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Plant Sale is May 24

Plant Sale is May 24

It’s spring! The trees are leafing out. The forsythia’s in bloom, and the rhododendrons, and the apple trees are beginning to bud. This can only mean one thing: It’s almost time for the Belfast Garden Club’s Annual Plant Sale! Scheduled for Saturday, May 24 from 9 a.m. until noon at the Belfast Boathouse and Steamboat Landing, the plant sale will feature hundreds of plants donated by BGC members and local plant purveyors. Annuals, perennials, herbs, shrubs, trees: We’ll have them all. The Gardener-to-Gardener table will be back, stocked with useful tools and garden items, including pots (no plastic). This year,…

Anchors

Anchors

Exuding “the massive / Mysticism of stone, / Which failure cannot cast down / Nor success make proud,” boulders appeared this week in the Belfast post office garden. The foundation of the new planting going on this spring, these boulders will do a lot of work in a small space. They’ll help stabilize the soil and prevent erosion, provide shelter and shade for pollinators, and define the pedestrian path that leads from sidewalk to parking lot. To quote Robinson Jeffers, they will also add a touch of “massive mysticism” to the garden situated at one of the town’s busiest points.

Trees to Grow On

Trees to Grow On

Members of the BGC TWiG and Education committees convened at East Belfast Elementary School this morning to continue the Arbor Day celebration with a group of kindergarten and first-grade students. Three new trees–a tulip tree, a white oak, and a black gum–were purchased by the club to site on the bare and windy hill overlooking the road. The committees prepared the holes and added the trees, then the students shoveled the dirt back in, carefully tamped it down with their right-sized feet, and gave each tree a good soaking. Many of the students remarked that they’d never seen a tree…

Belfast City Park Gains a Black Gum Tree

Belfast City Park Gains a Black Gum Tree

Members of the Belfast Garden Club joined forces with Belfast Parks and Recreation staff to plant a black gum tree near the entrance to City Park on Arbor Day, April 25, 2025. Parks and Recreation Director Pam Salokangas read a proclamation declaring Belfast’s embrace of Arbor Day and its principles, followed by a reading of a poem by Belfast poet laureate Maya Stein that spoke to the importance of trees in our lives. Then the digging began! Assisted by several strong BPR employees, garden club members dug the right-sized hole to accommodate the sapling, and gave instruction on how to…

City Park gardeners

Arbor Day Is On the Way!

On Friday, April 25th at 10 a.m., Belfast Garden Club members will join City Park staff to celebrate Arbor Day in the best possible way: by planting a tree! City Park will gain a black gum (Nyssa silvatica) tree to replace the ancient horse chestnut tree that didn’t survive the winter. A proclamation announcing Belfast’s dedication to the health and welfare of its arboreal residents will be read, followed at noon by a guided walking tour of City Park’s trees led by Aleta McKeogh. You can continue the tree walk at 2pm at the corner of Union and Commercial Streets,…

Down to Zero

Down to Zero

Before it looks better, it looks. . .strangely bare. Public Garden volunteers worked with Belfast Department of Public Works employees to clear the Post Office Square garden of vegetation this week, moving trees to replant in the patch forest at Wales Park and potting perennials to use in the twelve other public gardens planted and maintained by the BGC. When complete, the new Post Office Square garden will make the area safer for pedestrians and drivers and more attractive to pollinators. Safer footing will be a boon to those passing through the garden from Church Street, and unobstructed views for…