Sacramento Digs Gardening Article
Your resource for Sacramento-area gardening news, tips and events

Articles Recipe Index Keyword Index Calendar Twitter Facebook Instagram About Us Contact Us

Discover the buzz at California Honey Festival

Sacramento Digs Gardening
BY Debbie Arrington PUBLISHED APR 30, 2019

Hard-working bees and their honey are celebrated Saturday at the California Honey Festival, Woodland.

(Photo: Kathy Morrison

Bee-happy free event fills downtown Woodland on Saturday

Love honey? Interested in helping bees? Want more fruit and vegetables in your own garden?

Catch the buzz at the third annual California Honey Festival, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday, May 4, in downtown Woodland.

In partnership with the Honey and Pollination Center and the Robert Mondavi Institute of Food & Wine at UC Davis, this free festival is dedicated to all things honey and bee-related. It has quickly grown into one of the largest events of its kind.

Honeybees continue to be in peril. This family-friendly fest combines education about how to help bees and the issues these important pollinators face with the delicious product of their work – honey. Downtown Woodland has embraced the Honey Fest’s message with restaurants offering honey-filled menus and bars serving honey-laced drinks.

At Saturday’s festival, scores of vendors will offer honey-related products in booths along Main Street between First and Third streets. Taste dozens of different honeys and discover their wide range of flavors. (Not all honeys are sweet!)

Learn how to help bees by creating pollinator-friendly gardens filled with flowers that bees love (and need). Ever thought about beekeeping? This place will get you inspired and supply you with the basics.

A bee flits among Betty Boop roses. Learn how to help bees during the

California Honey Festival on Saturday. (Photo: Debbie Arrington)

Sample honey-based mead as well as beer and wine in the bee-happy festival garden. Plus there will be plenty of tasty honey-enhanced things to eat.

A cooking stage will offer demonstrations all day on using honey as a sugar substitute as well as making the most of this special ingredient. The UC Davis educational stage features eight workshops, ranging from beginning beekeeping and how to make mead to attracting more bees to the urban landscape. There’s also lots of family entertainment, including Uncle Jer’s Traveling Bee Show (3 p.m.). Find the full schedule here: https://californiahoneyfestival.com/schedule/

In addition, celebrity landscape expert Ahmad Hassan of “Yard Crashers” will host the festival’s Pollinator Garden, offering his expertise on how to plant your own bee-friendly habitat.

Proceeds from the festival support several bee- and pollinator-related non-profit programs and projects aimed at supporting bee health worldwide.

Details: www.californiahoneyfestival.com .

Comments

0 comments have been posted.

GENERAL GARDENING

An article about gardening.

Keywords:

gardening Sacramento family events bees spring gardens Yolo County events honey Woodland pollinators UC Davis

Newsletter Subscription

Sacramento Digs Gardening to your inbox.

Taste Spring! E-cookbook

Find our spring recipes here!

Local News

Thanks to our sponsor!

Sites We Like

Garden Checklist for week of May 5

Survey your garden after the May 4 rainstorm. Heavy rain and gusty winds can break the neck of large flowers such as roses. Also:

* Keep an eye on new transplants or seedlings; they could take a pounding from the rain.

* Watch out for powdery mildew. Warmth following moist conditions can cause this fungal disease to “bloom,” too. If you see a leaf that looks like it’s dusted with powdered sugar, snip it off.

* After the storm, start setting out tomato transplants, but wait on the peppers and eggplants (they want warmer nights). Pinch off any flowers on new transplants to make them concentrate on establishing roots instead of setting premature fruit.

* Trim dead flowers but not leaves from spring-flowering bulbs such as daffodils and tulips. Those leaves gather energy to create next year's flowers. Also, give the bulbs a fertilizer boost after bloom.

* Pinch chrysanthemums back to 12 inches for fall flowers. Cut old stems to the ground.

* Mulch around plants to conserve moisture and control weeds.

* From seed, plant beans, beets, cantaloupes, carrots, corn, cucumbers, melons, pumpkins, radishes and squash.

* Plant onion sets.

* In the flower garden, plant seeds for asters, cosmos, celosia, marigolds, salvia, sunflowers and zinnias. Transplant petunias, zinnias, geraniums and other summer bloomers.

* Plant perennials and dahlia tubers for summer bloom.

* Don’t wait; plant summer bulbs, such as gladiolus and tuberous begonias.

* Harvest cabbage, lettuce, peas and green onions.

Taste Summer! E-cookbook

Find our summer recipes here!

Taste Fall! E-cookbook

Find our fall recipes here!

Taste Winter! E-cookbook

Find our winter recipes here!