2011 EMG Educ. Conference

Just finished up with the annual Extension Master Gardener's conference here in Manhattan the last couple of days, and a rousing time of camaraderie was had by all! 

The conference here was kicked off by a great keynote speech by David Salman, the President and Chief Horticulturist of High Country Gardens.  David's opener was an interesting discussion of the principles of xeriscape gardening, with many illustrations of plants that will grow in Manhattan. It was really great to hear from a gardener who sees less rainfall than we do here in Manhattan, and one so dedicated to preserving our water resources and helping us design beautiful landscaping.  David's nursery has a blog as well, appropriately titled The Xeric Gardener.

I went to several talks, but my personal "education time" this year was cut short because I gave two talks myself.  I did one presentation about the process of writing a book and blog, in concert with Local Extension Agent Gregg Eyestone, who writes a weekly newspaper column and contributes to Riley County Extension's blog.  I did another talk on growing Hardy Roses in Kansas, and then repeated it the next hour in a second slot since it had been a couple of years since a rose topic had been on the agenda.  Had a great time and some good give and take in all those sessions, and I also enjoyed talking with other Kansas blogging friends such as GaiaGardener.

I've got enough canned talks now on roses and other topics that I'm thinking of sacrificing one of the separate pages of this blog to put up the PDF's of those talks for others to view. What do you think? Good idea or not interesting?

As far as the talks I attended for personal gain, I learned why I haven't been doing well with raspberries (DON'T GROW HERITAGE IN KANSAS), I learned about the basics of tissue culturing from a retired engineer whose home propagation setup is good enough to be a Homeland Security nightmare, and I learned a bit more about the theory of color and design in the landscape.

Along those lines, for those readers who are not Extension Master Gardener's, consider this a plug for joining and contributing to your local groups, wherever they may be across the nation.  Yes, you have to put in a little community service along the way, but that time is well paid back by the network of local gardeners you engage.  Where else do you get the opportunity to spend two days playing hookey from our day jobs and pretend you have entered the wonderful world of full-time gardening for pleasure?   

Garden Tour Requests

To all the trembling gardeners out there;

Yes, this is the time of year when Extension Master Gardener's are busily planning out next year's Garden Tour in your local town.  Take it from me that this is no reason to rush out and spread trash around the vegetable garden nor to maim the Weigela in hopes that your garden is overlooked for consideration.  In truth your garden was likely scouted out during the previous summer in anticipation of the coming year by some cunning Master Gardener and your name was placed on a list of possibles and a secret file generated about your garden.  Remember when you found the dew marred by footprints moving through the garden one early summer morning, but yet nothing seemed to be amiss save the roses that were mysteriously deadheaded?  Remember that dark summer night when you could have sworn you saw lights floating about your daylilies for a few seconds, and the thyme walkway looked trampled, but all you found was that the tomatoes had been staked up a bit higher? Those weren't the actions of a new SWAT team at Homeland Security, they were the next most dangerous group, a stealthy bunch of Master Gardener's with a mission and a complete inborn inability to leave the plants alone.

When the fiends finally reveal themselves with a request to display your lovely garden on the tour, take a deep breath and just say yes.  Despite what you've read about the horrors of hundreds of people closely scrutinizing your azaleas and trampling the clematis, the gardening public that will visit your garden on G-Day (shorthand for the actual tour date) will never notice the henbit springing up among the roses because their eyes will be only on either the smallest details of that double peach-colored miniature rose or on the larger picture of your garden composition.  Mirabel Osler, in A Breath from Elsewhere, describes these visitors to her garden as either Crouchers or Gapers, respectively. The Croucher’s move bent over at the waist, meticulously naming, admiring, and coveting individual plants, while the Gapers saunter around a garden in a state of enlightened bliss but miss the details of the latest daylily cultivar you just spent $100 for.  Despite what you've heard, the public won't mutter that your lilacs are ruined with mildew, or comment on the unholy color of the white marigolds (at least within your hearing range).  I've been a victim...ahem...host site for my local garden tour and I found the people that came through are truly delightful and only inquisitive and complimentary, not overly critical.  Sometimes, you'll even gather enough compliments to deceive you into believing you might actually be a real gardener.

It won't be any more work than normal, either, to get ready for the Tour.  You won't do anything crazy like shoveling off three feet of snow over the garden in January so you can begin Spring cleanup early, and of course you won't begin to build the Taj Mahal of gazebos or put in that 3 acre water feature just to impress visitors.  And those rumors about evening up the grass ends with hand-trimmers at midnight the night before G-day are just myths circulated by scaremongers. Trust me, you'll barely feel the urge to spread a little extra mulch this year.

So, for the benefit of Master Gardener's everywhere, just say "Yes."   Please.

Sometimes a Diversion...

...is just what a gardener needs.

As the active gardening year is winding down (I say "active" gardening year because the fantasy gardening season pf winter is getting ready to begin in Kansas), I had the wonderful opportunity today to see a really exceptional gardening presentation by Kelly D. Norris, of Rainbow Iris Farms. The occasion was the annual Extension Master Gardener continuing education meeting here in Manhattan and Mr. Norris gave the keynote address, titled "Zoneworthy."

Kelly is a young guy, full of vigor and excitement and knowledge, but best of all, a great presenter with lots of beautiful pictures and sarcastic humor thrown in to spice up the lessons.  If fact, he had everything I love to see in a speaker, except maybe a sense of deep cynicism, but since he's young and not a jaded, tenured professor, I guess I can forgive that. 

Being somewhat local to me here in Kansas, from western Iowa, Kelly certainly understood what we go through to garden here in Kansas.  I've taken several lessons and witty comments to heart from his lecture, including:

"Nobody plants something thinking, gee, I wonder what this will look like covered in ice?"  I've never heard a truer statement about Flint Hills gardening, and Kelly accompanied this with a great picture of an ice-covered plant in his own garden.  As shown by the picture of  the ice-covered 'Heritage' English rose on the right, and of my front garden pictured below in December, 2007, I'm right there with him.  It never occurred to me to picture rose hips on 'Heritage' with a half inch of ice on them when I purchased it.

"There are five gardening seasons in the Midwest; spring, summer, fall, winter, and hell.  No, actually there are six; spring, summer, hell, fall, winter, and hell."  The first season of "hell" was defined as being the last week of July and first week of August, and the second the last two weeks of January.  Absolutely an accurate description of my climate, except I'd add that spring and fall are only two weeks long each. As an example, we just went from the 95 range to the 67 high of today in less than two weeks.  Tonight it's supposed to get down to 35 and we've got a chance of frost.

"Grow know-maintenance versus no-maintenance plants."  Kelly's point here was that there is no such thing as a "no maintenance" plant, so we should select plants knowing what their maintenance requirements are and if we can fulfill them in our gardens.

"Stop looking to see if a plant merely survived through a year and stop celebrating when it does."  His point being that we should select plants that not merely survive in our gardens but we should seek out those that THRIVE there.  Zonal denial is not a healthy state of mind for a gardener.

"Take pictures of the same spots in your garden over and over."  Great advice for a guy who likes to take garden photographs anyway.  What better way to see the seasonal progression of our gardens.  I'll start today.

There were lots of others, but that should give you a sampling of the wisdom of a good gardener and a great presentation.  If your garden group needs a speaker, take it from this old Professor who lectures for a living and get Kelly to come down your way.  I'm betting I just saw the guy who will be the next Paul James or P. Allen Smith of gardening circles.