April 18: Coker College Hosts Earth Day Festival at Kalmia Gardens

Coker College will host its annual Earth Day Festival April 18 from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. at Kalmia Gardens.

The event, which is free and open to the public, will host activities for all ages including falconry, beekeeping, nature walks, yoga, a reptile collection, a plant sale, music, arts and crafts, games and displays on environmental research and alternative energy.

Bill Alexander, former chair of the biology department at the South Carolina Governor’s School for Science and Mathematics, will conduct a nature walk at 10:15 a.m. (participants are encouraged to bring binoculars). Reggae music with Levi and Lucia Byrd will be available from 11:15 a.m.-11:45 a.m. and 1:00 p.m.-1:30 p.m., and Belinthia Poole will offer a yoga class for beginners at 12:00 p.m. near the pond. Falconry demonstrations will be provided by Coker employee Mitch Brantley, a licensed falconer and vice president of the South Carolina Falconry Association.

Kalmia Gardens will also host its annual Duck Cup fundraiser at 12 p.m. For a $5 donation, participants receive a ticket that corresponds to a numbered rubber duck that will “compete” in a race down Black Creek. Ticket-holders of winning rubber ducks will receive prizes.

Established in 1935 and open to the public, Kalmia Gardens includes a historic house and a 35-acre private botanical garden. The Thomas E. Hart House, built in 1820 with timber cut from the property, and surrounding gardens are on the National Register of Historic Places. The site boasts a wide array of rhododendrons, camellias, azaleas, wisteria, tea-olives, dogwood and the Gardens’ namesake—Kalmia latifolia, the Mountain Laurel. It also features a daylily display garden that has been recognized by the American Hemerocallis Society. Kalmia Gardens is part of the scenic South Carolina Cotton Trail and is the gateway to the 796-acre Segars-McKinnon Heritage Preserve.

For more than 40 years, Earth Day, which is celebrated on April 22, has helped draw attention and resources to critical issues of environmental sustainability. Annually, more than 1 billion people in 190 countries participate in Earth Day activities, making it the largest secular civic event in the world.

Kalmia Gardens of Coker College is located at 1624 West Carolina Avenue in Hartsville. For more information about Coker’s Earth Day Festival, call 843-383-8145 or email kalmia@coker.edu.