Growing Deeper Show Notes

An interview with Jenny Hopwood from the Xerces Society all about the life cycle of stem nesting bees and how we can create habitat for them. Often known for their work with pollinator habitat, the Xerces Society works with any invertebrate species.

Listen in to today’s episode where Sarah and Hanna share and discuss their favorite nature and gardening related apps. From iNaturalist to SkyView to Planter there are a lot of tools to help you learn about and enjoy they great outdoors.

Did you know Nebraska has over 200 species of butterfly? Hanna and Sarah compare which species they see the most in their urban vs rural yards and how to create nesting habitat. They also take a look at the species that migrate including Monarchs.

Botanical Latin- the language of plants- can be baffling but also incredibly helpful. Not really a language at all, this system of naming (nomenclature) gives each plant and official and universal name.

Erin Ingram and Jenny Keshwani join us from GROWABLE, science literacy team, at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. They recently hosted an event called Climate and Mental Health for high school and college students and shared with us what they learned.

It’s the middle of the summer and hopefully everyone has something blooming in their garden! But, midsummer brings some issues with it as well; flopping, insects, diseases & Random Death (it happens to us all). These issues aren’t unique to this time of year but they often intensify in the summer heat.

How does heat affect plants? How do plants affect temperature?

The first week of June we always celebrate Nebraska Wildflower Week by traveling to the panhandle to spend time hiking and visiting with our partners and friends. For this episode we’re going to take you along with us.

It’s time for another episode of the Bloom Box Growing Deeper podcast. In this edition, Sarah and Hanna answer listeners’ questions about gardening, including how much to water during this very dry spring, how to deal with invasive weeds and more.

Denise Wally, former Nebraska Forest Service coworker and current friend, joins us to talk about her love of growing mushrooms.

It’s Spring Affair Week and that applies to EVERYTHING we do at NSA. So, today’s episode is all about Spring Affair.

Trees play a key role in pollinator habitat; from providing early spring food to shelter for winter hibernation. Flower get most of the attention when we talk about gardening for pollinators but let's not forget to plant trees too!

No tricks here! But we are changing things up and talking about all our 'unpurposeful' gardening projects. We always try to help you garden with a purpose but today that purpose is whatever brings you joy whether or not it has a direct tie to habitat or ecological services.

Victory Gardens made a comeback during Covid. This is an opportunity for us to talk about a significant movement in home horticulture- similar in many ways to the current movement of sustainable/habitat gardening at home.

The days are getting warmer (between snowstorms) and we're getting excited for spring!

Between the Spring Affair plant list and the Bloom Box design archives this episode is dedicated to pre-spring "window" shopping.

In today’s episode, Sarah and Hanna revisit the foundation of good gardening: soil. If you’re ready to get into the garden, now is a good time to work on your soil before you start spring planting.

Our interests and hobbies matter to the people who care about us most, sometimes they come along for the ride, diving in with us, and sometimes they cheer us on while appreciating the fruits of our labors (pun definitely intended).

We took a look at some of the research around using plants to create community in public spaces and keep those spaces safe and inviting.

Great Plants is a program of the Nebraska Statewide Arboretum in partnership with the Nebraska Nursery and Landscape Association.

The Great Plants Gardeners is published annually to announce the plants of the year along with other timely topics.

Get cozy with a book this winter while we wait for the ground to thaw and planting to begin! Sarah and Hanna, along with Michelle our communications specialist, talk about their favorite books that keep them thinking of gardens and growing.

Help us Plant Nebraska by supporting the Nebraska Statewide Arboretum Annual Campaign

The winter solstice is drawing near! This week we're talking about winter survival methods, human and animal. For humans, a major cold survival tactic is to celebrate with feasts and holidays; so we're learning about solstice festivals around the northern hemisphere.

Some ideas for the gardeners in your life this holiday season! (or give gardeners ideas for their Christmas lists)

In this episode Sarah and Hanna talk about what they wish they had known when they started gardening. They get into proper tools, soil types, and size and timing among other things.

Happy Halloween from Bloom Box!

What do bees do in the fall? Courtney Brummel from the UNL Bee Lab talks us through fall in the life of both native bees and honey bees.

Fall beauty is more than just brightly colored trees and pumpkins (thank goodness because good tree color years only come around once in a while)!

It's easy to understand why fall is so many peoples' favorite season; cooler temperatures, beautiful colors, hot drinks! Gardeners tend to focus on spring and ride the wave of spring planting fever but we love planting in the fall too.

It's easy to understand why fall is so many peoples' favorite season; cooler temperatures, beautiful colors, hot drinks! Gardeners tend to focus on spring and ride the wave of spring planting fever but we love planting in the fall too.

School may have started but it's still summer! We've weathered the July/August heat flash and are ready to get back outside. We're playing a little bit of catch-up and looking forward to fall.

One of the magical things about plants is their ability to bring people together. Whether its the beauty, the connection to nature or the source of food; gardens create common ground between people who may have little else in common.

Being a gardener means trying new things, embracing our failures, and experimenting again. Anyone who has gardened for more than a year has likely experienced some pretty epic successes and a few hard falls.

Have weeds? Looks like you’re a gardener! And you’re not doing it wrong- there’s no way to have a garden and not pull some weeds.

We discuss some common terminology in the garden!

It’s National Pollinator Week! Obviously we love our pollinators here at Bloom Box so join us in talking about some of the most important insect pollinators and what we can do to help them.

Ann is a Research Technician for the Department of Agronomy & Horticulture at the University of Nebraska. She graduated this spring with her Masters of Applied Science and presented her research on the Bloom Box program!

We went a little long this week, there was just so much to talk about! Gardening in apartments comes with some unique challenges but plant lovers are creative and will always find a way to grow.

Happy Mother’s Day to all the mothers and mother figures in our lives who taught us to love the outdoors and inspired us to grow (pun intended ;) ).

It’s Spring Affair Week! Spring Affair is the Nebraska Statewide Arboretum’s largest fundraising event and the largest plant sale in the Midwest.

We love getting your questions and hearing about your gardens! We answer questions as they come in but every so often we’ll share some of those questions with everyone.

Many gardeners are birders and many birders are gardeners. It’s a natural crossover as you work in the garden to notice the birds that come and go. Sometimes they’ll even follow after you; digging for worms in your new plantings or picking up seeds scattered during your cleanup efforts.

Climate is a huge deal in the garden; whether you are worried about the effects of climate change on your garden, started gardening in an effort to do your part, or are learning about how to choose plants that will grow in your climate. Many of our gardening choices are dependent on the climate and learning how to work with it’s variability and the weather it produces.

Don’t grab that rake yet! It’s still not quite time to start cleaning up the garden. We just want to help you get ready and maybe talking about it will let off some of that impatience we’re all feeling about now.

We promised to help you “grow deeper” and this week we delivered! We talk all about soil; what it is, what it isn’t, what lives in it, why it’s so important, and what we can do to improve and protect it.

Spring is on the way! And we look forward every year to the gardeners, volunteer groups, students and teachers who we will be privileged to help plant.

This episode we’re diving right into gardening topics with how to prepare a new garden bed or get ready to replant an old one. An insider tip: as gardeners we’re always in a hurry to get outside so we often shorten well used phrases like “preparing a new bed” to “bed prep”.

Get to know Sarah and Hanna- how they became gardeners, why they love working for NSA and what they are looking forward to about podcasting together. We’ll also tell you more about what Bloom Box is, our plans for this podcast and how we plan to help you become the gardener you want to be.