With temperatures hitting nearly one hundred this week, many of us are yearning for fall. At the Lord and Schryver Conservancy, fall preparation is already underway. We work hard to share the designs of Lord and Schryver by recreating several each year. One area requiring significant prep work is our annual Tulip display.

Remember Gaiety Hollow’s wonderful, early Spring Tulip display planted after a 1934 plan? Recreating the annual flower bulb show takes months of planning, from the proper harvesting and storage of last year’s bulbs, to selecting one of Edith and Elizabeth’s planting plans, finding cultivars and color matches, and placing orders. For 2021, we will be recreating the 1956 bulb planting plan.

Each year brings a new challenge and a design to create. I will be busy pouring through some of the old flower bulb catalogs searching for the appropriate color, height, and character of the 1956 bulb plan to match it as closely as possible. We are lucky that Edith and Elizabeth kept such great records of their home garden displays.

It was a fun week filled with the sound of kids laughing and learning at Gaiety Hollow. Straub Outdoors brought a small group of science summer students to learn about Lord and Schryver, carnivorous plant biology and pollinators in the garden.

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The big oak tree at the top of the West Allee was a hit with the students, and a lot of fun was had dissecting the stomach contents of the Carnivorous Sarracenia purpurea and leucophylla plants that were chock full of insects when viewed under the microscope. The students participated in a pollinator scavenger hunt around the garden as well.

We were pleased to partner with Straub Outdoors to offer this student learning opportunity and hope to work with this organization again in the future. What a great opportunity for the Lord and Schryver Conservancy to be a resource for learning in the community!