Annual Middletown Green Expo celebrates Earth Day with lessons on sustainability
Apr. 22—Cindy Unangst, co-chair of Middletown's Sustainability Committee, helped start the town's annual Green Expo in 2016 as a way to earn Middletown a municipal sustainability certification.
Since then, Unangst has seen the expo blossom, with more and more vendors attending each year, educating town residents on a variety of sustainability techniques.
Saturday's expo at Middletown Memorial Park, which coincided with Earth Day, had a serving of sustainability for every age group.
There were arts and crafts activities for younger attendees, including a "seed bomb" station where kids could start propagating native plants, and an electric car exhibition for adults looking to switch from gas-powered vehicles.
"It's all about the education," Unangst said, "and letting residents know about all the things that they can do to help the environment."
In one corner of the expo were Middletown "Green Team" members Ann Payne and Pam McDonald. They hosted an exhibit on pollinator-friendly gardens, offering seed packets of a special variety of milkweed that monarch butterflies prefer.
Conveniently placed next to them was the park's pollinator garden, a lush combination of native plants that helped earn Middletown its "Bee City USA" designation a few years ago.
McDonald and Payne, who sported a cape with the design of Monarch wings on her back, chatted with attendees about how to maximize their garden space with pollinators like bees and monarchs in mind.
Payne became interested in pollinators around 2015, when she learned that bees were dying en mass due to habitat fragmentation and climate change.
She later introduced an ordinance to Middletown town government to plant the pollinator garden and pursue "Bee City USA" certification, and has been impressed by nationwide efforts to restore pollinator populations ever since.
"Now people all over the country are starting to plant what's called a 'way station,'" Payne said. "So when [pollinators] migrate from Mexico to Canada, they have places to raise their young."
Middletown resident Melissa Estes and her daughter Sami Estes stopped by the Green Team's pollinator garden exhibit to learn about what they could do to help pollinators.
They left with a packet of butterfly weed seeds in-hand, the native species of milkweed that attracts monarchs.
Other vendors included regional utility company Potomac Edison, which provided information on its participation in "EmPOWER Maryland," a statewide program that helps customers reduce their electricity bills through energy efficient upgrades.
One of the more popular stops at the expo was hosted by Whispering Meadows Alpaca Breeders, where local 4-H club member Megan Kuhn showcased a few alpacas and offered food pellets for attendees to feed to them with.
Even under looming clouds that threatened thunderstorms, the spirits of Kuhn and passersby were buoyed by their furry friends.
Attendees of all ages stopped by to feed the alpacas, then moved on to a new activity or exhibit, enjoying the expo and the rolling green hills around them as they went.
