Category: Outdoors

Kiddie Pool 26/07/16

Family fun for whenever

Fairs & festivals

  • The Second Congregational Church, 25 Gregg St. in Wilton, will hold its annual Summer Fair on Saturday, July 18, from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. featuring crafts, food, music, kids’ activities, plant sales, book sales, a food auction at 1 p.m. and more, according to an email from the church. See 2ccwilton.org.
  • The 10th annual Fairy and Hobbit House Festival will take place at Bedrock Gardens, 19 High Road in Lee, Friday, July 17, through Sunday, July 19, from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. daily, according to bedrockgardens.org. Come in costume to compete in the Designer Fairy and Hobbit House Competition (see the website for details), vote in the competition, take part in fairy- and gnome-related activities and more, according to the website, where you can purchase tickets and reserve parking.
  • The Nashua Fairytale Festival will take place Saturday, July 18, from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. in Greeley Park in Nashua featuring stage acts, fairytale characters, character meet and greets and “over 30 community vendors with activities, caricaturists, games, books, and more for the whole family,” according to nashuanh.gov/546/SummerFun.

Fun at the theater

  • O’Neil Cinemas, 16 Orchard View Drive in Londonderry, continues its Summer Kid’s Series of screenings of kid-friendly movies on Mondays and Wednesdays at 11 a.m., according to oneilcinemas.com. Screenings on Monday, July 20, and Wednesday, July 22, feature How to Train Your Dragon (PG, 2025).
  • Chunky’s in Manchester has some family-friendly events on its upcoming schedule. On Tuesday, July 21, the cinema will screen Minions & Monsters (PG, 2026) at 11:30 a.m. as part of the Little Lunch Dates series geared to parents and preschool children, “with the lights slightly dimmed…. This is a worry-free lunch without the fear of disturbing others,” according to chunkys.com, where you can purchase tickets.
    The theater also has a family-friendly theater candy bingo event on the schedule on Friday, July 24, at 6:45 p.m., the website said. “With your $10 purchase you receive a Chunky’s complimentary Movie Pass for a future movie & $5.00 off one food item during the event. With this purchase you are eligible to receive a FREE Bingo Card! This event will last around an hour and a half, so we hope to get at least 8 rounds in! We’ll do classic straight bingo and a handful of other creative rounds to win!,” according to the website, where you can purchase tickets.
  • The Summer Movie Clubhouse, a lineup of kid-friendly films running Wednesday and Thursday mornings (with a start time usually around 10:30 to 11 a.m.), continues at Cinemark Rockingham Park (15 Mall Road in Salem; cinemark. com/theatres/nh-salem/cinemark-rockingham-park-and-xd). Catch Dog Man (PG, 2025) on Wednesday, July 15, and Thursday, July 16, at 10:30 a.m. and How to Train Your Dragon on Wednesday, July 22, and Thursday, July 23, at 10:30 a.m., according to the website.

Plants that have stood the test of time

The Fourth of July celebrations are over — the fireworks, parades, hot dogs and strawberry shortcake. Leading up to the Fourth I paused to think about the gardens of Thomas Jefferson, one of the authors and signers of the Declaration of Independence. He lived and gardened at Monticello, his estate in Virginia. According to the Monticello website, Jefferson planted (or ordered and supervised the planting of) 160 different kinds of trees and shrubs as well as perennials, annuals and vegetables — and kept notes of everything. Monticello still grows almost everything he did.

Jefferson grew one of my favorite trees, the Eastern Redbud (Cercis canadensis). It is a wonderful early-summer blooming medium-sized tree and I’ve had one for at least 10 years. It is suitable for a part shade location or full sun. In the wild (New Jersey and south) it is found mainly as an understory tree. It blooms in early summer with small pink blossoms that seemingly pop right out of the bark. Cold hardy varieties are common now and it is rated to Zone 4.

Jefferson loved peaches. He grew more than 30 kinds of peaches but we can grow just a handful that are sold here in New England. A few will survive a Zone 4 winter, but Zone 5 is better for peaches, with winters that never drop below minus 20.

All peaches do best in full sun, meaning six hours of sun or more per day in summer. They are self-fruitful — they self-pollinate and you need only one tree to get fruit. Apple, plums and most pears do need a second variety that blooms at the same time for pollination. Most fruit trees are said to “Not like wet feet.” So don’t plant them in an area where the soil is usually wet.

The ‘Reliance’ peach, developed at UNH, has been around for decades and is one of the better cold hardy peaches. It is productive and tasty. Other good peaches are Red Haven and Madison. Contender is well thought of, but I have not found the fruit very tasty, and a lot of my fruit has rotted on the tree. Other growers love it. Try to taste peach varieties before planting one.

Jefferson was intrigued by sugar maples as an alternate source for sugar, but they did not do well down there. Virginia is a bit too hot. In my experience, if you have an old maple that is declining in health, try giving it some garden lime. Spread it not just under the drip line, but go out much farther because the roots do.

I gave lime to an old maple because I read about an experiment in 1999 at the Hubbard Brook Experimental Station in northern New Hampshire. Scientists found that acid rains had depleted calcium in soils there. They distributed calcium (using crop dusters) and found it increased health in stands of sugar maples and red spruce. I’ve given my old sugar maple several applications of lime over the last 25 years and it is doing fine. And don’t park cars under your maples as root compaction is not well tolerated.

One of Jefferson’s favorite trees was Southern Catalpa (C. bignonioides). That is hardy to Zone 6, but I grow northern Catalpa (C. speciosa) and love it. I planted mine eight years ago as an 8-foot-tall tree that came in a 7- or 10-gallon pot. Now it is 30-some feet tall with a trunk diameter of 12 inches a foot off the ground. My catalpa blooms vigorously in late June or early July each year, producing cream colored flowers that are 2 inches long and flecked with purple inside, growing in panicles. The seed pods look like foot-long beans.

Catalpas can get 60 feet or more tall, and are a bit weak-wooded, so they are prone to wind damage or blow-overs. My solution? I use an extension ladder to get up to a spot 30 feet off the ground each fall and cut off all growth that occurred that year. I top it. That keeps it from getting too tall — it can and does grow up to 5 feet in a year. Of course, at some point I won’t be allowed up a ladder. So far, so good. I’ve done it for the last three years.

Jefferson loved lilacs, as we all do. If your lilac has not produced many blossoms in recent years, it may also need a treatment of garden lime. Lilacs do best with soil that has a neutral pH, around 7.0, and lime will help get the pH closer to neutral. By now they have already set their buds for next year, but add lime or wood ashes now while you are thinking of it.

A shrub liked by Jefferson is called the Carolina Sweet Shrub (Calycanthus spp.). I grow it, but found it a bit fussy. I moved mine twice to find, like Cinderella, the fit that was “just right.” I first tried it in full sun and the leaves scorched — despite plenty of moisture. After the second year I moved it into shade, but it didn’t get enough sun and did not bloom much. Finally, five years later, I moved it under a big pear tree, where it gets filtered sun all day and it blooms and grows vigorously. The blossoms are a deep wine red, up to 2 inches across and shaped like little peonies. Some specimens are very fragrant, though mine is not. It blooms in early summer,

Like Jefferson, I like keeping a list of what woody plants I grow. Since I bought my house in 1970, I have planted at least 118 different kinds of woody plants, and about 95 percent of them have survived. And I’m still going to plant a few more. I make it through winter and mud season each year, in part, because I want to see what plants survived, too.

Henry may be reached by e-mail at henry.homeyer@comcast.net or by regular mail at PO Box 364, Cornish Flat,NH 03746.

It’s time to pay attention to the vegetable garden

Go look at your tomato plants

By now, most of us have planted our vegetable gardens. My peas, onions, lettuce, spinach and potatoes went in early, and now our tomatoes and peppers have settled in and are starting to grow. Is it hammock time? No, now it’s better to do some maintenance so that we can go to the beach later on with a good conscience.

Many gardeners are looking for a magic potion to put on their tomato plants to prevent that nasty fungal disease that blackens the leaves and shortens the lifespan and production of their tomato plants. Alas, there is none. But there are a few things you can do to minimize it.

Right now go look at your tomato plants: Do they have any leaves that touch the soil? If so, take a sharp knife or scissors and cut them off. The spores of the disease are in the soil, unless you are starting somewhere that was most recently lawn or field. That first year you will probably have plants free of blackened leaves.

Mulch under your tomato plants now, before disease sets in. The spores get on leaves by splash-up when you water or get a heavy rain. Got a bagger on your lawn mower? Save the grass and spread it over the soil. Or you can buy straw (which is seed-free) or mulch hay (which is not, but is less expensive). Spreading four layers of newspaper on the ground before putting down mulch helps keep soil moist and keep weeds from germinating. I don’t recommend using chipped branches or bark mulch in the vegetable garden.

One last bit of advice on tomatoes: I have found that buying the biggest cages possible is best, 54 inches tall, with four legs, not three. They’re not cheap, but you should get 25 years or more out of each if you store them in the barn for the winter.

I have plenty of lettuce to eat right now, having planted it early. But I will start seeds now. Although I could sow seeds directly in the ground, I prefer to plant seeds in cells and keep them on a sunny deck where I will see them, water them and monitor them. When they have two true leaves, sturdy ones, I will plant them in the ground. That allows me to space them well. Small seeds are easy to over-plant directly in the ground, and then I’d have to find the time to thin them later.

That brings me to thinning, sigh. The most tedious job in the garden. If you planted carrots, beets and radishes early on, they are about ready to thin. Start now and thin to one inch apart. Then, a bit later, thin again, but to 3 inches apart. Crowded carrots compete with their cousins for water and minerals just as they would with weeds. Eat those thinnings. Young carrots are a real treat.

I don’t mind weeding. Some of you do, and I agree it can be tedious. Young people wear earbuds and listen to music, but I like to listen to the birds and the burble of my brook going by. Did you know that by adding stones to a brook you can tune it? In 2003 I interviewed Robert Irwin, an installation artist who designed the gardens at J. Paul Getty Center in Los Angeles, and he told me he personally “tuned” a recirculating brook he had installed at the gardens. Water falling over stones makes a pleasant sound that depends on the drop and quantity of water falling.

But back to weeding. The best time to weed is after a rain or a good watering. I use a CobraHead weeder, a single-tined tool that easily slides through the soil, loosening it so that weeds pull easily and weed roots are less likely to snap off. Right now is the time to weed because the bigger they get the more difficult they are to pull.

I used to do all my weeding standing up, bent from the waist. Now? Mostly I kneel. I use a “Garden Kneeler” I got from Gardener’s Supply Co. It has a padded kneeling platform a few inches off the ground and handrails on the sides that are a great help in getting up from the kneeling position. Turned over, it provides a seat, and it can be folded up for storage. Using mine, I just weeded a double row of onions 16 feet long, and felt no aches and pains from doing so.

To avoid re-weeding the same bed, over and over, there are two things you should do: (1) never let your weeds flower and produce seeds; (2) mulch after weeding. Same as above, newspaper covered with straw. In the old days, newspapers used toxic chemicals in the ink. Now? As far as I know, all the inks are made with soy products. By the end of the summer my earthworms will have mostly eaten the papers.

If you grow potatoes, it is important to watch for potato beetles. Go down the row, pawing through the leaves so you can watch for the orange egg masses under the leaves and scrape them off. Later, if you look for larvae or beetles every day or two and pick them off, you can control the problem in a home garden. Just drop the culprits in a jar of soapy water. There is also a biological control called Bt, which is a naturally occurring bacterium that you can spray; it sickens the larvae as they eat the leaves but will not harm anything else.

I’ve been picking and eating homegrown vegetables all my life, and I am convinced that it helps me stay young(ish) and healthy. And it gives me great joy.

Henry can be reached by email at henry.homeyer@comcast.net or by USPS at PO Box 364, Cornish Flat, NH 03746.

Kiddie Pool 26/07/09

Family fun for whenever

Blueberry season

• Blueberries imminent, is the message at many area farms offering pick your own blueberries. “We are shooting for next weekend the 11th or 12th for opening day!” said a post on the Facebook page of Berry Good Farm in Goffstown (berrygoodfarm.com) on July 2. Blueberries were on the “now picking” list at Brookdale Fruit Farm in Hollis (brookdalefruitfarm.com), according to a July 4 Facebook post. At Applecrest Farm Orchards, 133 Exeter Road in Hampton Falls, they will honor the season with a Blueberry Celebration on Sunday, July 12, with live music from Reunion Hill from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m.

On stage

• The Palace Youth Theatre Summer Camp, featuring performers in grades 2 through 12, will present The Music Man KidsFriday, July 10, at 7 p.m. at the Palace Theatre, 80 Hanover St. in Manchester, according to palacetheatre.org, where you can purchase tickets.

• The Palace Theatre’s 2026 Bank of New Hampshire Children’s Summer Series continues with Peter Pan Jr.Thursday, July 9, at 10 a.m. and 6:30 p.m. and Friday, July 10, at 10 a.m. at the Palace Theatre in Manchester, according to palacetheatre.org, where you can purchase tickets. Next week’s show is Willy Wonka Jr. with showtimes Tuesday, July 14, through Thursday, July 16, at 10 a.m. and 6:30 p.m. and Friday, July 17, at 10 a.m.

• RB Productions, which is a “non-profit community theatre organization founded in 2003 by Ryan Brown to provide experiential and educational theatre opportunities for youth and young theatre professionals throughout greater Concord and the state of New Hampshire,” will present Footloose Youth Edition on Friday, July 10, and Saturday, July 11, at 7 p.m. the Capitol Center of the Arts’ Chubb Theatre in Concord, according to ccanh.com, where you can purchase tickets.

• The Secret Garden, based on Frances Hodgson Burnett’s novel, will be presented by Majestic Productions at the Derry Opera House, 29 W Broadway in Derry, on Friday, July 10, and Saturday, July 11, at 7 p.m. and Sunday, July 12, at 2 p.m., according to majestictheatre.net, where you can purchase tickets.

Concerts for kids

• The Hampstead Public Library, 9 Mary E. Clark Drive in Hampstead, will host Mr. Aaron on Thursday, July 9, from 4 to 5 p.m. at the library pavilion (rain location will be inside), according to hampsteadlibrary.org. “He’s bringing an exciting musical extravaganza including synthesizers and plants (yes — plants can make music too!), bringing imaginative and interactive music making for all! Great for families and kids of all ages,” according to the website, which said reservations were appreciated but not required. See mraaronmusic.com for a look at Mr. Aaron’s videos.

• The Somersworth Festival Association continues its Kid Concerts at the Pavilion at Somersworth High School on Wednesdays, July 15, at 6 p.m. with Miss Julieann, according to nhfestivals.org. See missjulieann.com to see Miss Julieann’s videos and get a look at her new book, There’s A Dinosaur at My Door.

Raising funds with flying skillets

Hillsboro Summerfest has it all

The Hillsboro Summerfest will take place from July 9 to July 12. According to the festival chair and creative director, Katherine Charrette, the celebration has been going on in one form or another for 36 years, offering carnival rides, music and community events to raise money for Hillsborough’s Fire Department and in recent years the Lions Club.

”It’s been a few different things over the years,” she said. “We were originally the Fireman’s Muster, so they would get together and compete, and it’s really grown since then. We were the Balloon Fest for a long time, and we’ve recently rebranded in the past seven years as the Hillsboro Summerfest, so we could kind of broaden our scope a little bit.”

“Our proceeds go to the firefighters,” Charrette said, “and their association, which provides lots of medical equipment.and materials that we need. It also splits with the other partner we have, which is the Lions Club. They provide lots of free meals for senior citizens. They do lunches with kids and students at the school. They provide eyewear. We’re completely nonprofit and our goal is to get money from this festival into the pockets of other nonprofits.”

Charrette said that aside from raising money for good causes the goal of Summerfest is to provide affordable entertainment.

“We really try to provide as much free stuff as we possibly can,” she said, “in order to have people not spending a ton of money and be able to really enjoy themselves without a huge price ticket. [What you see] all depends on the day that you show up. If you show up on Thursday, you’re going to see kids and teens running around everywhere, going on all the rides as many times in a row as they can. If you were to show up on Saturday, you could see a 12-foot-tall butterfly, a strongman performance by two-time world record holder Mighty Mike — he’s coming here from Nova Scotia to perform for us — we have stilt walkers, we have a long and very good fireworks show. We have a magic show. We have an RC truck crawler meet-up on Sunday this year — we have a truck that dumps off a bunch of rocks and you can take any kind of RC vehicle that you would like and you’ll be able to just kind of get tips and tricks from other RC enthusiasts … it’s really just about RC vehicles meeting up and learning from one another. And we are doing a giveaway for like a $300 RC crawler truck, which is like … a very tiny version of a lifted Toyota Tacoma.”

Another high point of this year’s Summerfest will be a 5K road race, Charette said.

“We have one of the most beautiful 5K courses in the world. Our route goes along our river and over a beautiful, very old bridge. So that’s a really unique experience.” Another not-to-be-missed event that has become a yearly tradition, she said, is the Women’s Skillet Toss. “All of the proceeds for that go to women’s heart health,” she said. “And this is exactly what it sounds like, which is hucking a skillet as far as you possibly can — only underhand, no overhand. And this year we have added a Men’s Marshmallow Long Drive so we can provide something for men as well. The money raised from that will raise money for men’s mental health.” The Long Drive is golf-oriented, Charette said. “You take your driver and hit a ball as far as you can, only we’ll be using marshmallows because mental health is messy sometimes.”

The Hillsboro Summerfest
When: Thursday, July 9, from 6 to 10 p.m.; Friday, July 10, from 5 to 11 p.m.; Saturday, July 11, from 2 to 11 p.m.; and Sunday, July 12, from noon to 5 p.m.
Where: Hillsborough Fair Grounds on Henniker Street in Hillsborough.
More: hillsborosummerfest.com

Kiddie Pool 26/07/02

Family fun for whenever

Summer of theater

• Catch the first production from a Palace Youth Theatre Summer Camp, featuring performers in grades 2 through 12, at the Palace Theatre, 80 Hanover St. in Manchester, on Thursday, July 2, and Friday, July 3, with Diary of a Wimpy Kid, according to palacetheatre.org, where you can purchase tickets. The production is a 60-minute version, according to the website.

• The Palace Theatre’s 2026 Bank of New Hampshire Children’s Summer Series kicks off the next week with Peter Pan Jr.running Tuesday, July 7, through Friday, July 10, with shows Tuesday through Thursdays at 10 a.m. and 6:30 p.m. and Fridays at 10 a.m., all at the Palace Theatre, 80 Hanover St. in Manchester, according to palacetheatre.org, where you can purchase tickets.

Game time

• The Nashua Silver Knights have several upcoming games at Holman Stadium in Nashua, according to nashuasilverknights.com, where you can purchase tickets. In addition to the 10:30 a.m. game on Saturday, July 4, against the Norwich Sea Unicorns, the Silver Knights will play the Lowell Spinners on Monday, July 6, at 6:03 p.m. and then face the Vermont Lake Monsters both Tuesday, July 7, and Wednesday, July 8, at 6:03 p.m., the website said.

• The NH Fisher Cats play a series of games against the Portland Sea Dogs Tuesday, July 7, through Sunday, July 12, according to milb.com/new-hampshire, where you can purchase tickets. Games Tuesday through Saturday start at 6:03 p.m. and Sunday’s game starts at 1:05 p.m. On Tuesday, July 7, and Sunday, July 12, the first 500 fans each day will receive bobbleheads #1 (July 7) and #2 (July 12) in the three-bobblehead Manchester Chicken Tenders series, the website said. On Tuesday the team plays as the Manchester Chicken Tenders and on Sunday the team will play as the Manchester Buffalo Tenders, the website said. On Wednesday, July 8, the first 500 fans can get a Coca-Cola Soccer Jersey, the website said.

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