Happy Easter Tollgate Garden Volunteer Important Dates and Events

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1 The Tollgate Farm News Volume 20 Issue 4 April 2014 General Meeting in Activity Center MSU Tollgate Gardens Volunteer General Meeting in the Activity Center Thursday, April 17, 7:00 PM Accessible Hoop House for Gardening Therapy Join Tollgate volunteers in the Activity Center on Thursday, April 17, to learn about the design, construction and ongoing use of the nation's first completely accessible hoop house at St. Joseph Mercy Hospital in Ypsilanti, Michigan, that opened in May Jeremy Hodges will talk about the development of the interior layout and the design of the structures in the greenhouse, which is used by clients with traumatic and acquired brain injuries. Produce from the greenhouse and farm at St. Joe's is sold in the hospital lobby with excess items being donated to Food Gatherers. Read about Jeremy's work building a second accessible hoop house at the Chelsea Senior Center, Jeremy Hodges is the Production Coordinator for the Moriah Enrichment Center, a 68-acre vocational farm in Manchester for residential and out-patient clients. He is on the board of directors of the Washtenaw County Conservation District. Jeremy was well received at the recent Michigan Horticultural Therapy Association conference, where he presented on inclusive farming and agri-therapy. Jeremy has a BS in horticulture from MSU, where he specialized in landscape design and construction management. He is married with two young boys and looking forward to bringing them to Fall Fair. He is also active in coaching children in various sports. Happy Easter Tollgate Garden Volunteer Important Dates and Events APR MEETINGS MAY MEETINGS 17 TGV General Meeting Last Meeting in Activity Center 7:00 PM 6 TGAC Meeting 7:00 PM 14 Fall Fair Meeting 7:00 PM 15 TGV General Meeting 7:00 PM APR ACTIVITIES MAY ACTIVITIES 26 Spring Clean-up / PAR Prep / Nursery Division Pancake Brunch at Noon 9:00 AM 3 Rose Garden/Rock Ledge/Heritage 9:00 AM 10 Children s/xeriscape/activity Ctr. 9:00 AM 17 PAR Planting/Demo/Plant Sale 9:00 AM 31 Plant Sale Prep/Farmhouse 9:00 AM Page

2 GREETINGS Greetings All, from the Tollgate Farm Manager Roy Prentice Maple Syrup Making Although I was afraid that the 2014 maple syrup season would be a total unmitigated bust, favorable weather in late March and early April really pulled us through. Lead by many hard working individuals, the season was a success. Although the season started late and lots of snow made work in the woods difficult at times, we ended up making over 93 gallons of syrup. The maple crew worked very hard this year maintaining and improving the tubing system that connects over 250 trees. We saw lots of drop by visitors during the season and had many organized tours of kid groups of various stripes. The season provided us with enough syrup to provide for our pancake brunch on April 26th and to give and sell to our many wonderful volunteers. In terms of production, this year turned out to be a bit better than average. Sap flow is always subject to the vagaries of the weather, that s farming! We Need Volunteers As the snows of the historic winter of 2014 release their icy grip on the land, the Tollgate volunteers have already had several workdays where we sallied to the gardens to prepare for the coming growing season. Each year the gardens get better. Each year we have more visitors that come to Tollgate to enjoy the fruits of our work. Please help us make Tollgate reach its fullest potential. We still need a few area garden leaders to look after gardens on the farm. Please plan to attend our activity days. Without your help, Tollgate would be just another farm. With your help, we will continue to work toward a high level of true awesomeness. Thanks for all that you do to make Tollgate such a special place! Roy April 11, 2014 April 8, 2013 Photos by Darretta Ferasin Page 2

3 Notes from the President I go to nature to be soothed and healed, and to have my senses put in order -- John Burroughs Let spring begin! The gardening and growing season is off to a slow start with the prolonged snow cover and cold. The Tollgate Gardeners are ready and have started the season with a couple of cool work days. Pruning, grass cut back and pond clean-up was started with some other areas (not under snow) getting a little early attention as well. We have high hopes for warmer temps for April! See the posted activities in this issue. Clean-up days and orientation of new volunteers will be big days for our maintenance schedule and chance to make new garden friends. With the slower start to the season we will need our experienced gardeners, who know where their plants that require division are in the garden, to make early divisions for the plant sale. Dividing a little earlier will help get those divisions potted so they are healthy looking by the plant sale date. Your contribution of non-invasive plants for the Plant Sale this spring will help us with this major fund raiser. Pots, in one and two gallon sizes are needed, please no other sizes at this time since smaller ones are quickly overgrown and larger ones, hanging basket pots, clay and decorative pots are NOT appropriate for our intended use (consider recycling!). Our early season efforts will be for division, potting of donated plants for a successful sale. There are still many gardens in need of Garden Team members for organization of maintenance activities in specific gardens. Ask me or any TGAC member for ways you can contribute. That s all for now. Happy Spring! Thank you for being a Tollgate Garden Volunteer. Renee Cottrell, President Photos by Renee Cottrell Page 3

4 Fall Fair Submitted by Dennis Roggers It was great to see how excited the Fall Fair Committee was just to meet this month. Fresh from the long winters break, we are eager to get started again. The craft committee will be meeting later in the year and I will let you know when that is in the months ahead. It looks like we will be keeping most of the activities with a few improvements and a few new things as well. We are always looking for new crafts, activities, entertainment, and revenue. So, if you have any ideas or suggestions please call or me or get in touch with another member of the committee and we will toss it up at the next meeting. We had great success with the can drive last year ($203.10) and we would like to try it again. There is a box on the floor by the fridge in the Volunteer Communication Center that you can drop off your Returnable bottles and cans. Many small changes are in the works for this year s Fair, and I think you will be happy with all of them. From the parking lot, to the hospitality area, changes are in the works but your thoughts and comments are always welcome. Please note that our committee meeting day has changed to the second Wednesday of the month at 7:00 PM in Roy s office, all are welcome and we hope to see you there. You can reach me at fallfair@sup-mac.com. Dennis The Tollgate quilt is back from the quilter, Pam Heldt. The Quilting Bees will be sewing on the binding and the quilt will be ready to show off. Each year an exquisite quilt is crafted by Tollgate s own Quilting Bees. The money raised is used to support the lush Tollgate Gardens. Approximate Size: 71" x 71" Raffle Date: Saturday, July 19th at the close of the Tollgate Summer Open House, Art in the Gardens. Tickets: $2.00 each or (3) for $5.00 TICKETS AVAILABLE AT THE APRIL TGV GENERAL MEETING Fall Fair 2013 Page 4

5 Live, Laugh and Eat Dessert First before every meeting Have too many cookies, cakes, other desserts and you want to share? Bring them to our monthly Thursday evening meeting. Want to bake but don't have a crowd to share your goodies with? Bring your bake goodies to our meeting this month. Need recipe or idea? me (Yvonne) at mainwoods@gmail.com. Membership Forms Have you gotten your membership form in? If you have you can sit back and relax enjoy that cuppa joe knowing that you'll continue to receive the Farm News Newsletter and all the updates about workdays, meeting, and other projects. The cut off date for returning your membership form is May 26. After that time the database gets cleared of folks who haven't returned those membership forms and those important s stop arriving. Please don't let that happen to you! Membership forms can be found at: Tollgate_Membership_Form_2014.pdf Nancy Roggers FYI You can contact me at tollgatemembership@gmail.com with any questions, new name tag request, or changes in your information. By John Woodrich WANTED: Please save your newspapers (no shiny ads) for the PAR garden. We also need clean translucent milk jugs (lid not necessary). We will be cutting the bottoms out of the jugs and using them as mini-greenhouses for our tomato plants. Both of these items can be dropped off in the Volunteer Communication Center. Page 5

6 A Special Thanks! To all of you who made a donation to help the Tollgate Gardeners make Tollgate a more beautiful place. Your donation is greatly appreciated! The support that you have provided will continue to help our program prosper and grow. Thanks again and Happy Gardening! Mary Bohner Maureen Dinverno Art Durow John A. Erich Tom Gray Margo Gray Sue Grifor Heather Hamlin Deirdre Hope Beverly Hydo Rebecca Irey Cathy Lichtman Catherine Monchamp Karen Ng Margaret Palmer Grace Pfeiffer Joe Pyden Dionizatoth Reinelt David Rogers Laurie Ryskamp Anthony Senatore Dennis Standiford Wanda Whalen Sue Woodsum Betsy Wilds More Workday Snapshots Page 6 Photos by Darretta Ferasin

7 Tollgate Volunteer Information Activity Days Activity day hours are 9:00 AM to 3:00 PM unless otherwise noted on the Tollgate Garden Volunteer Important Dates and Events listed on the first page of the Tollgate Farm News or by the Area Garden Leader (AGL). Lunch will be provided - veggie alternatives are available upon request. This schedule does not exclude you from working independently on the site. However, on non-scheduled days, your efforts will need to be selfdirected with guidance from the garden area clipboards located in the Volunteer Communication Center. If you aren t getting The Tollgate Farm News , Check your SPAM folder Volunteer Activity Day and Meetings Information ext. 400 Garden Tools Available for Use at Tollgate Spades Garden Rakes Brooms Wheel Barrels Weed Buckets Leaf Rakes Garden Hoe Long Handled Garden Forks List of Suggested Gardening Implements to Bring from Home as Needed Trowel Hand Pruners Loppers Garden Scissors Your Favorite Weeding Implement Hand Saw Plant Division Forks Shrub Rake Sun Screen Gloves Knee Pads Insect Repellant Tollgate Garden Advisory Council Farm Manager Roy Prentice ext prentic1@msu.edu President... Renee Cottrell Vice President... Peg Palmer Secretary... Dave Komraus Treasurer... Sue Janczarek Membership... Nancy Roggers PR... Yvonne DeMattos Fall Fair... Dennis Roggers Programs... Jackie Stengel Hospitality... Yvonne DeMattos Farm News Editor... Darretta Ferasin For membership questions or to update your current membership information send to: tollgatemembership@gmail.com MSU Tollgate Gardens Volunteers For general information and questions Contact Roy Prentice The Tollgate Gardens Advisory Council next meeting will be held on Tuesday, May 6, 2014 at 7:00 PM in the Tollgate Office Building. All Tollgate Gardens Volunteer members are welcome to attend. Listings to contact individual Council Members and Area Garden Leaders are available at all general meetings and in the Volunteer Communication Center. Tollgate Volunteer Membership is renewed annually. The 2014 Tollgate Garden Volunteers membership is from December 1, 2013 to November 30, THE TOLLGATE FARM NEWS Tollgate Gardens Volunteer Office Meadowbrook Novi, MI, Page 7