Winterizing Your Garden

Monday, November 9, 2015 at 7:00 PM at Mercer Methodist Church

"Winterizing Your Garden."  Dennis James will speak on getting beds ready for winter.  

He'll also touch on care of your garden tools.

Hostesses:  Dorothy and Karen  Maxwell, Leslie Finkbeiner

Raffle donations wanted!

Take Note:  There will not be a Garden Club meeting in January.

Thank you to everyone that worked to clean up our beds for winter and plant tulips for next spring.

Mercer Garden Club September Meeting is Monday, September 14. 2015

Our September 14 meeting will be at The Birdwatchers Store, 630 New Castle Road. (Route 108) Slippery Rock.  It is 2.5 miles from I-79, Exit 105.  We will meet at the church at 5:00 PM to carpool.  This store is an official Audubon and National Wildlife-certified bird and animal sanctuary.  We will be able to watch the birds in the sanctuary.  There is also a very nice gift shop. 

My Pink Lily's are blooming!

Last fall I gave away pink lily bulbs to members of Mercer Garden Club.  These Lilys come up in the spring with green long leaves then they disappear and in August a flower spike emerged and bloomers. Spectacular!  Many of my bulbs did not bloom, I suspect bulbs were eaten by moles, however I had 6 blooms.  Beautiful and very fragrant.  Post your pictures or add comments if you had your Lily's bloom.

Joe in his Lily Garden

Mercer Garden Club members in the garden 

Hey! Look here!

Truly amazing collection of the rare and unusual Lilys and other flowers and native plants.

Mercer Garden Club July Meeting and Field Trip

This photo is of our leader Connie at last months meeting at Altmans Hosta Garden. 

Altmans Gardens are impossible to capture the beauty and scale of these gardens.  The many shades of green in the shade are breathtaking and relaxing to view.

Our July 13 meeting will be at Joe Nemmer's gardens on North Perry Highway.  We will meet at the church at 6:00pm to carpool. We visited Joe's garden on June14, 2010.  Joe maintains "grow gardens not show gardens".  He is a breeder of rare and unusual Lilys and is active in  the North American Lily Society,  To learn more about NALS check the web page http://www.lilies.org.  Several of our members volunteered to help Joe in 2010 at The International Lily Show and Conference held in Mars PA.  It was a wonderful experience. You can go to Mercer Garden Club Blog www.mercergardenclub.blogspot.com, archives June 2010 and see pictures of his garden.  I am sure we will see changes. His water features were just completed before our last visit. The trees and other plants will have settled in and grown a lot in 5 years.   Joe also presented us with a wonderful program on growing  Lilys in 2009 and many of us planted unusual Lily bulbs from Joe.  

Lily from my garden last summer.  Several of my Lilys were damaged by frost so no bloom on this one this year. I plant a dozen new bulbs and am anxious to see which ones will bloom this year. 

Spring Garden Tours

Welcome Spring!  May is our busiest month of our Garden Club year.  The uptown beds need to be cleaned up and I hope everyone will lend a hand.  The beds need to be cleaned and planted by May 20when we do the mulch.  Rain date for the mulch is May 21.  Our Conservancy planting is May 19 around noon.    We will have more discussion at our May 11 meeting.  Here's an amusing definition I found in a garden dictionary:  "Green Thumb:  Common condition suffered by gardeners in which the skin of the thumb develops a greenish hue as the result of handling large amounts of currency at nurseries."  Connie

 

May 11 Program

We will travel to Mast's Greenhouse off Route 318.  There will be a variety of hanging baskets, garden flowers and vegetables.  Meet at Mercer Methodist Church by 5:45 PM to carpool.

 

June 8 Program

We will tour the many gardens of Joan Altman in New Wilmington.  Joan is the hosta lady and also has many garden rooms/areas and gazebos.  We will leave Mercer Methodist Church at 6:00 PM to carpool to New Wilmington.

 

March and April 2015 programs Mercer Garden Club:

March 9 Program

Master Gardener Laura Hlusko will present our program on "Attracting Wildlife To Your Garden:  Toads, Mason Bees, Insects and Birds."  Laura will focus on why we should want wildlife in our gardens, what benefits these wildlife provide us as gardeners and methods to attract.

Hostesses:  March hostesses:  Vera Filer, Betty Graham and Sheila Craig

April Program

Our April 13 program will be presented by Gary Micsky of the Mercer County Extension Office.  His topic will be "American Chestnut Tree Restoration."  A project is underway in Mercer County to promote planting and growth of chestnut trees.

Hostesses: Maria Farrell and Connie Jewell