Massachusetts

Best places to find fresh flowers during spring in Massachusetts

Published

1 week ago

March 29, 2025

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Best places to find fresh flowers during spring in Massachusetts

Spring has sprung in Massachusetts.

People looking to shed the winter blues can once again immerse themselves in floral displays across the state.

From fruitful farms to bountiful gardens, here are some of the best places to see flowers bloom — and possibly take some home — during spring in Massachusetts.

Eastern Massachusetts

The Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University

125 Arborway, Boston

The Arnold Arboretum’s 281 acres of trees, flowers and other plants make it an ideal place for walks, picnics and other activities this spring. Visitors can also celebrate Japanese culture during a cherry blossom celebration from 2 to 4:15 p.m. Saturday, April 19

Massachusetts Horticultural Society’s Garden at Elm Bank

900 Washington St., Wellesley

Not only can visitors see more than 75,000 blooming tulips at this garden, they can also take them home. Tulip Mania is set to return to the Massachusetts Horticultural Society’s Garden at Elm Bank in Wellesley in April. There are also several other gardens to stroll through.

Cider Hill Farm

45 Fern Ave., Amesbury

Named the fourth most beautiful farm in the world by The Travel in 2022, Cider Hill Farm is a 145-acre farm where visitors can cut their own flowers. The farm’s annual Tulip Feast, featuring 100,000 flowers, is scheduled for May 3 and 4 and May 10 and 11. Tickets should go on sale by late April.

Central Massachusetts

New England Botanic Garden

11 French Drive, Boylston

Visitors can see several blooming spring flowers at the New England Botanic Garden at Tower Hill, from daffodils and tulips to magnolias and irises. The garden, which was voted the best Botanic Garden in the U.S. by TravelAwaits in 2023, has tons of events in March and April as well.

Ferjulian’s Farm

7 Lewis St., Hudson

Ferjulian’s Farm allows visitors to get lost in its two-acre hillside field this spring by offering subscriptions to the Flower Cutting Garden. The subscription costs $175 and lets people pick flowers from more than 200 varieties once a week from July 7 to Oct. 5. Subscriptions go on sale Sunday, April 13, on Ferjulian’s Farm’s website.

Western Massachusetts

Naumkeag

5 Prospect Hill Road, Stockbridge

Forty-eight acres of elegant gardens surrounding a rare cottage await visitors at this public garden in the Berkshires. Naumkeag will host its annual Daffodil & Tulip Festival, open Thursdays to Sundays from April 18 to May 11. Tickets for the festival can be purchased online.

The Botanic Garden at Smith College

16 College Lane, Northampton

The Botanic Garden of Smith College is free and open to the public year-round. Visitors can explore the garden’s 127-acre arboretum, 6 acres of managed outdoor gardens, and/or its 12,000-square-foot conservatory on a spring day.

Botanic Garden at Mt. Holyoke

15 Lower Lake Road, South Hadley

The Mount Holyoke College Botanic Garden has more than 2,000 different types of plants throughout its Talcott Greenhouse and surrounding gardens. The gardens and greenhouse are open year-round and are free for the public.

Did we miss your favorite flower destination? Email dcifarelli@masslive.com with suggestions.

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Massachusetts

Several nurses in one unit diagnosed with brain tumors at Massachusetts hospital

Published

11 hours ago

April 5, 2025

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Massachusetts reps slam Trump admin for ‘clawback’ of $106M in K-12 funding

Published

23 hours ago

April 4, 2025

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Massachusetts reps slam Trump admin for ‘clawback’ of 6M in K-12 funding

Massachusetts’ congressional delegation said the Trump administration’s decision to “clawback” $106 million in COVID-19-era funding for K-12 schools is “harmful and incredibly frustrating to students, families, educators, and school district leaders.”

In a letter sent Thursday to the U.S. Department of Education Secretary Linda McMahon, the state’s entire Congressional delegation and Gov. Maura Healey said they were “alarmed at this abrupt termination” of congressionally authorized and appropriated funding for education in the state.

Springfield is set to lose out on the most cash — more than $47 million — while Boston is losing $3.4 million, according to the Healey administration. The elected officials said the “about-face” on the continued availability of the money was an “insult.”

“Massachusetts gives students the best education in the country. We urge you to reverse course and allow leaders in the Commonwealth to deliver for students and communities without continued chaos and disruption,” the group said in the letter.

The Healey administration said it was notified last week that it was losing access to money set to flow to Massachusetts through a pandemic-era fund that the governor claimed the state had until March 2026 to utilize.

Healey previously said the money was going to be used to stand up mental health care and math tutoring for students, as well as increasing school security and installing systems to clean the air in school buildings.

In a statement earlier this week, a spokesperson for the U.S. Department of Education said the COVID-19 pandemic is over and states and school districts “can no longer claim they are spending their emergency pandemic funds on ‘COVID relief’ when there are numerous documented examples of misuse.”

“The Biden administration established an irresponsible precedent by extending the deadline for spending the COVID money far beyond the intended purpose of the funds, and it is past time for the money to be returned to the people’s bank account,” the spokesperson said.

The spokesperson said the agency would consider extensions on an individual, project-specific basis “where it can be demonstrated that funds are being used to directly mitigate the effects of COVID-19 on student learning.”

Healey and the Congressional delegation said the reversal on the cash affects 41 states and over $2 billion in funding.

The state’s congressional delegation said school districts and individual schools built their budgets based on the understanding they would have the money from the federal government.

“For example, the New Bedford school district allocated funds for a school-based health center. Some school districts were anticipating using the funding for mental health supports, security, air quality improvement, and math tutoring,” the lawmakers said in the letter.

The lawmakers said the withdrawal of the money “will force schools back to the drawing board, requiring them to fight these cuts, rework their budgets, and scale back or eliminate projects intended to help students, educators, and communities.”

Healey previously said Trump “suddenly ripped away more than $100 million in funding that is supposed to go right to Massachusetts students and schools.”

“At a time when students are still struggling to recover from the pandemic, we need to be doing everything we can to address learning loss and the youth mental health crisis,” she said in a statement earlier this week.

Originally Published: April 4, 2025 at 12:14 PM EDT

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Sign at Massachusetts temple vandalized, swastika painted on sidewalk

Published

1 day ago

April 4, 2025

Press Room

Sign at Massachusetts temple vandalized, swastika painted on sidewalk

Police investigate possible hate crimes in Franklin

02:40

Franklin police are investigating two incidents of vandalism as potential hate crimes. On Wednesday, police received a report of a vandalized sign at the Temple Etz Chaim on Washington Street.

Someone splashed red paint on the “We Stand with Israel” sign at the temple.

Red paint was also sprayed on a light and solar panel illuminating the temple’s sign and part of the panel was ripped from its mounting bracket.

Vandalism at temple

For a place that shares the word of faith and love, it was difficult to talk about fear and concern after the act of vandalism at the only Jewish house of worship in town.

“Balancing feelings of being disheartened and sad with real visceral anger that something like happened,” said Mike Rubin, president of Temple Etz Chaim. “It’s left some people feeling very vulnerable, very scared but also the community feeling violated.”

Investigators think the vandalism happened between 8:30 p.m. Tuesday and 8 a.m. Wednesday.

Then around the same time frame not too far away, there was another concerning discovery.

Swastika painted on sidewalk

Oil is now covering a spot on the ground where police say someone spray painted a swastika on the sidewalk in front of a business on East Central Street.

Investigators say right now it’s too soon to say if the two vandalisms are connected but that possibility is not being ruled out.

“It’s hard to believe that something like that would be coincidental,” Rubin said.

As police try to solve the potential hate crimes, the community won’t waver on their message of love.

“Yielding to vandalism and yielding to the fact that somebody out there wants to cause you harm it’s not going to make us any closer to a better society,” said Rubin. “I’m hoping this gives us a more proactive way to really unite together rather than only coming together when times are tough.”

Franklin police are asking anyone with information regarding these incidents or may have seen something during these times to contact them.

Tammy Mutasa