The strawberry plants are small enough to hold in a palm, but some of them have blossoms forming. I’m cupping them in my hands and pressing them gently into the earth.
The day is warm, and I’m catching my breath. I’m halfway through sawing wooden palettes in half lengthwise to make an impromtu fence frame for this young strawberry bed. Last year someone (winged, four-footed, who knows) got to the berries when they’re still new green nubs, and while I don’t mind sharing, I’d like a share …
So I’m DIYing with the wooden frames that showed up in the fall to hold the wood pellets for the stove — improvising a sawhorse, scrounding corner posts — mostly for the pleasure of seeing what I can make and breathing the air in my backyard while the lilacs are in bloom. And it feels good to feel the sun on my back and the earth in my hands again.
We’re almost past the chance of frost, and planting season is coming. So I’ll be exploring for plant starts, seeds and seedlings. Zion Lutheran Church in Pittsfield has a plant sale on Saturday from 9 to 1 p.m., with herbs and perennials. They’ll be hapening at the same time and a few steps away from the outdoor farmers market on the common, and farmers markets this time of year often have plant starts from local farms too.
Helia Native Nursery will hold their next open days May 25 to 27 — this weekend they’ll be in Lakeville, Conn, taking part in the annual Trade Secrets rare plants and garden antiques sale to support Project Sage, a local group working to end relationship violence.
A shade closer to home, Woven Roots Farm in Great Barrington has a plants ale coming on May 27 too, with ‘red and green lettuces, cherry and slicing tomatoes, red and green Kale, zucchini and summer squash, slicing and pickling cucumbers, hot and sweet peppers, eggplant, herbs, flowers and more.’
Wing and a Prayer native plant nursery is open for the spring now on Sundays and Mondays, up in Cummington, alongside the seed saving network annual plant swap. Maybe if I time it right I can stop by to look for scarlet bee balm … and swing by Sangar General Store in Windsor afterward for a samosa and an oatmeal cookie.
It’s a beautiful morning — I think I’ll go outside for awhile — #berkshireweekend
The earth felt cool and damp, and the sun was warm on the church steps, and I was holding a clump of bergamot in my arms. The Hilltown Seed Savers held a plant swap …
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