Fairbanks Museum & Planetarium

06/15/2026

Looking for activities to do with your little one this summer?☀️ Join our Nature Buddies Program! Held over several Sundays in June, July, & August. Sign up for a couple or all sessions!
Link to our website: https://fairbanksmuseum.org/nature-buddies/

06/06/2026

Hello, we have spaces still OPEN for our Herbalism class tomorrow from 11:00 am till 1:00 pm which is on Herbal First aid where you can learn traditional uses of common plants to stock your home first aid kit!

Link to register (scroll to bottom): https://fairbanksmuseum.org/lifelong-learning/

06/06/2026

Our seventh and final flower for Flower Week is Wild Chervil (Anthriscus sylvestris), a non-native member of the umbel family, the same clan as carrots, parsley, and Queen Anne's lace.

Brought over from Europe, it now froths up along Vermont's roadsides and field edges each spring in lacy white clusters atop hollow, grooved stems and fern-like leaves. Beautiful as it is, Wild Chervil is an aggressive spreader, sending down a deep taproot and scattering seed so freely that it crowds out natives and lowers hayfield quality, which is why it is treated as an invasive w**d. It also carries a lesson in caution: the umbel family includes harmless cousins alongside dangerous look-alikes like poison hemlock and wild parsnip, so this is one flower best admired rather than handled or tasted.

That wraps up Flower Week, seven blooms from delicate native starflowers to bold invasive species, each with its own story rooted in the Northeast Kingdom!

06/06/2026

Will YOU hold the winning key?

At Community National Bank's Fairbanks Unlocked, every guest will have the chance to choose a mystery key.

Only ONE key unlocks the treasure—and the lucky holder takes home the loot! ✨

Will fortune be on your side? There's only one way to find out...
https://fairbanksmuseum.org/event-calendar/fairbanks-unlocked/

06/05/2026

Our sixth flower is the Tall Buttercup (Ranunculus acris), and it marks a shift in our table: unlike the natives before it, this cheerful yellow bloom is a non-native, brought over from Europe and Asia and now naturalized across Vermont's meadows, pastures, and roadsides.

Its most charming trick is optical: the petals carry a brilliant, almost lacquered shine, produced by a mirror-like layer of cells that bounces sunlight back at you. That glossy glow is the secret behind the old childhood game of holding a buttercup under a friend's chin to see if they "like butter." Beneath the charm, though, the plant is mildly toxic, carrying an acrid compound that irritates the mouths of grazing animals, so cattle and horses leave it alone, which is exactly why it spreads so freely through hayfields and pastures. Bright, bold, and a touch mischievous, the Tall Buttercup is a reminder that not every familiar roadside flower is a Vermont native.

06/05/2026

Jumpstart summer fun with Discovery Camps for your young naturalists!
https://conta.cc/4g2B4pb

Email from Fairbanks Museum and Planetarium Programs for all ages keep you engaged with the natural world this month ...     Observer June 2026: Upcoming programs, exhibits, and events   Community Nat

06/04/2026

Our fifth flower is Wild Ginger (Asarum canadense), a low, creeping native of rich, shady woodlands throughout the Northeast Kingdom.

Its pairs of soft, heart-shaped leaves form a lush groundcover, but its real secret hides right at the soil line: it produces a single, unusual flower unlike almost anything else in the spring woods. Cup-shaped and deep maroon with three pointed lobes (visible tucked near the roots in the second photo), this lone bloom opens not up among the leaves but right against the ground. Rather than courting bees, it lures early-season flies and beetles crawling across the forest floor. Despite its name, it is not related to culinary ginger, though its rhizome carries a warm, spicy aroma. Its seeds even come with a fatty packet that tempts ants into carrying them off and planting new colonies. Humble and ground-hugging, Wild Ginger rewards the curious who kneel down to look beneath the leaves.

06/03/2026

Part of Flower week, features a non-flower yet common being the Interrupted Fern (Osmunda claytoniana), a stately native of moist woodlands, clearings, and roadsides across the Northeast Kingdom.

Though not a flower, it earns its place on the wildflower table for its striking form and ancient history. Its name comes from a curious habit: midway up each tall green frond sits a cluster of dark, spore-bearing leaflets that "interrupt" the leafy blade, and once they release their spores and wither away, they leave a visible gap where they once grew. Even more remarkable, this fern is a true living fossil; nearly identical specimens appear in the rock record from roughly 180 million years ago, meaning the Interrupted Fern of today would look right at home among the dinosaurs. Hardy, elegant, and unmistakably ancient, it carries the deep green spirit of the Vermont woods.

06/02/2026

Our third flower is Solomon's Seal (Polygonatum biflorum), a graceful native of rich, shady woodlands throughout the Northeast Kingdom.

Its long, arching stems lean elegantly to one side, lined with broad ribbed leaves, and from beneath each pair dangle small bell-shaped flowers in greenish-white, almost hidden like quiet ornaments. The curious name comes from its underground rhizome: as each year's stem dies back, it leaves behind a round scar that looks like a wax seal or signet stamp, the kind once attributed to the biblical King Solomon. Counting those scars can even reveal the plant's age. By late summer the flowers give way to deep blue-black berries, and the whole plant belongs to the same family as asparagus. A subtle native beauty, it rewards anyone who pauses to look beneath its leaves!

06/01/2026

Our second flower is the Canada Mayflower (Maianthemum canadense), one of the most common woodland groundcovers across the Northeast Kingdom and much of northern North America.

Often called "false lily of the valley," it spreads by underground rhizomes to form dense green carpets beneath the trees, sometimes blanketing entire forest floors. In late spring it sends up frothy spikes of tiny, fragrant white flowers, each bloom unusually built in parts of four rather than the typical three or six of its lily relatives. By late summer those flowers ripen into speckled berries that turn from pale green to ruby red, a favorite of chipmunks and woodland birds. Small but mighty, this native is a true sign that spring has settled into the Vermont woods.