- Jenny Robson - Communications
- Apr 7
- 8 min read
Updated: Apr 8
Re-sending this post due to access issues....
GET READY TO GARDEN!
This month's newsletter is chock-full of information, so be sure to scroll all the way to the bottom!
President's Message
As we head towards summer and the end of the Garden Club’s programming year, I want to remind everyone about the Club’s Annual Meeting (a breakfast meeting this year) which will be held on June 5 at 9:30 at the Woman’s Club. Expect an invitation in the mail. We will have a brief, but very important, business meeting to elect the new slate of officers and introduce committee chairs, and to review our finances and the work of our committees over the past year. We are also planning a “Give and Get” table where everyone is invited to bring garden related items from home: cuttings, extra pots, seeds, books, really any item you no longer need and would like to see go to a loving home. If the dahlias I divided last fall survived, I’m planning to bring some tubers potted up. Remember you can score free pots at the outdoor bin at Cole Gardens/Oak Glow Farm. If you are potting up plants from your garden, please be mindful of the jumping worms problem.
We have three more programs this spring, a joint program with the NH Humanities Council on April 10, an author presentation at Gibson’s on May 10, and a garden tour on June 19. You can read more about these programs and sign up at our website. I hope to see you there.
Gena
New Hampshire Audubon update: We have learned that Polly Perry and some others established the Whitney-Perry-Forbes Fund at the NH Charitable Fund, which is a designated fund that pays an annual grant to the NH Audubon for camperships. The Fund is established in honor and recognition of the Concord Garden Club. Lauren Kraemer at NH Audubon confirmed that they are still receiving this grant and has graciously allowed the grant to serve as the donation that entitles the Club to use a room at the McLane Center twice a year for free. The updated Donation Agreement for Campership Program will be uploaded to the Google Drive so we can find it in the future.
April Meeting
Speaker -- Abby Goode with the NH Humanities Council
Thursday, April 10, 2025
4:30 PM – 7:00 PM
Cocktails at 4:30 PM, Program begins at 5:15 PM
Woman's Club of Concord
44 Pleasant St, Concord
This is an interactive program, co-sponsored with the Woman's Club, that begins with a discussion of current ideas about sustainability and then examines Thomas Jefferson’s vision of American agriculture abundance. We will explore this particularly eugenic conception of sustainability and discuss what new or different versions of sustainability might prove more useful in our current moment.
RSVP here
Questions? Contact Linda Gilbert - lvgilbert@comcast.net
May Meeting
Author Jill Nooney
Bedrock - the making of a public garden
Saturday, May 10th, 2025
12:30pm
Gibson's Bookstore
45 S. Main Street, Concord
Gibson's Bookstore, in partnership with the Concord Garden Club, is pleased to welcome author Jill Nooney for her new book about Bedrock Gardens in Lee, NH, Bedrock: The Making of a Public Garden.
Bedrock: The Making of a Public Garden is a love letter from a woman to the 30 acre garden she spent 40 years creating in Lee, NH. Featuring over 300 photographs of the garden, sculptures, water features, and built structures, the book takes us from the garden’s private origin to a public garden.
The author's property, acquired from the original owners in 1980, was a 37-acre dairy farm that had been abandoned for about 40 years. The initial years were dedicated to clearing the land of poison ivy and pucker-brush. Work on the farm as a landscaped project started about 1987. Nearly all of the work has been carried out by the two creators, Jill and her husband Bob Munger. They cleared the scrub growth and overgrown fields, established access roads, and managed the woods with guidance from foresters and arborists. Gradually, gardens were created bed by bed. In 1991, a wildlife pond was added, and in 1999, a family room was appended to the original house. Despite these additions, the original house and outbuildings, including a three-hole outhouse, remain intact. Today, about two-thirds of the property is garden.
The garden features numerous structural elements such as paths, an espaliered fence, an arborvitae hedge, architecturally interesting rocks, pergolas, and garden art. The beds boast exceptional plant varieties, often started as seedlings, including many unusual specimens of perennials, trees, and shrubs.
Jill Nooney grew up in rural New Jersey. She attended Bennington College, Smith College School of Social Work, and the Radcliffe Seminars Program in Landscape Design. She has had a lifelong interest in plants, art, and healing the human spirit.
Program Chair - Ruth Perencevich
RSVP here please!
June -
Annual Meeting
Thursday, June 5, 2025
9:30-11:00am
Woman's Club of Concord
44 Pleasant Street
Watch your mail for an invitation (including a dues reminder for '25-'26 CGC membership) to attend our Annual Meeting to elect new officers and committee chairs and conduct the Club's business.
Coffee and pastries will be provided.
We will also have a plant and garden items exchange, so bring cuttings, seeds, pots and other items to trade with other members.
Program Chair: Gena Cohen Moses
Thank you!
Later in June --
Field Trip
to the Gardens of Laura Trowbridge
Thursday, June 19, 2025
11:00am
29 Cornish Road
Peterborough, NH
Carpooling at the Clinton Street Park & Ride, 10am
Laura Trowbridge is a garden designer who works primarily on the gardens of historic homes. Her own extensive gardens, developed over the past 35 years, have been featured on the Garden Conservancy Open Days tours. She has authored articles for Fine Gardening, and her work has been featured in Country Gardens, New Hampshire Home, and Living the Country Life.
She speaks regularly to garden clubs about garden design and how to incorporate more annuals and tropicals into your garden. Laura's passion for annuals leads her to change her gardens significantly from year to year. Every spring she drives to nurseries all over New England to buy new and exotic plants.
You can read more about Laura and her work at LauraTrowbridge.com
Program Chair -- Lauren Savage
RSVP here.
This program is for Members Only
Gardening in April
Spring Cleanup Time!
First, a caveat on timing: To support beneficial insects, “wait until after several 50-degree-Fahrenheit spring days to clean up again,” advised The Habitat Network (a former project from Cornell and the Nature Conservancy). Doug Tallamy likewise stresses leaving leaf litter in place in fall, and not being too quick to tidy up in spring. Some overwintering insects, notably bees and certain butterflies and moths, are triggered by a stretch of 50-ish-degree days to get moving. Once they do, often after resting in leaf litter or under tree bark or even inside goldenrod galls, for example, such species are no longer as vulnerable to our spring-cleaning actions that might kill them, or move them away from their host plant. (Note: There’s no one precise formula for when every species awakens that will protect them all, so these are just guidelines in pursuit of the greater good.)
Ready to get started?
Start cleanup near the house. Tidying beds along the most-traveled front walkway early reminds me that I can do this, a little at a time. Walking past a mess every time I go out: not so inspiring. Work out from homebase.
“Spot clean” key areas–again, working on first things first. In the edible garden, why prep the tomato row when you haven’t even planted the peas or spinach? “Spot clean” targeted areas so that earliest crops can get sown, then double back later when all extra-early goals are met.
Similarly: Gently remove matted leaves to uncover early spring ornamentals first, such as emerging spring bulbs and ephemerals, even if you can’t stop to clean the whole bed. Start cutbacks by trimming battered leaves from semi-evergreen perennials, such as hellebores and epimedium and gingers—and with ornamental grasses.
Stay on track with seed-starting. Make a chart of what to sow when, indoors or out, or organize packets week-by-week, in an accordion file or recipe-card box. Move any packet that’s best sown a little at a time ahead two weeks in the filing system after you use it, to plan for a staggered supply of salads, carrots, radishes and such. (Don’t know when to sow what? The calculator tool will help you.)
Make space in the compost heap for incoming debris you’ll be generating fast. Extract (and preferably screen) finished material from the bottom to topdress beds as you clean them.
Order mulch now, preferably a bulk delivery—skipping all those plastic bags, and ideally choosing a locally produced material. What makes good mulch, and how to use it.
If you haven't already, empty nest boxes of old nests, and maybe add more birdhouses. Nestbox 101 is here, plus here’s how to be a good bluebird landlord.
Muck out water gardens, removing floating de-icers. Get pumps and filters going again, following these spring water-garden tips.
While doing all that: Never walk, or work, in mucky soil. I stay off soft and also semi-frozen lawns, too, delaying some chores. I can do the tasks in another week, but I can’t easily fix soil turned to concrete.
Treat yourself to a little color—again, for encouragement. I like big bowls of pansies or violas, for instance, to cheer me on in April, because the list can feel daunting, especially in years when winter sticks around a little too long (or your helper disappears).
UNH Extension, our wonderful local gardening resource, has some useful workshops on their schedule --
April 10th - Easy Grow Vegetables
May 13th - Growing Pollinators
June 14th - Tips for growing Tomatoes
For more information about these and other programs, and to register, visit the UNH Extension site.
Public Service Announcement: Blue Stem Native Nursery (Norwell, Mass) provide this very useful guide on techniques to eradicate the incredibly invasive and tenacious Garlic Mustard (we've all got it!) and the importance of doing so. Catch it early if you can!
If you're wondering, here's what it looks like:
NOFA-NH is also providing a series of gardening workshops this spring, called Feeding the Family, which focuses on sustainable and organic gardening techniques. The workshops are both online and in person.
Online Workshops:
· April 10 – The Soil-Centered Garden: Soil Health Essentials (6:30-7:45 PM)
· April 17 – Mushroom Cultivation: Shiitake, Oysters & Beyond (6:30-7:45 PM)
· April 24 – Beekeeping Basics and BEEyond (6:30-7:45 PM)
· May 1 – Part 1: Permaculture Practices for a Resilient Garden (6:30-7:45 PM)
In-Person Workshop:
· May 31 – Part 2: In-person Session - Permaculture in Action (10:00 AM - 12:00 PM)
Visit NOFA-NH for more information and to register.
Community Information & Volunteer Corner
Kimball Jenkins Estate is hoping to hold two Spring Cleanup days, and would greatly appreciate the help of Garden Club members. They are set for Thursday May 15 (with a rain date of Friday May 16), and Thursday May 29 (with a rain date of Friday May 30). Please keep your eyes peeled for details and signup info in our next newsletter. Meanwhile please let me know if you have any questions.
Millie LaFontaine
603-491-6428
It is probably too late to book your trip to Holland’s Keukenhof Gardens, however you can get your tulip fix again this year at The Farm at Wolf Pine Hollow's TulipFete, late April through early May in Hancock, NH. Go to their website for details: wolfpinehollow.com
If you love visiting beautiful gardens, The Garden Conservancy's Open Days are for you. The Open Days, which have already started for 2024, are held at private gardens all over the country and provide a rare opportunity to see spectacular gardens which are otherwise closed to the public.
To see the local schedule, visit The Garden Conservancy and select New Hew Hampshire from the "State" drop menu. A few wonderful NH gardens will be open on May 18th, one in Chesterfield and one in Gilsum.
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