2020 Monarch Migration Celebration

The pollinator gardens at Historic Hanna’s Town are an important educational and ecological resource. In recent years, staff and volunteers, led by Master Gardener and WHS collections manager Joanna Moyar, have cultivated new gardens to restore the late 18th century environment. The pollinator garden in front of Hanna’s Tavern runs along the Forbes Road, a historic corridor that brought travelers and settlers to Hanna’s Town. The garden includes many plants that early European settlers and Native Americans would have encountered in natural meadows, including goldenrods, asters, black-eyed Susans, beebalms, mountain mint, spiderwort, and milkweeds. As a member of the Westmoreland Pollinator Partners, the Historic Hanna’s Town gardens are used in educational initiatives about native plants, their human uses, and efforts to remove invasive species, reduce mowing, and increase ecological diversity at the site. New gardens were recently added as part of Eagle Scout projects and this effort will continue in coming years, so visitors are encouraged to visit often to see what’s new!