Why Hand Pollination is Sometimes Necessary?
At Hunter Park Gardenhouse, we're passionate about nurturing our plants and ensuring a bountiful harvest. Today, we wanted to share a bit about why we sometimes need to hand pollinate our crops.
Hand pollination is a technique we use to help our plants when natural pollination isn’t sufficient. Here’s why we do it:
🐝 Unfortunately, in the GardenHouse, pollinators are not as plentiful as they are outdoors. This means fewer bees to naturally pollinate our plants.
🌼Hand pollination allows us to control which plants pollinate each other, ensuring the best possible combinations for healthier and more robust plants.
🌱 By hand pollinating, we can ensure a higher yield of fruits, vegetables, and herbs. This means more produce for you to enjoy!
At the GardenHouse, we're committed to sustainable and organic practices. Hand pollination is just one of the ways we support the health and productivity of our garden.
Happy gardening!
***Peep farmer Hillary, showing us how to hand pollinate watermelon
#HandPollination #SustainableGardening #1991greenery #HerbFarm #OrganicFarming #SupportPollinators #GrowYourOwn
We LOVE when the Monarchs come to Hunter Park GardenHouse!
Monarch butterflies are among the most beautiful and well-known butterflies in the world. Recognized by their striking orange and black wings, these majestic insects undertake an incredible migration journey, traveling up to 3,000 miles from North America to central Mexico each year. Monarchs are not just a visual delight; they play a crucial role in pollination, helping to sustain the ecosystems they travel through. Unfortunately, their populations are in decline due to habitat loss, climate change, and pesticide use. Protecting these butterflies by planting milkweed and reducing pesticide use can help ensure that future generations can continue to marvel at their beauty and benefit from their ecological contributions.
#monarchbutterflies #butterflies #pollinators #savethemonarchs #urbanfarming #lansingmichigan #farming #savetheplanet #gardening
Let's take a moment to appreciate two unsung heroes of nature: bees and milkweed!
Bees, our little buzzing friends, are essential pollinators that keep our gardens blooming and our food supply thriving. They work tirelessly, flitting from flower to flower, ensuring that plants reproduce and fruits grow. Without them, our world would be a lot less colorful and delicious!
Milkweed, on the other hand, is more than just a beautiful plant. It's a crucial lifeline for monarch butterflies, providing a place for them to lay their eggs and nourishment for their caterpillars. But did you know that milkweed is also a great friend to bees? Its fragrant flowers are a sweet source of nectar that bees absolutely adore.
So, as we celebrate this fantastic Friday, let's give a shoutout to bees and milkweed for their incredible teamwork in making our world a more vibrant and lively place. Consider planting some milkweed in your garden this weekend—it's a small act that makes a big difference for our pollinators!
Thank You Half Barn Farm for helping us out, with these BEAUTIFUL Violas!!
Flame weeding a a big part of our garden bed prep, to keep weeds from interfering with our crops. Watch Farmer Tom give a quick explanation on flame weeding.
No herbicides, no worries!
Wolf spiders play a crucial role in maintaining a balanced and healthy garden ecosystem by controlling pest populations. Embracing their presence can lead to a more sustainable and thriving garden environment.
Our rain garden, still doing its job!
Allen Place Open House - Program Live Stream
Hear brief remarks from our co-developer, key partners, generous funders, and enduring friends and neighbors.
I met a new friend packing plant orders this morning! All of a sudden I saw something green across my field of vision: this little fella ended up on my glasses. Meet a syrphid fly larvae! These predatory fly larvae are the immature form of hover flies, a bee mimic fly that you may see visiting flowers from time to time. A double friend, the adults serve as pollinators and the larvae are voracious predators of a common garden pest, the aphid!
Remember, think twice before you squash an unfamiliar “creepy crawly” you may have just met a new friend!
For more info on syrphid flies, check out this video: https://youtu.be/N-g-1Qyrk2I
You gotta love freshly planted fields and efficient watering set-ups!
Most of our summer irrigation is done via drip irrigation- a very water-efficient system which delivers water directly to plants’ roots. That system doesn’t work well for our direct-seeded salad mix, which needs lighter amounts of water evenly spread over the soil. So sprinklers it is! These will be set on a timer to run for an hour early every morning, when the sun is low and we will loose the least amount of water to evaporation.
