Breezy Hill

The Merry Weather Garden Club met on Thursday, May 17^th, 2012 and traveled north of Greenville to Rocky Mount Road and Breezy Hill, the horse farm and home of Andrea and Jim Harding.

   The Harding’s home is unique in that it was the Stacy Presbyterian Church located off Court Square in Greenville until just over a decade ago. Originally built in 1886, the church was destroyed by a cyclone on March 3^rd, 1893 but rebuilt that year. The Hardings moved the church from Greenville on March 3^rd, 1999.

   It was very exciting for the club members to tour the home because the Hardings are nearing completion of an addition to the structure that allows for a large master bedroom and bath, closet space, upstairs bedrooms for the grandchildren and an additional living area on par with the large scale size of the sanctuary.  

   The original sanctuary portion of the church is today’s modern designer’s “great room” and serves as a dining area where the Hardings converted the church pews into chairs for the large banquet table, a living and media area, kitchen, plus office corner.  The magnificent ceiling draws the eyes upward and the dark beaded woodwork with its triangular and box patterns is striking. Andrea, or Baby Sister, said it took workmen only four days of hand rubbing to restore the beautiful sheen and luster to the wood

   The architecturally distinctive turret creates a unique circular guest bathroom on the first floor. Harding has used period Victorian wallpapers, borders and trims alongside rich and gilded colors to accent the architecture. On upper floors, the bell tower room makes for a quaint bedroom with its original stained glass windows and the loft area over the kitchen more sleeping space.

   The sanctuary’s side doors now exit onto a large screened porch affording a panoramic view of the creek side of the farm property.

   Club members marveled out how perfectly matched or “married” the new addition’s shingles and siding are with the original. Inside, warm honey colored wormy pecky cypress is juxtaposed with a rock fireplace creating interesting paired textures. The mantel is an especially worm ridden reclaimed swamp cypress trunk.

   Of equal interest for the club was the garden.  Massive old English oak wooden gates welcome guests to the garden where crepe myrtles shade and tower over the center of boxwood edged squares and triangles of the formal parterre garden.  An iron bench, a gazebo, and the original church bell beckon the wanderer to pause, rest, read, chat or just enjoy being idle.  The views across the pastures from atop Breezy Hill are splendid, and yes, there is a constant cooling breeze.

   Andrea and Jim Harding have done most of the restoration work of the Victoria church and the garden club was surprised to learn that many of Andrea’s favorite finds and older European pieces have come from carefully shopping on EBay. An added delight of the tour was the Harding’s five year old grandson, Andrew Bennett Kirk, who led his own tour version of Breezy Hill and eagerly offered to continue the tour at the creek, barn, peacock pen, and to his other favorite areas.

   The next meeting of the Merry Weather Garden Club will be on Thursday, June 7^th at the Mabons with a brunch hosted by Sallie Mabon and Mary Anne Harman.  The program, Creating the Environmentally Friendly Backyard, will be presented by Lauren Johnson.

Merry Weather Garden Club attends Concord Lunch and Learn

The Merry Weather Garden Club met on Thursday 19^th of April, 2012 and traveled to Concord to attend the Concord Garden Club’s 14^th Annual Lunch and Learn.  The delightful format attracts garden clubbers from around the state to the Old Strickland Store which has ample seating space for the hundred plus crowd.  The ladies bring a sack lunch and the garden club provides drinks and desserts.  Several local venders have gardening items for sale and the Concord club has a raffle fundraiser for a quilt, gardening books, and items that help support the Harriette Beckham Fune Scholarship.  Brandi Bishop, a senior at UGA, was the deserving recipient and she will continue her studies at ABAC with the goal of teaching agriculture in high school.

   Three members of the Concord club demonstrated gardening ideas.  Martha Boswell began her program on terrariums by pointing out there are True Terrariums and New Terrariums.  The “True” type is a sealed container whose history dates back to the Edwardian times.  1830’s surgeon Dr. Nathaniel Ward is credited as being the inventor as he scooped up a moth pupa on his travels and noted that a fern sprouted in the case.  His first terrarium was displayed at the World’s Fair in London. The terrarium idea caught on because this was the method of shipping and transplanting plants on overseas voyages.  The terrarium changed plant history as tender plants such as orchids became available worldwide.

   Location is important for successful terrarium gardening.  Experimenting to find the right amount of light is key, and most find a north or northwest window best. Boswell used a simple flower vase first filled with pebbles for drainage and activated charcoal to keep the soil sweet.  The charcoal is found at pet supply stores that have fish items. Moisture and shade loving plants do best.

   New terrariums feature anything in nature in a glass enclosure such as a bird nest on a cake stand. Hurricane lamp shades are great for an orchid display-anything that keeps the wind off the plant. Flowering plants should have their blooms snipped off after blooming as they can cause mold. Boswell had simple tools: a backscratcher to pack the soil into the elongated vases, a hair coloring wand to garden the soil.

   Second presenter, Beth Jones, emphasized using what you found in your yard and forest instead of buying plants. She keeps a standard topiary that can be thematically decorated for any occasion. She used rhododendron blossoms and ferns to brighten the topiary limbs. Two clematis blooms and a native ginger in a cute pitcher made a delightful table arrangement. Native buckeye which fills our woods just now made an elegant statement. Oriental poppies alongside an opened Japanese umbrella adorned with Coosa dogwood limbs decorated one table at the luncheon. Hellebores and deutzia filled another container. Jones brought her son’s flower show winner: the hip bone of a cow filled with green grey succulents.  The arrangement made a rugged Southwestern cowboy theme.

   Anna Evans finished off the program with a whimsical and creative display titled, “Fruits, Veggies, and Herbs, Oh, My.” She placed flowers in cowboy boots for a western theme. Blooms in a pair of stilettos alongside a purse made a chic vignette. She entertained with quotes as she arranged: “Don’t quit playing because you get old; you get old because you quit playing.” She insisted we exercise our imaginations when arranging table displays and begin with an outrageous idea for a container.

   Evans pointed out that it is the women in the family that creates the memories of an occasion so use the imagination.  For one table Evans placed gardening books, tools, and grocery store potted plants wrapped in burlap fabric.  She finds unusual inexpensive pieces for containers at yard sales and then often gives them as gifts or door prizes to her guests. Her favorite fillers in arrangement are the cast iron plant or aspidistra, Indian Hawthorne, nandina, and abelia. Pink carnations perked up and changed the look of a silver begonia potted plant that her guests had seen several times.

   Finishing off her program with humor, Evans took a cabbage, shredded leaves for eyelashes, used peppers for ears, and carrots for the nose and mouth and created a multi use centerpiece.  She added a wig and scarf for the character to be a woman, a cowboy hat, cigar, and bandanna to be a cowboy and rearranged it as needed to be the focal point at a retirement party or to honor a luncheon guest.

   Evans finished by emphasizing their local Wednesday market filled with locally grown food:wednesdaymarket.locallygrown.net. With the average produce traveling 1500 miles to get to market and leaving a large carbon footprint it is wise to develop a locally grown food network and critical for healthy eating.

   The Merry Weather Garden Club will meet next in May and tour the home of Andrea and Jim Harding. Formerly the Stacy Presbyterian Church, the historical building is the center of Breezy Hill Farms.

Creating Whimsy in the Garden

The Merry Weather Garden Club met on March 15^th at the home of Sally Neal who hosted the meeting and program. The club “walked the garden” as its horticultural talk and noted the early spring blooms.  Besides the usual white and blue wisteria beginning to open, the dogwood, iris, redbud, snowdrops, late daffodils and forsythia were showing their colors. Other plants the club asked to be identified were Neal’s grandmother’s lilac that was beginning to bloom and give off its heady fragrance, Carolyn Gilbert’s Tropicana colored flowering quince she had passed on to Sally, and the showy golden kerria. The members carpooled to the Neal’s farm in Mountville where the speakers for the meeting waited.

   The subject of the program was bringing whimsy to the garden to encourage young gardeners. Neal pointed out the numerous books and web sites that had tips for gardening with children.  “Make it fun” was high on each author’s list with other advice like giving garden space to a child and letting them have ownership of the plot, and sowing popular seeds like sunflowers, lettuces, radishes, snow peas, cherry tomatoes, nasturtiums, bush beans, potatoes, and pumpkins.

   While adults often put composting, insects, and getting dirty at the bottom of their idea of having fun, children think the opposite. Getting dirty or “mucking in the soil” is an important part of growing up. Composting and rotting discards, playing with and counting seeds, having a lab garden, watching cool and weird insects, browsing catalogues, having their own scaled down tools, building frog houses, making tee pees for climbing beans, dressing a scarecrow, designing “pizza gardens” or theme gardens like those for wildlife are all part of the wonderful outdoor classroom that is a garden. Besides becoming a good steward of the earth, children will usually eat their healthy produce.

   Garden art or whimsy in the garden was the topic demonstrated by speakers Mary Ann Rasmussen and Martha Evans, both of LaGrange.  Rasmussen’s daughter Caryn has created delightful fairy houses using gourds.  The unusual shapes of the common birdhouse and dipper gourds are accessorized by Caryn with moss and pebble lined doors and windows, and buckets and gardening tools add to the scene to create magical villages for the wee folk.

   Martha Evans described her experiences growing up as the middle child of six children who regularly were told to go outside and play, and the door locked to keep them outside.  They dug in the dirt and created mail boxes, rock and leaf houses, stick and leaf people and in the process unlocked and nurtured wonderful imaginations all while having great fun.

   Growing up on the fringes of Brenau College, Martha met one of the professors who took her daily constitution through Brenau’s scenic woods.  The teacher introduced Martha to the sprites, elves and fairies that populated the woods and spun stories that have stayed with her.  Today she manufactures and sells fairies that she designed over three decades ago and are more popular than ever.  Her fairies and garden furniture and gardening tools are in demand for creating miniature gardens and inspiring imaginations. 

   Evans placed a layer of moss in a flower pot, added a metal arbor and birdbath and simply transformed an ordinary potted plant into something special. Her gardens have won national awards as she tours with her products.

   Evans echoed the message of the speakers by pointing out her children’s guests don’t get to bring video games, cell phones and movies to their farm but are turned loose to explore and create.  The resulting forts, fairy houses, animals and people made from nature give the children favorite, long lasting memories all the while inspiring their creativity.

   In club business, Neal announced the April meeting would be on the 19^th and it would attend the 14^th annual Lunch and Learn hosted by the Concord Garden Club with speakers Beth Jones, Martha Boswell, and Anna Evans touting home grown projects. The May meeting will be on the 17^th and will be a tour of Andrea Harding’s Breezy Hill home and new addition.

   Mary Ann Rasmussen described the Basic Design Course that was held on March 13^th by the Elms and Rose Council which was the first of five daylong classes teaching flower arranging and this class studied line and line mass designs and color harmonies. Four other classes will follow throughout the year.  The cost is $25 and includes materials and lunch.

   Toots and Ed Hobson visited Gibbs Gardens in Ball Ground recently.  The spring daffodils were in full bloom and are called the largest mass and number of varieties outside of Holland. The grounds feature a replica of Monet’s bridge and lily garden at Giverny, a Japanese Garden, arbor garden, manor house, summer house, children’s garden, bakery and more.

   Treasurer Jean Biggers gave the fiscal report and Neal distributed the 2007 awards (that had just arrived!) for participating in the Backyard Habitat Category from the Community Wildlife Project to Sallie Mabon, Peggy Jones, Mary Anne Harman, Linda Wilburn, Neal and Karen May.

Hosta

January 2012

The Merry Weather Garden Club met on Thursday, January 26^th at Marilyn Austin Carter’s home in Woodland.  She and Lynda Woodall hosted the January meeting that began with a delicious soup and sandwich luncheon.  The group of ladies welcomed new members Joan Allen of Manchester and Carla Snider of Woodbury.  The congenial group gathered in the kitchen for lunch and was so comfortable they remained there for the program in order to view the speaker’s pictures and gardening tools close up.

Georgia and Alabama Master Gardener Ellen Averill from Cataula presented a program on hostas, formerly called Plantain Lilies and named after Austrian botanist Nicholas Host. The herbaceous perennials include over 3,000 cultivar varieties varying in colors of green, blue, yellow, chartreuse, and gold. It is really a wax on the leaves that make them blue, and Averill pointed out that darker leaves mean a hosta needs more shade. The plants are shade tolerant, she said, but not necessarily shade lovers, but hostas never need hot afternoon sun.  Most members’ successful hosta beds receive morning sun as they are planted on the east side of their homes, and the plants are in shade during the afternoon. 

Averill  explained the size designation of the many varieties: dwarf-less than 4 inches tall, miniature-4 to 6 inches, small-6 to 10 inches, medium-10 to 18 inches, large 18 to 28 inches, and giant over 28 inches tall.  There are waist high specimens that are truly impressive. The club members quickly learned  that it takes four to eight years to reach maturity with members admitting to having given up on their hostas or dividing them too early.

Hostas bloom from spring to fall but many gardeners cut off the bloom to encourage plant growth and cause less pull on the roots. Hostas cannot be propagated from their seeds. Fertilizers may be granular, Osmocote, or liquid but Averill recommends fertilizing when the hosta first appears in the spring, six weeks later, and then in midsummer. Like peaches, the plants need thirty days of forty degree and below temperatures.

Moisture is critical to good hosta growth. An inch to 1 ½ inches per week is needed.  Averill offered a master gardener tip to ensure you know how much your sprinkler system is watering an area: use a tuna can under the irrigated area and when it is full, the area is getting an inch of water.  Averill explained what the hosta drip tip is and should it turn brown, there is a moisture problem.

Hostas are edible but unfortunately deer, slugs, and snails really love hosta.  Other than recommending electric fences and having dogs to keep away the deer, Averill did have suggestions for snails and slugs.  She takes a plastic water bottle, cuts off the drinking end and inserts it into the bottle, stapling it firm.  Snail and slug bait is put in the bottle and she places the plastic bottle under the hosta leaves.  The slugs enter the trap and die and the pest poison is not leached into the soil.

Disease common to hosta shows up as yellow spots on the leaves.  There is no remedy and she suggests digging up the plant and throwing it away.  Never compost it as the disease stays in the composted soil.  When dividing plants in early spring, she sterilizes her knife and lifting fork with a bleach solution to make sure fungus and disease are not passed along.

Averill gave the members handouts that listed hostas for beginning gardeners (August Moon, Golden Tiara, Guacamole),and  hostas best for our Georgia area ( Illicit Affairs, Pandora’s Box, Shiny Penny, Night before Christmas). Some of the most popular varieties are Sum and Substance, Saga, Great Expectations, and Patriot. Close to us are Southern Growers in Columbus and Pine Forest Gardens in Tyrone that have hosta displays or nurseries.

Club members ended the meeting by touring Marilyn’s home and admiring her art and unique sculptures.  She always has interesting artwork scattered throughout her garden that supports or juxtaposes nicely with her plants; however in January, few plants were up and so the members clearly could see the “bones” of the garden. Our warmer than usual winter did have hellebores and jonquils in full bloom. The pond with its ducks, the chickens, and bottle trees and artwork made for a colorful walk in January.

The Secret Life of Bees

October 2011

The Merry Weather Garden Club met on Thursday, October 13, 2011 at the home of Jean Biggers. Linda Latzak co hosted the meeting. Guest speaker was Jim Byce whose topic was bees and beekeeping.  Unfortunately an unexpected thunderstorm precluded the plans to meet at the Byce home where his hives are located, but Jim brought the basics of beekeeping to Jean’s living room!

Byce started keeping bees about 35 years ago when he moved to the country.  He was not successful in his first attempts but today people in the county call Byce to remove swarming bees. Byce explained how useful bees were for gardens and pollination and many members had seen the 18 wheel transports moving bees to areas where pollination was needed.

Byce began by explaining the types of bees: the queen, drones, and workers. The drones sole purpose is to mate with the queen and then they are shoved out of the hive by the worker bees.  The queen’s only job is to lay eggs. The workers bring the nectar to the hive, make the honey, and make sure the queen is maintained at a perfect temperature-92 degrees.  To do this they fan to circulate air or cuddle and group around her.

The workers travel to hundreds of blooms to collect nectar and bring it to the hive in their “honey pouch.”  Other workers chew the nectar and break down the sugar with their enzymes and produce a simple bacteria resistant sugar mixture which they put in the honeycombs, plug with wax, and keep until they need to eat it.

Queens are larger and more elongated than regular bees and may be spotted in the hive. Byce has removed older queens which are not productive and replaced them with a new queen.  The new queen comes in a small cage that is plugged with bee candy.  The workers chew through to get to the new queen and the hours this takes allows the new queen to spread her distinct pheromone on to the workers so they will accept her. The distinct pheromone of a hive is what keeps the bees knowing who is a stranger or invader.

Club members asked about killer bees which are an African strain that was crossed with a European variety in the hopes of cross breeding to make better bees.  African bees are hard workers at pollination and making honey but also aggressive.  They have migrated into Georgia now.

Byce answered questions about yellow jackets that can re-sting and chase you down whereas a honey bee stings once and the stinger comes out.  Beekeepers wear white as it is a calming color for bees. Long sleeves, gloves, head protection are also important. The cost of three pounds of bees and queen is about $75, the hive and frames, $125.  The costs get higher if you buy a honey extractor which spins the frames to release the honey and the heated knife to cut the wax plug from the combs.

Byce showed the frames of a hive and the brood chamber.  He recommends a 2:1 ratio of sugar water to help a new hive build and boost production.  He demonstrated using a smoker to fool the bees into thinking there is a fire and they go into the hive to protect it. Byce reads extensively about bees and explained well how bees think and operate.  The “secret life” of bees made for a fascinating program.

Autumn Wreath-making

The Merry Weather Garden Club met on Thursday, September 22, 2011 at the home of Helen Claussen in Harris City.  Toots Hobson co hosted. Claussen lives in Meriwether’s first gated community-one that she developed-and it was interesting seeing the new extension to our county airport on the drive in to her home.

Members were met with delicious refreshments made by Claussen and many brought back by Hobson from Hawaii featuring macadamia nuts or coffee flavors.  Claussen entertained the group with readings from popular emails, jokes, and stories before the business meeting.

Linda Wilburn gave an update on Greenville streetscapes noting that the work is coming to a completion. The wrong size railing was ordered and delivered, but that error was caught by Sally Estes and corrected. The $300,000 Phase II portion has been approved that will renovate the west side of the downtown area. Matching money from the Callaway Foundation, the city and the county should allow for the project to be done. $50,000 was raised privately for Phase I, and $70,000 will be needed for Phase II. Wilburn expressed her thanks to Sam Welborn of the DOT who has been most helpful with extra funding for Phase I.

Phase II will reuse many of the granite slabs currently on the sidewalks as well as add pavers. The next step will also redo the traffic signs with the hope there will be fewer of them. Currently one downtown island has eight directional and traffic signs on it.

Toots Hobson presented the program on wreaths noting that their use goes back to the Greeks who “wreathed the vines” and used them as crowns. She showed the club Scandinavian wheat straw woven into wreaths that were displayed hanging horizontally instead of on the usual vertical plane.  African grasses from Tanzania are commonly woven into wreaths as are German E aster wreaths of twisted grass.

Months earlier, Hobson had cut grapevines and twisted and shaped them into wreaths for the club members to use.  She purchased colorful and whimsical fall items for the ladies to decorate their wreaths noting, as Diane Sawyer also found, that she could find no American made decorations at the craft stores. Scarecrows, bright orange leaves, feathery plumes, sunflowers, ivy, and beautiful ribbons all made for a fun afternoon of decorating wreaths which each member took home.

The next meeting of the garden club will be October 13^th at which Jim Byce will entertain the club with the secret life of bees and the fun of beekeeping.  Jean Biggers and Linda Latzak will host the meeting.

Serenbe Farms

August 2011

The Merry Weather Garden Club met on Friday 19^th of August and toured Serenbe Farms in Palmetto. The tour and lunch was arranged by garden club hosts Sallie Mabon and Mary Anne Harman.

The club was met by Ryan Graycheck a UGA landscape architect graduate who was serving one year apprenticeship at the organic farm. Maya Velasco, a second apprentice, helped with portions of the tour.

Graycheck explained the mission of Serenbe Farms: to grow organically as much healthy produce as possible on five acres; to educate the community about healthy farming practices; to build community through food. The farm is fulfilling its goals as the small five acres produces a 60,000 pound harvest yearly which it sells to the Serenbe community’s three restaurants, and supplies their 115 subscription families with food, plus supplies the weekly market sales made at both Serenbe on Saturdays and at Atlanta markets. The subscription cost to receive thirty weeks of fresh produce is $25 per family.

Oak logs for the Shitake Mushrooms

Education through garden club tours and apprenticeships are proving successful too especially for apprentices who move on to top jobs because of their experience in Palmetto. Serenbe’s last objective of building community recognizes that a generation of people have grown up eating out or consuming fast food, and its goal is for families and communities to harvest, cook and sit down together to enjoy healthy home grown meals.

Four people work the five acres that were once a cotton farm.  Lots of organic matter is added to yearly to the soil to build it up. Composting, crop rotation, and cover crops are the three C’s practiced.  Buck wheat is the most popular cover crop because it adds phosphorus to the soil, and ryes and legumes add nitrogen. A ten year vegetable rotation plan is used. Drip and light spray irrigation is used on our hot summer days with 3-4 hours of water on the crops.

The fall crop from seeds germinated nine weeks earlier in the greenhouse had been planted with summer crops in full harvest.  The crew was dreading picking the itchy okra. Five varieties of okra were planted such as Red Burgundy, Hill Country Red, and Clemson Spineless. A number of varieties of every vegetable are planted to ensure full production. Fifty four varieties of peppers are planted and they are in beds marked sweet to hot.

Edamame (soybeans) almost ready to harvest.

The garden club first viewed the beds of greens: lettuces, mustard, bok choy, arugula, and cilantro that were under a shade cover. Blueberries, raspberries, watermelons and muskmelons were being cleared of pests by free ranging chickens that are part of Serenbe’s pest control plan. Heirloom varieties, especially tomatoes, have an increased number of pests.  The farm uses Neptune’s Harvest and Maxi Crop which are certified organic products in its irrigation system.

An eight foot electric fence protects the wooded side of the farm from deer. Cover cloth is used over young squash, cucumber, and zucchini plants until blooms appear and the cover is removed for pollination.

After touring the garden, the club enjoyed slices of cold watermelon-a new yellow meat variety grown on the farm.  Members watched one apprentice as she readied greens for market.  Club members were allowed to pick flowers (celosia, amaranth, and zinnias) as well as pot seeds (patty pan, zucchini, and cantaloupe). The garden club day ended with a stop at Frank’s Family Restaurant where everyone enjoyed a delicious lunch.