Open House and Workshops at the Creekhouse (1075 Harlemville Road, Ghenty, NY)—Join us in celebrating the beginning of summer with an all-day open house featuring brief tours of the butterfly house and native plant garden, a butterfly-themed “story walk” for children, and two in-depth workshops.
10am-4pm Open House: Butterfly House, Native Plant Garden, and “Story Walk”
Stop by any time for an informal experience of the Butterfly House (stocked with local butterflies from surrounding fields), Native Plant Garden, and a butterfly-themed “story walk” for children along our small Creekhouse trail. We are happy to show you around or you can explore at your own leisure.
10am-noon Workshop: Gardening with Native Plants (facilitated by Claudia Knab-Vispo and Josie Laing)
The lightly-managed garden around FEP’s home at the Creekhouse features many native pollinator plants and can serve as an example of a rewilding residential landscape
During this workshop, you will have the opportunity to:
- See examples of perennial beds of different ages, a meadow developing from a former lawn, a dry meadow, a wet meadow, a woodland, and a natural “water garden,” and learn how we manage these areas.
- Get to know our easily-grown native pollinator plants.
- Learn about our experience with the establishment, monitoring, and maintenance of native meadows at a variety of locations in the Hudson Valley.
- Bring your questions and discuss different native plant gardening scenarios.
- Take home seeds and small potted plants from our pop-up native nursery.
Registration requested (fep@hawthornevalleyfarm.org), but walk-ins are welcome.
1pm-3pm Workshop: Exploring Columbia County Butterflies (facilitated by Conrad Vispo)
Columbia County is home to almost 100 species of butterflies. And yet, how many of these can you picture? Where do they live? What conservation challenges are they facing? How can you learn more about them?
During this workshop, you will have the opportunity to:
- Observe a variety of local butterflies in the butterfly house stocked with “catch of the week”
- Learn about the rarer butterflies of Columbia County (ones you won’t see in our butterfly house or the surrounding fields)
- Get an introduction to the tools of the trade
- See a display of historical butterfly books illustrating the evolution of Northeast butterfly knowledge and its role in public natural history education
Registration requested (fep@hawthornevalleyfarm.org), but walk-ins are welcome.