From the Univest Public Media Center, welcome back to another thrilling episode of You Bet Your Garden.

I am your host, Mike McGrath, and today's show is largely special.

We have in the building, outside, and all over the place, there's so many of them, Morris dancers, sometimes called Morris men, and they're going to show us some of the dances that have been used, oh, for millennia to spiritually awaken the soil and welcome the new crops while chasing away the evil spirits that destroyed all your tomatoes last year.

So keep your eyes and, or, ears right here, cats and kittens, cos it's coming up faster than you harvesting premium black gold, as well as your garlic and tomatoes, right after this.

Support for You Bet Your Garden is provided by the Espoma company offering a complete selection of natural, organic plant foods and potting soils.

More information about Espoma and the Espoma natural gardening community can be found at espoma.com.

Welcome to a very special episode of You Bet Your Garden from the Univest Studios at Lehigh Valley Public Media in Bethlehem, PA.

I am your host, Mike McGrath, and we have a special treat for you today.

First, I want to urge everyone who's listening on radio or podcast to go to youbetyourgarden.org to see the wonderful dances that we are going to talk about.

All right.

It is a special, very special time of year.

Everything seems to be cascading together.

International Compost Awareness Week, Earth Day and lesser known, because it's not on the calendars, is May 1st, which probably has more gardening and farming tradition behind it than any other day of the week.

Years ago, I became acquainted with the Kingsessing Morris Men, dancers.

And these are the guardians of your soil.

These are the guardians of farms and gardens.

Without them, we would be stuck forever with the bad spirits of last year.

And you remember which ones they were in your garden.

And more than that, they welcome the spring.

I am thrilled to have with me Joe Passante, who is a squire.

Joe, again, thank you so much for being on the show.

- Really glad to be here, Mike.

- You were on my show, like, 20 years ago.

- No.

A couple of the other dancers were there, Bill Quern and Jan Alter.

I had to work that day.

But we really enjoyed it.

We're with the Kingsessing Morris Men, we are an English dance team that's been dancing in Philadelphia since 1977.

And as you said, we're here to welcome spring.

May Day, May 1st is the beginning of spring and we do it in a traditional way doing English dances that were done at festivals and fairs, meant to - our kit is meant to make the ground ready for spring.

Our hankies are supposed to bring the sun out.

We wear bells to scare away the evil spirits out of the garden, and we have sticks to wake the ground, so it's ready for planting.

At dawn, at the break of the sun, Morris teams from all across the world celebrate by starting their dancing.

- And if you guys hadn't been doing this for 1,000 years, we'd have nothing to eat.

- That's probably true.

- I often think we neglect the spiritual, the ritual aspect of gardening, which, maybe, I would argue is the first human occupation.

You know, once people became agrarian, even back then, you could lose the farm if you had a bad season.

And I can only imagine calling upon the spirits of the Earth to help you have a successful season.

- And what better way to do it than to bring dance to the garden to celebrate the wonderful season?

The looking forward, the anticipation of a good harvest, so important, especially thinking about the long winter that you suffered through where food may have been scarce?

- Yeah.

Let's talk about the dance, which I'm calling the stick dance.

- Yes, that's done to a tune called English Country Garden, and we learned that dance via the internet from an English team called Blackheath Morris.

- Mm-hm.

- It's done in the field town style, so all the Morris dancers have a particular stepping and hanky or sticking methodology that really originates from small towns all across England.

And that's from in the Leafield tradition or Fieldtown tradition, that dance is done.

The sticks are supposed to wake the ground and make it ready for planting.

- Not to chase evil spirits.

- Well, they can chase the evil spirits.

Also, the bells are, I think, in my, the bells are to scare away the evil spirits.

- Right.

- But I think both will both will suffice.

We generally get rid of the evil spirits as best we can.

- Thank you, and all of the Kingsessing Morris Men, for showing up today.

I haven't been this happy in spring since I got a snow pea early.

- Well, Mike, we're big fans of yours and we're really thrilled to be here and we hope to make this a regular event with you.

- Absolutely.

- Take care.

- Book it!

- Ladies and gentlemen, the Kingsessing Morris Men from Philadelphia are proud to be here in Bethlehem to bring in the May with some Morris dancing, an ancient English form.

Is this the Kingsessing Morris Men?

You Bet Your Garden!

With a garden theme that won first prize in the Philadelphia Mummers Parade in 2020, English Country Garden!

- Wow, that was amazing.

I can't stop thanking the Kingsessing Morris Men for coming out today in advance of May Day to show us what we all should be doing on May 1st.

Now, that was, quote, the stick dance, which kind of appeals to me because you kind of get to beat each other if you want to.

But there is another very specific dance the handkerchief dance, the cuckoo dance.

And to explain what we're going to see is Ed Stivender, who is one of the principal dancers.

- The Cuckoo's Nest is an ancient English song, and the dance called Cuckoo's Nest follows that tune.

In that dance, we use handkerchiefs, throwing the handkerchiefs up into the air, as if to suggest the growth that we want the gardens to do and the sunlight that we need.

And this dance, Cuckoo's Nest, was choreographed by our fool.

The tradition in Morris is that the fool is usually the best dancer, and he excuses the dancer who has made the mistake.

One of the wonderful things about Morris dancing is no matter what mistake you make, the dance still continues.

The music goes on, and so you basically can catch up.

Our fool, Gary Undercuffler wrote this dance with the handkerchief, Cuckoo's Nest, and Gary Undercuffler is featured in a book by Tony Barrand, God rest his soul, called Six Fools and a Dancer.

One of the interesting things about it is that it has a double galley, which is very rare for a Morris dance.

- Mm-hm.

- English Morris dancing is the source of our dance, but there are variations that the American Morris dancers have put into them.

And Gary has been very clever in adding this double galley, which is not an easy move to make.

- The specialty for this dance is the scarves.

Do I hear you correctly that you're drawing sunlight down to the ground?

- Yes, that's one interpretation.

The action, as you'll see in the dance, is that the hankies go to the sun and invite the sun to come down.

And also, the idea is there's sort of a sympathetic magic thing, as Frasier would call it, a sympathetic magic of giving the plants around the dancers the idea that they should also go towards the sun and go out of the ground.

The sticks are beating the ground to wake up the seeds, and then the hankies are suggesting the direction that they should go towards.

The hankies are heliotropic, as you might say.

- And the bells are constant.

- The bells are there to announce the presence of Mummers and Morris dancers coming down the way and also to wake up the joy in the hearts of people now that spring is here.

- That's great.

Would you find it appropriate for people to dress in white, put flowers in their hat, and go out and bang sticks and, you know, wave scarves, as long as they're covered with bells?

- I think that that is a great idea.

And on Mummers Day, we also dance in the Mummers Parade.

If you have a Mummers badge, you can get away with just about anything.

- Ha-ha-ha-ha!

I know that one.

All right.

Well, let's take a look at the Cuckoo dance, and then we'll be right back.

- Ladies and gentlemen, children of all ages, and everyone who can hear my voice, this is the Kingsessing Morris dancers doing an ancient form called Morris dancing.

This dance was written by our fool.

It is called Cuckoo's Nest.

- Wow, I really can't thank the Kingsessing Morris Men enough for coming out and showing us, just that it's sweet, it's wonderful.

It's...

I believe in rituals, and there are old ways in the garden, ways that we've lost, and to preserve a symbolic dance like this is just so amazing.

I can't thank you guys enough for being here.

Now, you plan to be on Belmont Plateau.

- Belmont Plateau at six o'clock on Sunday, May 1st, 2022, where the sun will come up and shine brilliantly on the glass skyscrapers of Philadelphia.

And that's where we begin our dance.

We will be going around to other places during the day, going to a farmers' market later and hopefully at the Chestnut Hill Farm and Garden Club there on Chestnut Hill, Germantown Avenue, up at the top of Chestnut Hill.

- What can people do to reach your group?

- Look up the Kingsessing Morris dancers or the Kingsessing Morris Men.

There are several things on YouTube of us, in the Mummers Parade in particular, and the number that I have...

The number that you would call 484-477-9184.

- OK, very good.

I can't thank you guys enough.

The Kingsessing Morris Men.

Thanks to our interviewees, Ed Stivender, Joe Passante, the squire.

You know, I want to do, like, a four-hour show on this to figure out all this stuff, but you'll be back next year and I'll be wearing bells.

- Excellent.

Thank you, Mike McGrath.

It's been a great pleasure to be with you today.

- It's been a great pleasure to have you here and to remind people of the great tradition of horticulture.

As promised, it is time for the Question of the Week.

And today's lesson is how to plant a tree.

Erica, who lives in gardens in Wheatfield, New York, which is right between Buffalo and Niagara Falls, writes: Well, actually, you have just enough knowledge to ask a darn good question, Erica.

And before I fumble around for an answer, I would like to take a moment to praise your choice of plants.

The serviceberry, AKA, the juneberry, shadberry, and about a dozen other common names, is a remarkable plant.

It's native, comes in both the form of a tree and then is a multi-branching shrub.

It is one of the earliest plants to produce fruit, hence the juneberry tag.

The fruits are a lot like blueberries and taste like a combination of blueberries and almonds.

At least the best ones do.

Like mulberry, the fruit quality can vary considerably from plant to plant.

Some taste great eaten raw.

Some fruits are fit only for making jam.

Hey, you add enough sugar and anything tastes good.

They are a great plant for wildlife as well.

Several cool-looking moths and butterflies eat the leaves.

Many types of birds eat the fruit, and deer will eat the whole thing to the ground if you aren't careful.

Now, you have the principle down perfectly.

You would feel like a good parent if you fill in the planting hole with nice amendments and potting soil, peat moss, compost, perlite, and maybe vermiculite to create a welcoming environment.

But the reality is that the roots of your new plants would stay inside that welcoming environment instead of fighting their way out into your crummy clay.

Plants with helicopter parents never really seemed to grow, and they develop so few lateral routes that you can generally lift them right out of the ground four or five years down the line.

Are there exceptions?

Yes, and blueberries are a big one.

They naturally grow in highly acidic peaty soil, AKA, peat moss from peat bogs.

So you have to backfill their hole with a lot of milled peat moss.

With less needy acid lovers like rhododendron and azalea, a mulch of peat covered by a mulch of compost will generally suffice.

Now, your nursery bed, AKA, healing in, or positioning baby plants in a temporary bed until they're big enough to plant in an area whose soil scares you.

You have been a good mother so far, and you are correct that late summertime, early fall is the best time to plant new trees and shrubs.

But I think it's time for your kids to get out of the nursery and into the real world now.

Spring is fine for planting, especially in your Upstate New York clime, where harsh summertime temperatures aren't due till late July, and then they last three or four days.

Don't dig them up.

Soak the soil and pull them up ever so gently.

Their new spot should have good drainage, good for clay, at least, no ponding, and excellent air circulation as they are prone to some diseases if overcrowded.

Otherwise, assuage your fears by digging a super wide hole.

It's OK to bust up the clay.

Don't replace it.

There's an old expression in this game.

Dig a wide hole, not a deep one.

So go to town on the sideways action.

Position the plants high up in their planting space.

With trees, you have the root flare as a guide.

You always want to see that root flare above ground after planting.

With shrubs, you're going to have to just use your best judgment.

Breathe, grasshopper, and believe that the plants want to live.

Fill the hole back up with the same crummy clay you dug up.

No cheating!

Then let a hose drip at the surface of the soil for several hours for each plant.

Let the soil settle, mulch with two inches of your wonderful yard waste compost, and have a fast hand with the drip hose if you go a week without rain or it gets really hot, which you wish it would.

Last time I checked, global warming was still scared of your part of the country.

Bare root plants that have not been healed in - soak the roots in a bucket of clean water for several hours before planting, as above.

Plants in pots - slide the dirt covered roots out of the pot and use a garden knife to dig in there.

Get rid of any excess soil and loosen up the roots before planting.

Don't worry too much about injuring the roots.

You really want to shake the nether regions of such plants out of their pot-bound doldrums.

Then plant, as above.

Well, that was sure some fun advice about how you can care for your garden spiritually every May Day.

From now on, you start buying your bells.

You hear me?

And we'll have a Question of the Week at the Gardens Alive website, try and teach you how to plant a tree.

Gardens Alive supports the You Bet Your Garden Question of the Week, and you will always find the latest Question of the Week at the Gardens Alive website.

You Bet Your Garden is a half-hour public television show, an hour-long public radio show and podcast all produced and delivered to you weekly from Univest Studios at Lehigh Valley Public Media in Bethlehem PA. Our radio show is distributed by PRX, the Public Radio Exchange.

You Bet Your Harden was created by Mike McGrath.

Mike McGrath was created when he was eaten by a dinosaur and reincarnated as Ricky Ricardo.

Yikes!

My producer is threatening to ring my bells if I don't get out of this studio.

We must be out of time.

But you can call us any time.

at 888-492-9444.

Or send us your e-mail, your tired, your poor, your wretched refuse, teeming, towards our garden shore at ybyg@wlvt.org.

Of course, you'll find all of this contact information, answers to your garden questions, audio of this show, video of this show, and our podcast, all at youbetyourgarden.org I'm your host, Mike McGrath.

And for me, every day is May Day.

But you can bet your puppies that I will be out there at dawn with bells and sticks and hankies, and all that good stuff.

Because, remember, we gardeners need good luck more than normal people.