Your Small Kitchen Garden

The Pennsylvania Farm Show’s 700 pound butter sculpture sits in an air conditioned booth which makes capturing it in a single photograph impossible. Fortunately, you can make out the butter cow in this picture.

This morning I left my small kitchen garden behind and drove 60 miles south to the Farm Show Complex in Harrisburg. Snow had fallen overnight, so the first 12 miles of roads were buried. The deep winter weather made the Farm Show’s lure even greater. I wasn’t disappointed.

After a cold walk across the parking lot, I entered the complex and left winter behind. I bolted to the poultry building as judging had already started, but I learned that the judges would be working for three or four hours. So, I attended a presentation by a Penn State Master Gardener, Ginger Pryor who coordinates the Master Gardener program. Coincidentally, her presentation was about pollinator-friendly gardening, a topic I’d written about two weeks ago as a guest at the Northwest Flower and Garden Show blog. Actually, she emphasized all pollinators: bees, flies, butterflies, and hummingbirds.

Eye candy for the chicken enthusiasts. The birds at the Farm Show are intriguing, though there’s something it takes getting used to about a live poulry exhbit: Chickens smell unpleasant.

Afterward, I asked her for an interview during the week. Unfortunately, today was her last day at the show, but she assured me master gardeners would be on-hand and I’d be able to sit down with one to pass along the questions people have asked on Twitter (and any you post here).

A Farm Show Workout

The Farm Show Complex sprawls, and, while the Farm Show, itself, is on, you can take ten minutes to walk from one end to the other. I bounced from event-to-event, catching a demonstration by mounted police, English show-riding on draft horses, chicken judging (and egg hatching), vegetable displays, the legendary butter sculpture, amazing horse trailer/camper combos, and compelling exhibits about agricultural issues.

I wore myself out with all the walking, and along the way I lost track of winter; inside the complex is like a state fair, and my brain naturally assumes late summer or early fall when it’s at a fair.

Yes, there is a pumpkin at the Farm Show weighing more than 880 pounds.

I took a lot pictures, though the indoor lighting isn’t great for action photos. I also shot some video. With the packed day today, and another scheduled for tomorrow, I won’t get any video posted until Monday. In the meantime, I hope you enjoy the photos I’ve included in this post.

Your Small Kitchen Garden Master Gardener

There’s still time for you to submit questions you’d like to put to a certified master gardener. It’ll be Wednesday or Thursday before I get to interview one of the master gardeners at the show. Post your questions here, or tweet them to the hash tag #pafarmshow or to @cityslipper on Twitter.

Technorati Tags: off-season, PA Farm Show, state fair, winter