Calling all Phenology cooperators, Master Gardeners, OCVN’ers and others interested in learning more about pollinators!

Actual pollinators will vary 🙂

Come to Secrest Arboretum on Tuesday June 27th and/or Wednesday July 26th for two pollinator workshops, each 10AM to 2PM. Participants will spend time in the classroom learning about pollinator biology and practicing identification skills, then we’ll head outside to the gardens in search of pollinators.  Both sessions will include bee and plant information, but June’s session will focus on bee identification, and July’s will focus on plants for pollinators. You may register for both; there is likely to be some overlap…but lots of fun in the field and classroom on both days! 

Dates: Tuesday June 27th and/or Wednesday July 26th

Location: Secrest Arboretum, Wooster (Miller Pavilion)

Time: 10AM to 2PM

Cost: $10, payable at the door, but you MUST register here

Please bring your lunch. Dress comfortably and for the weather.

Questions? Please contact Denise Ellsworth at: ellsworth.2@osu.edu

Hope to see you later this summer in Wooster!

I just ran across these bee cards to help ID bees to genus. I hope they help as you learn more bees!

Thanks to everyone who was able to attend our spring update in Wooster late last month. I’m always amazed and humbled by our awesome cooperators and your continued dedication to the Phenology Garden Network.

A summary of our update can be found here, including the update PowerPoint and links to projects including the Ohio Bee Atlas, red maple study and English ivy study.

Be sure to let me know if you have a mature patch of English ivy (growing up a tree, mature leaves) to monitor this year for date of bloom.

Here’s a list of our 2017 plant additions:

Perennials provided to interested gardens in 2017

Shrubs provided to interested gardens in 2017

Thanks, everyone, and be sure to let me know if you have questions, needs or suggestions.

Denise

Carpenter bee on maple blossoms.

In case you missed it, it’s time to register for our spring update! If you’ve already registered, see you later this month!

What: 2017 OSU Phenology Garden Network Update

When: April 27, 2017, 9:30AM to 4:00PM

Where: Miller Pavillion, Secrest Arboretum

Who: All Network cooperators (volunteer data collectors) are invited to attend, new and experienced alike.

Topics for the day:

• Network data update (perennials and pollinators)
• About our new Network plants
• New phenology projects that need you: red maple, English ivy, Ohio pollinator plants
• A Bee phenology and ID refresher
• An arboretum walk with Joe Cochran for experienced cooperators
• Intro to phenology with Denise for new cooperators
• Plus, Dan Herms (on Phenology-Sabbatical this year!) will cap off our day with a phenology walk.

What you’ll get: besides a chance to learn and network with fellow phenology fans, everyone will go home with a wild quinine (Parthenium integrifolium), as a thank you for your phenology work!

What your garden could get: for those gardens interested, we’re expanding to offer 4 new perennials and 6 new shrubs (baby small this year). We’re adding 4 new plants to our native perennials, including wild quinine, New England aster, liatris and swamp milkweed. We’re also starting a new project to study pollinator visitation on 3 native shrub straight species vs. cultivars, including buttonbush, fothergilla and elderberry. Data won’t be collected on any of these plants until at least 2018 (and possibly 2019 for the baby shrubs).

What to bring: Your lunch! We’ll have coffee and morning refreshments, but are asking you to bring your lunch this year. We do have access to a refrigerator if needed.

What else? No fee to attend, but please register here so we can plan accordingly.

We hope to see you in Secrest Arboretum in Wooster!

~Denise

SEWANEE, Tenn. — Sexual energies were loosed early this year in Tennessee, then quashed. In February, spring peepers made my ears ring as I walked through wetlands east of Nashville’s honky-tonks. These frogs were a month ahead of their normal schedule.

But what is normal in a year when the calendar says spring starts Monday, yet the season started weeks earlier for plants and animals? When New York was clipped by a snowstorm last Tuesday, the streets had already been dusted with pollen from early-blooming red maples.

Spring has been particularly hasty and irregular this year, but this is no anomaly. In the latter half of the 20th century, the spring emergence of leaves, frogs, birds and flowers advanced in the Northern Hemisphere by 2.8 days per decade. I’m nearly 50, so springtime has moved, on average, a full two weeks since I was born. And you? We now experience climate change not only through the abstractions of science, but also through lived experience. Continue reading the main story

Corneliancherry dogwood (Cornus mas) in full bloom in Wooster (3/4/2017)

According to the USGS, spring is arriving about 3 weeks early this year! That figures, because I already feel about 3 weeks behind. Fortunately, we’ve decided to move back our annual OSU Phenology Garden Network update to April 27th so in a way I’m right on time!

We’re switching things up a bit this year, with a later date to meet, a slight change in location, and some new plants for cooperators (you!) and Network Gardens.

What: 2017 OSU Phenology Garden Network Update

When: April 27, 2017, 9:30AM to 4:00PM

Where: Miller Pavillion, Secrest Arboretum

Who: All Network cooperators are invited to attend, new and experienced alike.

Topics for the day:

• Network data update (perennials and pollinators)
• About our new Network plants
• New phenology projects that need you: red maple, English ivy, Ohio pollinator plants
• A Bee phenology and ID refresher
• An arboretum walk with Joe Cochran for experienced cooperators
• Intro to phenology with Denise for new cooperators
• Plus, Dan Herms (on Phenology-Sabbatical this year!) will cap off our day with a phenology walk.

What you’ll get: besides a chance to learn and network with fellow phenology fans, everyone will go home with a wild quinine (Parthenium integrifolium), as a thank you for your phenology work!

What your garden could get: for those gardens interested, we’re expanding to offer 4 new perennials and 6 new shrubs (baby small this year). We’re adding 4 new plants to our native perennials, including wild quinine, New England aster, liatris and swamp milkweed. We’re also starting a new project to study pollinator visitation on 3 native shrub straight species vs. cultivars, including buttonbush, fothergilla and elderberry. Data won’t be collected on any of these plants until at least 2018 (and possibly 2019 for the baby shrubs).

What to bring: Your lunch! We’ll have coffee and morning refreshments, but are asking you to bring your lunch this year. We do have access to a refrigerator if needed.

What else? No fee to attend, but please register here so we can plan accordingly.

We hope to see you in Secrest Arboretum in Wooster!

~Denise

Read more from USGS about our accelerated spring:

Get your flip-flops and shorts out because spring is arriving very early this year . . . at least 2-3 weeks early across almost the entire Southeast, from San Antonio to Atlanta to Washington, D.C.  This unusually early spring is likely to keep rolling north, already bringing surprising signs of spring to portions of the central Midwest and northeastern states. Full press release here.

Hi all! We’ve had a great response this year in terms of collected phenology/pollinator data. I’m in the process of arranging statistical analysis of 2015 and 2016 data, and would like to begin to crunch numbers in December. If you haven’t already entered all 2016 data, please do so by November 22nd.

I promise to share information on our top plants and pollinators this winter. Thanks for everything you do to support the OSU Phenology Garden Network!

Friday is the last day to register for the 2016 Phenology Garden Network update, to be held on April 6th at the Shisler Conference Center at OARDC in Wooster (1680 Madison Ave, Wooster 44691 #3 on map). This update is open to all OSU Network garden cooperators. On the day of the event, registration begins at 9:30, with the program beginning promptly at 10:00. Lunch is included. We will adjourn at 3PM.

Speakers and topics include:

Sarah Diamond, Case Western Reserve University; Dan Herms, OSU Entomology; and Denise Ellsworth, OSU Entomology

Long-term Butterfly Monitoring by Citizen Scientists

Phenology as a Tool in Ornamental Pest Management

Native Bee Identification

An Introduction to Phenology (a refresher or for newer cooperators)

Optional Phenology Walk (weather permitting)

Fee to attend: $10, payable with cash or check at the door. Register here (through April 1).

Questions? Please contact Denise at ellsworth.2@osu.edu

We hope to see you in Wooster on April 6th!

Registration is now open for the 2016 Phenology Garden Network update, to be held on April 6th at the Shisler Conference Center at OARDC in Wooster (1680 Madison Ave, Wooster 44691 #3 on map). This update is open to all OSU Network garden cooperators. On the day of the event, registration begins at 9:30, with the program beginning promptly at 10:00. Lunch is included. We will adjourn at 3PM.

Speakers and topics include:

Sarah Diamond, Case Western Reserve University; Dan Herms, OSU Entomology; and Denise Ellsworth, OSU Entomology

Long-term Butterfly Monitoring by Citizen Scientists

Phenology as a Tool in Ornamental Pest Management

Native Bee Identification

An Introduction to Phenology (a refresher or for newer cooperators)

Optional Phenology Walk (weather permitting)

Fee to attend: $10, payable with cash or check at the door. Register here (through April 1).

Questions? Please contact Denise at ellsworth.2@osu.edu

We hope to see you in Wooster on April 6th!

Many thanks to Ashley Kulhanek with OSU Extension in Medina County, for creating, branding and sharing this brochure. Feel free to download (or click on the settings wheel in the black box below) and edit as needed with your garden information.