What should you do now to prepare your yard for the winter? Find out in a free talk at 10:30 a.m. Saturday, Oct. 24 at Lockwood’s Greenhouses, 4484 Clark St., Hamburg. Gardening expert Sally Cunningham will present “Gardening 2015, the Final Chapter.” A question-and-answer session will follow. Please register by calling Lockwood’s at 649-4684 by Friday so they can estimate seating. It’s time to close up the garden (mostly) and prepare the yard for winter, Cunningham said. She will review…
by Connie Oswald Stofko What’s up with this warm weather in Western New York? We can’t predict these things with 100 percent accuracy, but because of El Niño, it looks like we are going to have a mild autumn and early winter, said John Farfaglia, extension educator with Cornell Cooperative Extension in Niagara County. Our winter may not be as cold as the two previous winters have been, “which would be nice for a change,” he added. We may not…
So many of us have trouble with deer, rabbits and other pesky critters in our gardens. Learn what to do about it in the class “How to Deal with Nuisance Wildlife” to be held from 7 to 8:30 p.m. Wednesday, Sept. 30, in the Print Shop Building on the Roycroft Campus, 21 South Grove St., East Aurora. The class will cover methods for dealing with a wide variety of wildlife in rural, suburban and urban settings. It is one of…
by Connie Oswald Stofko It’s the sale that gardeners wait all year for— Mischler’s 49-cent perennial sale. Since it comes around only once a year, you should do a little preparation so you can make the most of it. The sale will be held Friday, April 24 to Sunday, May 3 at Mischler’s Florist and Greenhouses, 118 South Forest Rd., Williamsville. (Please note that it starts this Friday; I had the starting date wrong last week.) Sale hours are 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday…
by Connie Oswald Stofko The moonflower (Oenothera acaulis, also known as a mountain dandelion) is an amazing plant. The light yellow flowers open in the evening, and they open so fast you can watch it happen in real time. “They open before your very eyes like time-lapse photography,” said Mark Yadon, vice president at Mischler’s Florist and Greenhouses. “They spin open— they open that fast.” I don’t have a photo, but you can see a video here. Yadon said some people place bets…
There was the Snowvember storm in 2014, which brought down trees and damaged mature shrubs. Even if you were lucky enough to have missed that, all of us in Western New York have experienced high winds, heavy snow and brutally cold temperatures this winter. And every year many gardeners contend with deer and rabbits, which can cause damage to our landscapes. Find out what you can do about damage to your landscape at a free talk by gardening expert Sally…
Back again this year is a popular hands-on workshop where you can let your creative juices flow and decorate a fresh wreath for the holidays. Workshops will be held at 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. Saturday, Dec. 6 at Mischler’s Florist and Greenhouses, 118 South Forest Rd., Williamsville. Each workshop will begin with a brief explanation and decorating demonstration by a member of Mischler’s staff. Afterward, you will be given a fresh, 24-inch evergreen wreath and red bow. You will…
by Connie Oswald Stofko I got a question from a reader that I thought might interest a lot of people: “I planted three baby boxwood shrubs in my front flower bed this spring (in West Seneca/South Buffalo). They are still very small, but have started sprouting new growth and I’m concerned about the cold and snow affecting them. “I was thinking of putting milk crates over them and covering them with the frost blanket that I have. That area of…
by Connie Oswald Stofko A combination of gardening problems faces Buffalo Niagara Heritage Village, the 35-acre historical interpretive center in Amherst that showcases 19th century buildings set up like a village. Much of the landscape is boggy, so gardens can be wet early in the season. In addition, there’s no irrigation system, and hoses can’t reach all the gardens, so there’s no easy way to water plants during the dry summer months. To deal with these conditions, Buffalo Niagara Heritage…
A staghorn fern mounted on a rustic plaque is one of the intriguing floral crafts you can make in the series of classes to be held this fall at Lockwood’s Greenhouses, 4484 Clark St., Hamburg. The staghorn fern has fronds that look like the horns of a staghorn deer. It’s an epiphytic plant or air plant. Epiphytic plants usually grow on another plant such as a tree and derive their moisture and nutrients from the air, rain and debris accumulating…
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