Every year there is something special about The Garden Show. Sometimes we find a fantastic product like the best garden apron in the world.
This is the place to find new ideas for quality tools. This year my friend Noni found a new hoe that she wants to use to dig holes for dahlias. Good garden tools are so important. This particular hoe was manufactured by a company that travels the world looking for ideas for tools in places like Haiti, Ghana and The Congo.
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Sometimes at the garden show we find inspiration for something we can do on a reasonable scale at home. I fell in love with the display garden featuring orchids. I got home to find my orchid blooming. I moved an African violet under the orchid and voila I had a mini garden show on my windowsill.
I love the garden sculptures I find. My best idea for my garden came from a photo of the prayer flags at Dan Hinkley’s garden at Windcliff. They are the scale I need in my garden. When the strongest feature in your garden is a plethora of hundred and fifty foot Douglas Firs, you need big artistic accents. However I couldn’t resist taking a picture of these enthusiastic garden gnomes. Go Seahawks!
This year my favorite part of the show was the seminars. Mary Morris gave a wonderful lecture and slide show on the gardens of Cornwall. This is a part of England I haven’t visited and would dearly love to. However, I don’t think I am going to hike a six-hundred thirty mile trail along the Cornish coast as Mary has done.
Mariane Binitti was full of useful information such as soaking delphinium seeds on paper towels for thirty-six hours before planting or just buy delphiniums growing in gallon pots. I bought delphinium seed this year so was happy for the tip about soaking the seed.
Greg Butler gave us a new term, hortisexual, as in I’m a hortisexual. I think this refers to what we do as we propagate new plants. I don’t do much propagating with the exception of my kale, but mostly I just let the kale do it’s thing and I plant the resultant seedlings where I want them. I may have varieties of kale that nobody else grows but they are happy in my garden.
Cisco Morris had some excellent information about wasps or hornets. Those buggers that live in the ground or inside the walls of your house and are so savage—kill them. They are not only aggressive, they will eat the wood on the side of your house and are happy to get into the insulation. On the other hand, the paper wasps that build the wonderful papery nests are beneficial. They eat aphids and other soft bodied plant predators. They don’t get aggressive unless you disturb their nests. Cisco recommended leaving nests alone if they are outside of an area where people will walk into them. Of course nests in public areas must be killed because the venom is so toxic. He also recommended wearing goggles when working around a paper wasp nest because the little buggers can shoot their venom. Isn’t the information we learn at the garden show fascinating?
I got lots of wonderful ideas like using ladders propped up together as trellises and using ethanol for a flame in a fire pit when only a decorative fire is needed. We covered the principles of good design and talked about themes in gardens. I fell in love with a grouping of lavender with artichokes. Oh And! For your outdoor chair cushions be certain to use an outdoor fabric with an outdoor-specific foam pad. If your outdoor cushions get rained on they will dry in an hour if you’ve used the right materials. Otherwise it may take days for them to dry.
Mariane Binitti was full of useful information such as soaking delphinium seeds on paper towels for thirty-six hours before planting or just buy delphiniums growing in gallon pots. I bought delphinium seed this year so was happy for the tip about soaking the seed.
Greg Butler gave us a new term, hortisexual, as in I’m a hortisexual. I think this refers to what we do as we propagate new plants. I don’t do much propagating with the exception of my kale, but mostly I just let the kale do it’s thing and I plant the resultant seedlings where I want them. I may have varieties of kale that nobody else grows but they are happy in my garden.
Cisco Morris had some excellent information about wasps or hornets. Those buggers that live in the ground or inside the walls of your house and are so savage—kill them. They are not only aggressive, they will eat the wood on the side of your house and are happy to get into the insulation. On the other hand, the paper wasps that build the wonderful papery nests are beneficial. They eat aphids and other soft bodied plant predators. They don’t get aggressive unless you disturb their nests. Cisco recommended leaving nests alone if they are outside of an area where people will walk into them. Of course nests in public areas must be killed because the venom is so toxic. He also recommended wearing goggles when working around a paper wasp nest because the little buggers can shoot their venom. Isn’t the information we learn at the garden show fascinating?
I got lots of wonderful ideas like using ladders propped up together as trellises and using ethanol for a flame in a fire pit when only a decorative fire is needed. We covered the principles of good design and talked about themes in gardens. I fell in love with a grouping of lavender with artichokes. Oh And! For your outdoor chair cushions be certain to use an outdoor fabric with an outdoor-specific foam pad. If your outdoor cushions get rained on they will dry in an hour if you’ve used the right materials. Otherwise it may take days for them to dry.
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