'Gardening with Children' workshop to be held at MSU center in Novi

Dr. Norm Lownds is presenting at Evenings in the Garden, “Gardening with Children-Finding Magic in Your Garden” is 6:30-8:30 p.m. March 30 at MSU Tollgate Farm and Education Center, 28115 Meadowbrook Road, Novi, register at events.anr.msu.edu/evenings17win, 248-347-0269 x229, tollgate.msu.edu, $20 per class.

6 steps to growing indoors

1. The best containers are wood pulp pots or peat pots. You can also use plastic cell containers with covers or egg cartons with holes poked in the bottom and saran wrap on top. (Or reuse the annual flats from last year.) Whatever you use, make sure it has drainage.

2. Fill with potting soil, preferably a mix with sphagnum peat moss. Moisten the soil. 

3.Plant a few seeds, not many, about 1/8 inch deep and pat the soil lightly. Then cover with plastic and place in a very warm place, out of direct sunlight.

4. Keep watered. Once the seeds sprout, move the pots to a bright spot, a south-facing window is best. Water often, but not too much or too fast. The plants are fragile. If they get too big for their containers, move them to bigger pots. 

5. When it gets close to planting time, it's time to harden them by placing them outside during the day, to get used to it, but not in direct sunlight at first. Bring them in every night.

6. When it's warm enough at night, transplant to the garden. Dig a hole slightly deeper than the pot and put the plant in, supporting it with your fingers. Firm the soil gently around the stem. Water carefully.

For tomatoes, it takes 6-8 weeks before they'll be ready to transplant outside. For Southeast Michigan, wait until Memorial Day to put tomatoes and peppers outside, because they are very frost sensitive and will grow much better when it's warmer at night. Occasionally, there is frost after Memorial Day, so watch the weather and cover plants when there's a frost forecast.

Burpee's guide to indoor seed starting

Annual orchid show is March 25-26 in Madison Heights

63rd annual Michigan Orchid Society Show is 11 a.m.-5 p.m. March 25, and 11 a.m.-4 p.m. March 26 at United Food Workers Bldg., 876 Horace Brown Drive, Madison Heights, miorchids.com, free admission.

Sugar Maple trees are on tap for syrup season

We are tapping maple trees to collect sap and make maple syrup.
The process is pretty straightforward, but you need a little bit of equipment and clean buckets or milk jugs to collect the sap.
Then strain the sap with a mesh strainer before boiling it down to syrup. It takes a lot of sap to make a little syrup, but it's delicious. The ratio is: roughly 40 gallons of sap boil down to just one gallon of syrup.
Here's a link with step-by-step instructions, maple syrup.