Somerville Garden Club

June 29, 2020
by Head Gardener
Comments Off on July 8, 2020 Virtual Meeting – Urban Gardening

July 8, 2020 Virtual Meeting – Urban Gardening

Urban Gardening involves growing food and ornamentals in small spaces. Whether you have a huge yard without the time or desire to tend it all, or an apartment with no outdoor space, this talk presented by Gretel Anspach will give you tips and techniques to start and maintain a garden you can call your own.  In this survey Gretel will cover considering alternatives to the standard sources for light, water and nutrients that plants need, for people who don’t have much space, or perhaps no yards at all.  It touches on container gardening and hydroponics.  

Gretel Anspach is a Trustee of the Massachusetts Horticultural Society, a Lifetime Master Gardener, education coordinator for the Massachusetts Master Gardener Association and a retired systems engineer for Raytheon. Gretel helped to establish and maintain two food production gardens that have provided fresh produce to the Marlboro Food Pantry for the last nine years. 

June 8, 2020
by Lina Morales
Comments Off on June 10, 2020 Virtual Meeting – Citizen Science

June 10, 2020 Virtual Meeting – Citizen Science

Monarch butterfly

Using Citizen Science to Help Insect Pollinators

Kristian Demary will speak about her research and advocacy regarding the protection of Monarch butterflies, in particular the removal of black swallowwort and pale swallowwort in favor of pollinator friendly plants.  More broadly, she will discuss “Citizen Science” and the collecting and mapping of data (using the nature app iNaturalist) to learn about neighborhood flora and fauna.


Kristian Demary is an environmental scientist and community builder.  She received her PhD in Ecology and Evolution from Tufts University, where she studied sexual selection in Photinus greeni fireflies.  Her post-doctoral research explores factors that improve honeybee colony survival and honey DNA.  She has been on the faculty of Mass. College of Art and Design for twelve years, teaching courses in environmental science and sustainability.  These areas of study are now being put to use in a Citizen Science project called the “Pollinator Protection and Pod Patrol,” which is mapping black and pale swallowwort.

Please contact PublicRelations@SomervilleGardenClub.org for a link to the zoom meeting if you are not on our mailing list.