Travel With The Gardeners to Charlestown and Wyebrook Farms and to Hopewell Furnace

Gardeners Go To Charlestown and Wyebrook Farms – by Barbara Geltosky

On September 12, a group of Gardeners took a Conservation Committee field study trip to the wilds of Chester County. In keeping with our Eat Local Theme, we visited two working farms, one in Charlestown, and one near Honeybrook, which also is a dining destination!

At Charlestown Farm, on 40 acres in Chester County, owner Liz Anderson, gave us a tour so that we had a better appreciation of what it means to be a small sustainable farmer. She explained the difference between being certified organic and using sustainable but non -organic practices, and how they face difficulties from damage from wildlife and weather. We saw the farm equipment, drying areas for squash and garlic and the hoop house where the winter crops are growing, plus fall crops growing in the fields. Charlestown also has a CSA (Community Supported Agriculture), where members can purchase seasonal shares of produce as well as come for pick your own vegetables and small fruits such as blueberries. The farm sells vegetables at Phoenixville Farmers market, each Saturday during the season. Liz founded the market with only six member farmers and it has grown substantially in the intervening years.

After some iced tea and delicious muffins, we continued on to Wyebrook  Farm, which was an interesting drive through the countryside. Wyebrook has a market café and a boutique grocery /butcher shop with artisanal local cheeses, and a good variety of sustainably raised beef, pork and chicken, from the farm. We had a wonderful selection of cheeses from the market, provided by Deb, and then enjoyed lunch outdoors in the café, prepared from local foods. It was an interesting and rewarding day as we learned more about the fine points of Eating Local.

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Partners for Plants-Gardeners and GCP at Hopewell Furnace – by Barbara Geltosky

On September 23rd, the Gardeners and members of the Garden Club of Philadelphia headed to the beautiful national historic site of Hopewell Furnace for a day learning about Pennsylvania’s endangered and rare plants, followed by the requisite tasty lunch at St Peter’s bakery. The two clubs worked together to get a Partners for Plants grant for the study of endangered plants at Hopewell Furnace. Partners for Plants is a joint initiative of the GCA Horticulture and Conservation Committees.  It pairs local GCA clubs with managers of state and federal lands and other significant public lands to monitor rare, endangered, medicinal, or invasive plants. This is the Gardeners first Partners for Project and we were excited to work together with Philadelphia GC,  through  a grant proposal written by Jorie Nailor.

We met park staff and our botanist, Roger Latham, at the Site’s visitor center where Roger reviewed the variety of species he’d been studying, one of which, he had yet to see in the wilds of Pennsylvania. Species included mad dog skullcap, bunchflower, blazing star and wapato, to name a few. We then travelled down the road to the wetlands site where Roger worked on locating the plants this summer, with park staffer Amy Ruhe helping to Geo tag some of the species. (She mentioned these locations would not be made public due to problems with poaching) Roger was very excited to show us some of the plants still in bloom, including the very special bunchflower, Veratrum Virginicum, which is a PA endangered plant. He gave us a short botany lesson (how to identify multiflora rose from the stipules) and inspired in us a new appreciation for the endangered plant life growing in isolated areas. We are hopeful there may be a way to give Roger a small grant to finish up some of the work next spring.

After seeing a short film that explained Hopewell Furnace’s origins and history, and meeting with the Masters Gardeners who maintain a dye garden, we continued on to lunch at St Peters Bakery, which was opened especially for us. We enjoyed having our delicious lunch outdoors on the deck by the creek!

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