Judy Mihok’s Garden Tour
Location: Moon Twp, PA
Date: Saturday July 6th
Time: 12pm
From Judy:
- We’ve been gardening for wildlife since we moved here 45 years ago. We love watching the creatures that share this space with us.
- Our yard is just over 1 acre. Most of our bedding plants are natives or native cultivars.
- We have wonderful landscapers who help us. Live Assets Management is the company and Stasha Kate and Jeff Karwoski are the owners. We get many plants from Arcadia Natives, some from mail order companies like Prairie Moon and Prairie Nurseries, Direct Natives, some from the Audubon nursery, some from Best Feeds and other places as we find them.
- Garlic Mustard, privet, thistle and other weeds are headache.
- We are on the Pollinator Pathway, are certified by the Audubon Society as a backyard habitat, part of the Homegrown National Park, and certified by the National Wildlife Federation. We’ve seen many birds…21 species during the backyard bird count a little while ago. A fox caught a rabbit and stopped by last year. Deer and rabbits and squirrels are always around.
- Since I heard Dr. Doug Tallamy speak at Phipps years ago, we’ve been getting rid of more and more lawn. Our yard has many large beds that feature lots of native plants. A meadow planting is now on what used to be a treacherous hillside to mow. Trees are surrounded by large beds and we keep filling in the gaps between them with all sorts of shrubs and perennials. Soil and light varies from sun to shade, and dry to moist. Native trees include white pine, swamp white oak, white oak, pin oak, bur oak, chinkapin oak, red maple, sugar maple, black gum, river birch, serviceberry, hornbeam, hophornbeam, redbud, beech, pagoda dogwood, holly and hackberry. Native shrubs include inkberry, fothergilla, viburnums, Spicebush, red twig dogwood, buttonbush, beautyberry, bayberry, clethra, calycanthus, winterberry, nine bark, maybe more.
- I have a beautyberry that has white berries, and 3 dwarf chinkapin oaks that I just got last year. Serviceberries are edible.