It’s a bittersweet time of year for home gardeners. Much of our home landscape is fatigued, and so are we! Yet some of our plantings have never looked better. It’s hard to coordinate all the choices presented to us in autumn. What shut-down tasks for this season are critical to garden health, while serving beneficial insects and birds that visit gardens? At the same time, how can we organize plans to improve our efforts - and designs - for next year?

This 4-class series aims to inspire home gardeners who want to get better at what they enjoy.

• Class 1: Putting your Garden to Bed in the Fall: Making Eco-Healthy Choices
• Class 2: Overwintering: How to Save your Favorite Tender Garden Plants for a New Life Come Spring
• Class 3: Deer Defense: Cornell-Proven Pointers to Help Outwit the Wiliest of Wildlife
• Class 4: Building a Backyard Wildlife Habitat: A Gardener’s Approach

All classes prioritize U. S. native plants wherever possible. Plant lists and resource notes, among other handouts, will be distributed by email before each class.

A retired corporate marketing director who was trained as a Cornell Master Gardener in Dutchess County, NY, Chris Ferrero now lives in Stockbridge, MA. She has led demonstration garden teams, plant propagation workshops, alternatives-to-invasives work groups, and children's' programs, and participates in other Master Gardener projects where she lends special expertise on shade perennials, flowering shrubs and native plants. She has also designed gardens that are recognized by Pollinator Pathways and the National Wildlife Federation. With 18 slide talks on a wide range of home gardening topics, she continues to be the busiest speaker in the Cornell Master Gardener Speakers' Bureau, presenting frequently to garden clubs, library groups and master gardener conferences across the Northeast. Since moving to the Berkshires, she is now on the faculty at the Berkshire Botanical Garden.

Previous | Next