Yes it is far, but we would be glad to make it a special trip (my husband and I don't know the area well and have plenty to discover).. However, our summer plans never materialize until much later (a trip to Montana and Maine last summer..almost at the last minute). For me it would be more for the 'information' aspect than for the trade--I only have very common natives and NO more room in my small garden.
Anne-Marie

Hi, Laurette:

Please keep me posted as your plans progress. I try to use mostly native plants in my gardens, but I (also) don't have a lot to trade...but I'm still interested, as Anne Marie is, in the information.

I live in the Capital District. How long a ride do you think it would be for me to get there??

adkmountaingirl
Wilton, NY

Hi Anne-Marie and Adkmountaingirl,

Gee, maybe I will come up there. Not hearing much interest down here for it. Hopefully that is just because it is early. Unfortunately, I cannot do much in the way of speakers unless I hear more people chiming up. Luckily I can do s'mores on a moments notice and I have had good luck bribing gardeners with the promise of melted chocolate and burned marshmallow in the past. I do have some good contacts but I need to be able to make them enthused via a good interested crowd to be able to go much farther in this exact endeavor at this time.

I hope people don't think they have to have a truck load of natives to share in order to come. It should be about getting together and sharing what we do have. If some people have more then they should be happy to help those without along. That is how I think of exhanges. That is how nice people have treated me when I have or had little, and I am happy to pass along whatever I have. Also if someone sneaks a non native to a friend while here we will look the other way *wink*.

Meanwhile I have been working on the framework of a Native Plant society. I call it NY LIFE - League for Indigenous Flora of the East. OK, I am a great believer in easily remembered catchy acronyms *grin*. Also in mottos and charged symbols. So I have been working on that end of it, as well a broad goals and concrete objectives, a web page, pictures and so on. I am not going to unveil all that until it has had the appropriate time to gestate because I don't want people to wander over to look, say "oh there is nothing here" and never come back. I want to go public when it is ready to cause people to say "hey, this is interesting!".

PAX et LVX
Laurette

Wow, Laurette, that sounds like quite an industrious plan, and I would definitely be interested in your NY LIFE society whenever it comes to gestation. I've tried the internet to see if there was such a group in NY state so I could learn more about natives, but I came up empty...so it seems like there is definitely a niche for it out there!

As I said when I first responded to this string, my goal is to use as many native plants in my bird and butterfly garden as I can... that's where my interest lies. I do have the occasional "exotic" but only a few...don't tell anyone! LOL.

Just curious, when you say maybe you will "come up there" does that mean that you live farther downstate?? Where?

BTW, do you have friends in the gardening business you were thinking of tapping as speakers, or are they veteran gardeners you know???

I also have a friend, lnmp, who also tries to use natives exclusively...we started gardening at the same time and this is our third year. I can pass the word along to her also.

Well, I'm on my way out to work in the garden right now...so happy gardening!

adkmountaingirl
Wilton, NY

Hi all - I'm in Utica area... . I could host. I have a camp in the southern adirondacks 1/2 hour north of Utica - on Hinkley Lake Just w/in the blue line. (spend the night) I have small woodland garden in Utica, and am working on bring in more natives to camp

Kim