Gardening and Growing Educational series
This growing season, keep an eye out for an educational gardening and growing series hosted at the Madison Valley Public Library. The series will include hands-on workshops, informational events, and garden tours. It will be a great resource for folks with an interest in gardening, ranging from complete novice to skilled gardeners who want to build on existing knowledge.
Gardening here in the Madison Valley has many unique challenges. Most notably, we regularly experience harsh weather such as hail and wind, severely dry conditions and a short growing season. This series will be led by master gardeners from the community to help you get the most out of your garden, focusing on topics to help you get started, improve your soil, and preserve food at the end of the season. Using your land to produce fresh food can be extremely rewarding, and these workshops will help you do it!
The first workshop will be held On Saturday, April 9 at the Madison Valley Public Library from 10 a.m. – 12 p.m. It will focus on when and how to start your seeds. Future topics will include:
April (TBD): Preparing Your Garden Bed
May 7th: Composting and Low Hoop Gardens Workshop
July (TBD): Freezing and Dehydrating
August (TBD): Harvest and Preservation
September (TBD): Breaking Down Your Garden and Preparing for Next Year
Please call (406-682-7244) or visit the library for more information about the series and how to register for events!
If you can’t attend events in person, an informational video series is in the works and you can watch from home. The Library will be hosting events with support from Madison Farm to Fork, the Madison Conservation District, Madison Valley Women’s Club, the Jeffers Community Garden, MSU Madison-Jefferson Extension and several gardeners from the community.
Another resource that will be available this summer is a honey extractor and other necessary extraction equipment. The Madison Conservation District will be adding this to their arsenal of rental equipment. The 4 frame extractor will be used by the Ennis School and the GROWW program to extract honey from their bee hives. The Madison Conservation District is planning to purchase an adaptable extractor that has a hand crank for the kids to get involved in the process, as well as an attachable motor for those who want to skip the workout. This will be a great resource for bee keepers in the area with a small number of hives, and will make bee keeping more accessible to anyone who’s interested. Keep an eye out for more information about the extractor in the coming months, and feel free to reach out to the Madison Conservation District (info@madisoncd.org) with any questions.