The first plant market of the year will take place on 26 April at the Latvian National Botanic Garden in Salaspils, alongside the Spring Mushroom Symposium. It is a chance to explore the varied world of mushrooms while getting ready for your own garden season, to meet plant growers, to find plants you have long been looking for and to talk things over with specialists.
The plant market will bring together almost two hundred plant sellers, garden goods traders, craftspeople and small-scale producers, running from 9.00 to 14.00. Visitors will be able to buy spring seedlings, fruit trees, shrubs, ornamental plants, herbs, vegetable and flower seedlings, as well as natural food products and garden craft goods. During the plant market, at 11.00, the Salaspils brass band will perform by the Botanic Garden glasshouse.
The Spring Mushroom Symposium will be held at the Latvian National Botanic Garden's environmental education centre "Botania", where informative and educational talks by mycologists and naturalists can be heard in the greenhouse from 11.00 onwards.
The symposium programme:
Diāna Meiere (Chair of the Board of the Latvian Mycological Society, Deputy Director of the Latvian National Museum of Natural History) on the topic "What colours can be obtained by dyeing yarn with mushrooms and lichens?",
Andra Simanova (Board member of the Latvian Mycological Society) – "Agarikon polypore and its use in the past and today",
Inita Dāniele (Chief Mycologist of the Latvian National Museum of Natural History) – "Spring mushrooms",
Audrone Spārīte-Jansone: "Mushrooms containing psilocybin and psilocin: a view from the perspective of clinical research".
During the symposium, visitors will be able to learn about the Latvian Mycological Society's project "Sēņu birze" – on the links between mushrooms and bawdy songs in Latvian folklore – and to view the travelling exhibition "Mushrooms and mushroom picking in banter and bawdy songs". More about the mushrooms found in Salaspils municipality can be learned from a photography exhibition by anthropologist and mycologist Evita Veinberga. Throughout the day, mushroom masterclasses will run alongside the symposium, where every visitor can try both dyeing with mushrooms and casting mushroom paper. The full programme is available on the Latvian National Botanic Garden website http://nbd.gov.lv/
Tickets for the event can be bought in advance online and at "Biļešu serviss" outlets; on the day of the event they will be available at the Latvian National Botanic Garden ticket offices in line with the event price list. This is the first of five Latvian National Botanic Garden plant markets due to take place this year – further themed plant markets are expected on 17 May, 21 June, 13 September and 4 October.
The Spring Mushroom Symposium is organised in cooperation with the Latvian Mycological Society, the Radio NABA programme about mushrooms "Micēlijs" and the Latvian Mycological Society's project "Sēņu birze", which is being created with the support of the State Culture Capital Foundation.