Longtime flower show fans know that the Gardener's Studio in the middle of the floor is a welcome respite. You can sit yourself down and listen to short lectures on a variety of topics. Today I heard Jim Bobb of Worcester Honey Farms. Didn't stay for the whole talk but in just a few minutes I learned some fun facts about bees: Skunks like to eat them by the hundreds, for example. Jim puts his bee boxes up high, forcing the skunks to stand on two legs. This leaves them vulnerable to bee stings on their stomachs, where they're extra sensitive. Nature is ingenious, isn't it?

Also, he says bees are politically correct; they're vegetarians. And if you get stung, first thing you do is use your fingernail to scrape the stinger away. You can also use a credit card, one of the few acceptable uses in these lean times. The normal reaction to a sting is swelling. If your arm goes numb or you start having trouble breathing, you're allergic. Time to get help asap.

Someone asked Jim if the stings hurt. "The first sting each year hurts," he replied. "The next 30,000 don't." He sticks his hand inside those hives a lot, I guess.

Hives can contain about 60,000 bees and guess who does all the work? Surprise: the women. "This," Jim said, "is the perfect society." I don't think so. But as he says, "Bees are the most amazing creatures."

Chester County bee keepers have an exhibit here at the show. I'm going to check it out. Also, get a copy of the flower show events schedule when you first come in. Still to come today .. talks on trees, worm castings, using recycled materials in the garden, and gardening with herbs. That's just one afternoon. Ciao!

The aisles at the show are pretty empty. But guess what -- folks are saying they've never had such a clear view of the exhibits. True. You can get right up close and read the plant tags. You can stand afar and admire. You can linger a bit. I just had a close look at Stoney Bank Nurseries' exhibit, "Isola Bella," in the Lake Region up north. This one makes use of some rather ordinary plants - Knock Out roses, for example, and astilbe and hosta. But it's massed in curvy rows, for a soft look that contrasts nicely with the formal stone statuary and pillars. The people I was talking with thought they might use that same technique at home, which of course is one of the show's goals. Dare I say it: Mission accomplished!? Ciao.

Gotta hand it to these flower show folks. They always look at the bright side, even on a snowy Monday.

I'm down at the convention center, about to head onto the show floor. I'm looking out the window of the media tent and it looks like a pillow fight out there ... white feathers flying every which way. And it's cold. I saw a couple of busloads of show visitors unloading, but so far it's pretty quiet. Jane Pepper, president of the hort society, said she was grateful the bad weather's coming at the beginning of the week and not the end. Not a bad way to look at things.

Headed out to the show now ... first stop: the Phillies statue! it's making people smile. Ciao.

Just read the weather forecast for tonight and tomorrow. It's not looking good - six to 10 inches of snow tonight for a total of 14 or so by tomorrow. I feel bad for the flower show folks. The more you know about the show, the more appreciation you have for the amount of work involved. But that's how it goes in March. Ciao.

Here's another view of Michael Petrie's painted tree branches. I did a story awhile back about people who paint dead trees. It's a great way to make your garden a lot more interesting, provided of course that the tree is in no danger of falling over and killing anyone. I saw a dead pine tree painted white with a green tint. It was positively ghostly. Swarthmore College had a bright blue tree that's now gone. I loved it. And I talked to a Hollywood garden designer who painted trees bright yellow to really upset expectations. A painted tree stump would be very cool, or even painted branches placed around the garden. Unfortunately, the only branches I get are small. Millions of small ones that fall in the wind and rain. Can't paint them. Can't even pick them all up. They're just too damned many. Ciao!

Here's a shot of Bailey Hale, one of three partners in MODA Botanica. You can see one of the allees in the exhibit. Check out the water bottles, which are headed for recycling after the show. Perhaps this is a sign that more emphasis is being placed on recycling and reusing materials used in the show. Many are tossed at week's end. Here's a silver lining: I've never done this, but I've heard from many people that if you go to the show on the last day, which is next Sunday, lots of plants get given away. Now that's what I call reusing. And not a bad way to economically feed your plant-purchasing habit. Ciao!

I wish I could do MODA Botanica's exhibit better justice than this, but it just didn't work. This exhibit is one of the most interesting at the show, at least from what I've seen so far. MODA Botanica is here in Philly, with three young and creative partners. I talked with one of them, Bailey Hale, as his team was putting 2,500 dark purple orchids into water tubes. The exhibit is meant to be a modern treatment of classic garden forms ... it features terracing and formal allees of hedges or topiaries using unusual materials, to say the least. There is a river of leaves from a plant called crazy vine from the Philippines and cascading amaryllis ... this is a lime green amaryllis (ever seen one of those? me either) that should start blooming over the coming week. How beautiful will that be? Black and gray yarn hangs down like roots on the underside. Two allees mimic the rows of cypress trees in Italy. Yellow twig dogwood topiaries are decorated with yellow orchids and green and purple anthuriums and a new rose called 'Amnesia,' grown in South America with no pesticides. It starts out pale green and opens to lavender. Wow! The allees are "planted" in tiny plastic water bottles that will be recycled after the show. The water bottles are meant to symbolize the importance of water in the landscape and I like the recycling touch. This is MODA's first year in the show; in fact, the company is only a year old. Bailey says the flower show folks were looking for some new blood - well, yeah, I think they got some! And he says they were encouraged to "shake things up a little bit."  He's thrilled and so, it seems, are show-goers. Other jobs - weddings and such - require these clever folks to do whatever the client wishes. It pays the bills and can be very rewarding, but this ... this is pure fun. "A labor of love," says Bailey, who is also an opera singer. He'll have to skip out at some point this week to join the chorus of "Turandot," now being performed at the Academy of Music. He sings basso. Talk about multi-tasking! Ciao.

Michael Petrie is known for his creative exhibits at the flower show. He was affiliated for more than 20 years with Styer's Nursery and now is out on his own with Michael Petrie's Handmade Gardens in Downingtown. Michael is always someone to watch at the show. This year, "The Painted Tree" is spare and interesting. He's got a 25-foot - dead - weeping beech tree, sans leaves, painted a different color every six to 10 inches. The tree is surrounded by nine cattle troughs filled with water dyed black. The troughs are deep and dark and reflect the painted tree. Michael has also put painted succulents in these troughs, one of which is shown here. Cool. They look like arms. In an interview a few weeks ago, Michael said, "I'm resisting the temptation to junk it up by putting lots of other trees or flowering trees in the exhibit because they would detract from the effect. If you think about it, water and pools and reflections of the sky always help to make the garden feel more expansive. It brings the sky down to earth and creates intersecting planes of view." He worried about the convention center ceiling being reflected. Not to worry. "Painted tree" works. Ciao! 

Michael Hasco has created a slew of kooky shoes for the Milan exhibit at the flower show. They're part of a Milanese boutique that also features handbags and hats made of dried and silk flowers, feathers, seeds and other natural materials. This exhibit was filled with people today at the three-hour preview for members of the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society. And, of course, the shoes were favorites with women. We have a gene for that, you know. Michael wanted his creations to be showy - and believe me, they are - and he says they all developed personalities by the time he was done. One, done in snazzy black and red, reminds him of a friend named June who recently died. One is very Chinoise. One was inspired by the King Tut exhibit. Michael lives in Carlisle and is a graduate of Pennsylvania College of Technology in Williamsport, where he studied floral and plantscape design. He also interned for a year at Longwood Gardens. Nothing on his shoes is live or fresh, but they all look remarkably realistic. Except for the fact that the heels in at least one case are 8 1/2 inches. While there may be some young ladies out there who would subject their feet to such torture, you won't find me among them. I just like to look. Ciao!