How to reduce tour garden’s carbon footprint

MIDDLETOWN — The director of Science at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden will deliver a lecture entitled “Reducing Your Garden’s Carbon Footprint” on Thursday, Feb. 21, at 7 p.m. at the Gilman Center on the Middletown campus of SUNY Orange.

“Even though composting and gardening organically drastically reduce your carbon footprint, other aspects of gardening carry a heavy carbon load,” said Dr. Susan Pell in the college’s press release announcing the program.

In order to explain this statement and its practical side, she poses some questions:

Where does the peat moss in your potting mix come from?

Can you repurpose old items to use as hardscaping rather than buy new materials?

Have you tried growing plants from seed?

In addition to her position in Brooklyn, Pell also is botany program coordinator in adult education and a School of Professional Horticulture faculty member at the New York Botanical Garden. In addition, she is on the adjunct faculty at Pratt Institute and the College of Mount Saint Vincent. She holds a bachelor’s degree in biology from St. Andrew’s Presbyterian College and a PhD in plant biology from Louisiana State University.

Essential information
The lecture is free and open to the public.

The presentation will take place in the Gilman Center which is Room 130 of the Library at SUNY Orange located at the corner of South Street and East Conkling Avenue, Middletown.

Additional information is available by contacting Cultural Affairs at 845-341-4891 and cultural@sunyorange.edu on online at www.sunyorange.edu/culturalaffairs.