Senior News - On the Cover This Month

The 2010 Chicago Flower & Garden Show, which runs March 6 through 14 at Navy Pier, makes it possible for proven and novice gardeners to learn from leading experts in a series of seminars. Attendance at all seminars is included in the price of show admission.

The roster of some five dozen speakers underscores the show’s mission to inspire, educate and motivate home gardeners, helping them enhance their skills and better understand every aspect of a garden environment.

Here are some of the landscape, horticulture and gardening experts presenting seminars for the 2010 show. To confirm seminar times, dates and subjects for these and others experts, visit chicagoflower.com.

Craig Bergmann, a registered landscape architect and garden designer, will talk knowingly about Making Art in the Garden. Since 1982,

his company, Craig Bergmann Landscape Design Inc., has specialized in putting a Midwestern, modern-day twist on the classic garden designs of Europe. His award-winning work has been featured in several books, as well as on PBS-TV’s “The Victory Garden” and on HGTV’s “Gardener’s Journal.”

Author, syndicated columnist and host of PBS television’s “GardenSMART” Joe Lamp’l brings show visitors closer to their gardening roots with his talk The $25 Victory Garden-Bountiful Enough to Feed Your Family. A frequent guest on “The Today Show,” “Good Morning America” and “The Victory Garden,” he is founder of The joegardener(r) Company and www.joegardener.com.

If you like this theme, you’ll want to hear Nancy Pollard speak about Farming on Your Patio. A horticulture educator with the University of Illinois Extension in Cook County, she oversees the South Suburban Master Gardener program.

Charlie Nardozzi, a nationally recognized gardening author and radio, web video and television personality, will share tips from his latest book, Vegetable Gardening for Dummies.

Author Terra Brockman, who combines her experience growing up as a member of the fourth generation of an Illinois farm family with her expertise in biology, literature, philosophy and history, has another point of view: Beauty, Pain and the Love of Local Food-How to Grow Your Own (and Sell Some Too).

Can’t get enough of this subject? Then listen to garden and food authors Jean Ann Van Krevelen and Amanda Thomsen, whose newest book is titled Grocery Gardening. They co-host a humorous garden podcast called “Good Enough Gardening,” which you can visit at www.goodenoughgardening.com.

The Power of the Kitchen Garden-500 Years of Gardening and Cooking, is a topic Ethne Clark, Editor-in-Chief of Rodale’s Organic Gardening, knows well. A horticulturist and garden historian, Clark shares her insights as the author of 15 books, including the recently revised edition of Hidcote: The Making of a Garden, originally published in 1989.

Another perennial favorite of the Chicago Flower & Garden Show crowd is Wisconsin-based author, educator and PBS television host Melinda Myers. This year, her subject is Planning and Plants for a Small Space Garden. A nationally known gardening expert, Myers has more than 30 years experience and has written more than 20 books, including Can’t Miss Small Space Gardening. Host of the nationally syndicated “Melinda’s Garden Moments” and “Great Lakes Gardener,” Melinda will sign copies of her books after the seminar.

Master gardener Greg Bartoshuk, an award-winning daylily hybridizer and past president of the North Shore Iris and Daylily Society, is back again by popular demand. His now-annual talk focuses exclusively on perennials, Perfect Perennials for Perpetual Color for Real Lazy Gardeners. Then, separately, Mary Samios-Russell picks up the gauntlet when she talks about Fabulous, Fantastic and Fun-Perky Perennials to Plant. She and her husband Charley started Contrary Mary’s Plants & Designs 12 years ago on their farm in Minooka.

Jim Ault, the director of Environmental Horticulture at the Chicago Botanic Garden and the recipient of 2009’s American Horticulture Society’s Luther Burbank Award for plant breeding, adds his insider tips with Confessions of a Pollen Dabbler: Developing New Perennials for Midwest Gardens. And C.L. Fornari, author of four books and a self-described out-of-control plant person, reflects on her passion, Perennial Garden Maintenance-The Need, the Nice and the Nuts-to-Do.

Show hours are 10 a.m. to 8 p.m., Monday through Saturday, and 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Sundays. Adult admission is $15 weekdays and $17 weekends. Tickets for children 4 to 12 years are $5 every day. Tickets can be ordered online at www.chicagoflower.com, where no service fee is charged. They also can be purchased at the door.

Group discounts start at 15 or more tickets. They can be ordered by calling 773-435-1250, or by downloading a Group Reservation Form at chicagoflower.com, which also has information on special hotel packages.

All-day discounted parking is $14. For details about CTA bus service to Navy Pier, call 836-7000 (any local area code) or visit the CTA Web site at transitchicago.com. For Metra travel information, go to metrarail.com for train schedules and phone numbers of the various rail lines serving downtown Chicago.

Photo caption: Craig Bergmann wil talk about Making Art in the Garden during a presentation at this years Chicago Flower & Garden Show.

It’s that time of year again. Daylight Saving Time (DST) begins at 2 a.m. March 14, the second Sunday in March. Many devices such as computers will adjust to DST automatically, but others will have to be manually adjusted. Before turning in the night before, set your clocks ahead one hour.

The purpose of DST is to extend daylight hours in the evenings during spring, summer and part of autumn. Of course, setting clocks ahead means morning comes an hour later. For example, sunrise on March 13 will occur at 6:06 a.m. and sunset will occur at 5:53 p.m. The next day, when DST begins, we’ll experience sunrise at 7:04 a.m. and sunset at 6:54 p.m.

However, spring will continue to bring us longer days. The vernal equinox occurs on March 20 this year. Equinox means “equal night”, when we experience equal periods of light and darkness. The hours of light will increase through the summer solstice on June 21. Solstice comes from the Latin word solstitium, which means ‘sun stands still’. On the solstice, the sun appears to stop its apparent movement when its path north or south stops before changing direction.

Astronomy aside, marking the equinox and setting our clocks ahead each spring are rituals that herald the beginning of milder weather, more sunshine, and all the pleasures the season offers.