Impressions of the Master Gardener Program

I began my Master Gardener studies this spring as part of the Heart of Virginia Master Gardener Program.  Part of being a Master Gardener is volunteering time and talents back to the community, and so I have already begun doing that by writing for the newsletter.  Cynthia, the newsletter chairperson, gave me permission to reprint my articles and I would like to share them with you here.

The following appeared in the February Heart of Virginia Master Gardener Newsletter.  Enjoy!

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The Heart of Virginia Master Gardeners – First Impressions 

by Jeanne Grunert

I was not quite sure what to expect when I approached the brightly lit Extension office building on that first Wednesday in January for my first Master Gardener class.  I joined the Master Gardener program not so much to learn how to garden as to expand my knowledge of south central Virginia gardening. I felt like I knew how to garden, or at least how not to kill my plants. However, I knew there were gap in my education, and felt that this rigorous program could fill those gaps while providing me with new opportunities to set down deep roots in the community through volunteerism.

On our first night, I met my classmates and mentor, Liz.  My 16 classmates are a diverse group of individuals, drawn together by a deep love of gardening and a strong desire to nurture a similar love in the community. They are teachers and landscapers, college professors and administrators, but most all, they are gardeners in mind, heart and spirit.

At our first class, Patsy and Tina distributed our textbooks, three-ring binders so thick and heavy I wondered if we could also use them to press leaf samples.  Our first assignment was to read the chapter on Botany before the following week's class. Snippets and whispers of high school Biology class returned as I dutifully read the chapter, vague memories of dissecting azalea flowers and pinning them to cardboard with hand-lettered signs reading stamen, pistil, ovary.

What did I get myself into? I thought, and fretted about midterm exams and final projects as if I was indeed back in the 10th grade.

Latin names, Linnaeus classification systems, plant identification…my head swam as I returned for the second class.  Greeting us was Professor Erika Gonzalez from Longwood University, curator of their extensive botany collection, and my fears of looking stupid melted away under her bubbly presentation and enthusiasm.  Peering through a hand lens at the mysterious heart of a carnation, I felt awe stirring deep within. I wanted to learn more.

Fears melting aside, I warmed up enough in our second class to pluck up a soil sample and squeeze it between my fingers as instructor David Smith, the Cumberland County Extension Agent, had shown us how to do.  Ribbons of soil pressed from between my probing fingertips, bringing his lecture to life through touch. Clay, sand, loam.  These terms now meant something. They meant grit, slickness, stickiness, color, texture, taste and scent, fertility and garden potential.

I learned to garden at my father's knee, and grew up in a family for which showing chrysanthemums in competitions, turning an unused room in the house into an orchidarium and adding a greenhouse onto the garage were normal events of my childhood.  Nevertheless, the intricacies of soil structure, the magic of plant reproduction, the complex chemistry behind the smile of a pansy are a new world for me.

Becoming a Master Gardener requires dedication, curiosity, and willingness. Fortunately, the warmth and friendliness of the Heart of Virginia Master Gardeners, County Extension Agents and guest lecturers make it all seem like a fun garden club meeting instead of the rich learning experience it truly is. You have so much fun you forget you're learning chemistry, botany, soil science and more.

As we approach the next series of classes, I look forward to learning more about insects, plant pathology and the plants themselves. As long as there is no "hands on" component to the entomology lecture, count me in!

Spring Chores: Cleaning the Bird Houses

This unseasonably warm winter means that many of the migrating birds didn't migrate - or if they did, they sped back here in a hurry. We enjoyed watching huge flocks of robins whirl about the farmer's field across the street each evening as we walked Shadow along the road.  I've never seen so many robins in one flock. Back on Long Island, you'd see robins in the spring, hopping sedately along a verdant suburban lawn pecking at worms. They were a sign of spring like forsythia blooming among the foundation plantings, tulips, crocus and daffodils.  Here in the countryside, it's astonishing to see hundreds and hundreds of robins in one gigantic flock.  They literally blot out bits of sky as they wing their way to a roosting spot in the evening.  We saw them a lot in January and early February, and many would land in a big oak tree along the neighbor's pasture.  Now I'm starting to see just a few in the yard, but still many more than I would see in one location on Long Island.

We've noticed that the bluebirds are back, and we love those beautiful, friendly little birds.  We have one cedar bluebird house hanging on the fence post by the vegetable garden, and it's had a tenant ever since we first nailed it up.  John made a whole bunch of bluebird houses last year and my friend Joan gave me one last year for my birthday.  The homemade bluebird houses hanging on a pine tree and facing south had a tenant; the other two, which face east-southeast, were never occupied.

I can hear the liquid trill of their beautiful songs in the morning, which tells me they are here and spring isn't far away.  On Sunday, we decided to clean out the bird houses. John took the cordless drill and we unscrewed the side flaps.  We removed the old nests and used a cloth to dust out the inside of the houses.

One thing you can often spot inside bird houses when you clean them is evidence of mice - but thankfully, no mice found our little birdhouses. Spiders and wasps, on the other hand, were plentiful (shudder.) I'm just glad we were cleaning the birdhouses in February and we could easily remove the wasp nest from one.  The spiders, on the other hand, had already hatched out from their silken cocoon.  There were tiny spiderlings sluggishly moving about inside the house. Trust me, I made John clean out THAT one!

If you haven't done so, do clean out the birdhouses you can reach.  We also painted the bird bath so that it is ready to go when April tell us the frost is a thing of the past!

Today's photo is courtesy of Morguefile, a photo sharing website.

Light for Indoor Seed Starting

Tomato "Mortgage Lifter" - robust seedlings

I thought you might enjoy my latest article for MainLine Gardening on light conditions needed for seed starting.  I offer some suggestions for easy seed starting using natural sunlight as well as ideas for using florescent lighting.

After my last post on my seed starting epic fail - which hasn't turned out all that bad, just slower germination than usual - Liz, my mentor in the Master Gardener trainee program, gave me a good handout from Virginia Cooperative Extension on seed starting.  Here is a link to the PDF Seed for the Garden which covers all your seed starting basics.  Enjoy!

My seedlings are actually doing a little better. No more peppers have germinated, but there were more cherry tomato seeds germinating today, and now the Early Girl tomatoes are showing up for the party.   The Mortgage Lifter giant beefsteak tomatoes are already burly seedlings. Even the plants on these guys are big!

A few folks at my Master Gardener class commented on how early I'd started my seedlings, but with our raised beds and the dark, compost-rich soil we have, I can typically plant my vegetables a few weeks earlier than others.  The dark soil and the raised beds tend to create a micro climate a few degrees warmer than the ground-level soil.

Seed Starting Problems

One is the loneliest number when it comes to seeds germinating!

Tomatoes grown for the Heart of Virginia Master Gardener sale!

Seed starting problems aren't anything new, but this year - massive fail! I hate it when I don't follow my own advice.  You see, given that I wrote a piece about germination tests for open seed packets, you'd think I'd be smart enough to follow my own advice and run a few germination tests on the open vegetable seed packets stored from last year.  Nope. I just planted them, trusting to my usual good luck, and waited. And waited. And waited.

• Three cells out of the four cells planted with tomato "Mortgage Lifter", which I planted in anticipation of donating to the Heart of Virginia Master Gardener's plant sale this may, came up - which is great. 
• Only 1 pepper out of the remaining "Rainbow" bell peppers came up.  What a lonely little seedling!
• One cherry tomato came up.
• None of the eggplant "Black Beauty" seeds came up.

Sigh. Epic fail. Luckily, I had replenished my seeds while shopping this past weekend and had some fresh seed packets to use.  I don't have any more of my favorite rainbow shades of bell peppers, but I planted "California Wonder" bell peppers again and they usually do great in my garden.  I only planted the Sweet 100 cherry tomatoes and Early Girl tomatoes last weekend, so they still have time to germinate.

You really can't do anything about things like this. Once seed packages are opened, you have a limited amount of time to use them.  They lose their vitality over time, some more so than others. While it's true that seeds hidden under the Russian permafrost for 30,000 years can survive, and scientists have been able to germinate cotton, grain and other plant seeds stored in the pharaohs' tombs of ancient Egypt, it seems as if a $1 package of pepper seeds doesn't last quite as long! 

Spring Flower Pictures

In honor of the first snowstorm of the year....a video montage of spring flowers.  Of course, they're NOT blooming now.  These are some of my favorite images from springs past.  Enjoy and think SPRING.

Advanced Vegetable Gardening Workshop in Prince Edward County

The Cooperative Extension office is offering a free advanced vegetable gardening workshop at the Prince Edward County Extension Office.  It's located right near the water tower in Farmville, across the street from Lowe's.  It's a free event and a great way for you to pick up additional information to grow a terrific vegetable garden! 

The event is March 8, 2012, from 6:30 p.m to 8:00 p.m., and I'm going to share the flyer below. 

Blue Orchids

I beg your indulgence for yesterday's purely commercial post. I was teaching myself how to make pages on my blog, and one page is devoted to my books.  Thinking I was saving the post as a page, I clicked "save" and oops - blog post!  Well, at least some of you will now know about my gardening book.

Yesterday after running several errands and appointments, my husband and I went to Lowe's to pick up my Valentine's Day present. But unfortunately, they were sold out! I'd seen a blue orchid there the week before that just captured my imagination. I'm not much of an orchid person. I have one phaelenopsis that I've written about and it's sort of like a pet or a mascot in the plant room. I'm more impressed by its stamina and ability to thrive under my ignorant care than anything else about the plant.  So it took me by surprise when this blue orchid captivated me.

Well, we went to Lowe's where I had seen the display, but unfortunately they were all sold out.  It's probably for the best. As I researched blue orchids today, I found out that some are dyed similarly to the way carnations are dyed. One way to tell is by looking carefully at the flowers. Tips and buds may be white tinged, and any new blossoms will be white.  While there are indeed some authentic blue orchids, the vibrant, almost neon blue colors I saw on the plants at Lowe's may have been the dyed fakes.  Who's to say? Sniff sniff...I didn't get a chance to find out!

Here's a great article I found detailing how to tell fake from real blue orchids.

More Spring Flowers Facing a Chilly Weekend

We noticed today that the early spring crocus, the yellow crocus, joined the daffodils in their out of season blooming.  Patches out in the fruit tree orchard were blooming today.  We're in for a chill this weekend, with temperatures dipping back into the seasonal mid 20s over the weekend.  I wish I could reason with my plants and explain to them that they're up to early.  I hate the fact that they're putting all this effort into blooming when the winter weather is just going to nip the beautiful flowers. But plants cannot be reasoned with. They just are.  And nature, as I am fond of quoting, is resilient.

Composting Basics

Isn't it lovely? My compost pile

Oh, the glamor, the beauty, the awesomeness of a good compost pile. Composting basics are easy to learn. Most people can add a compost pile in the yard or garden.  Whether you purchase a compost tumbler, compost maker or another device or make on yourself, nothing beats nice, rich compost added to the garden soil.

Why is compost so great? First, it reduces the waste leaving your home in the garbage pail. Garbage added to a landfill doesn't do much good, and those rich scraps of vegetable peels, coffee grinds and eggshells are lost in the massive amounts of trash bulldozed under the landfill.

Secondly, and more importantly, compost adds nutrients, improves soil structure, and adds beneficial microbes back into the soil. You see, nature never intended us to dump pounds of chemicals onto the soil. Nature created an intricate cycle of life that ensures that nothing goes to waste. Plants that die decay back into the soil.  Compost is mankind's way of organizing and speeding up the process.

Situate your compost pile with a few considerations in mind. It must be close enough to the house so that on cold, rainy, or snowy days, you won't hesitate to step outside and dump the compost bucket. Keep a compost pail, bucket or bowl in the kitchen. If it sits on the counter top, keep a cover on it unless you like breeding fruit flies.  My compost bin is a unique contraption that fits next to the garbage pail.  I have a garbage pail in a sliding drawer that pulls out from under the kitchen counter.  There was a shallow plastic bin, probably for recycling, behind it. I had it converted into a compost pail. A friend cut a plastic rim for the pail. The pail is simply a plastic bathroom garbage pail from Wal-Mart. It's lightweight and washes up easily, plus it holds a lot, making for fewer trips to the compost pile.

Your second consideration is the potential for odors bothering your neighbors.  Here in Virginia, that is not a problem for me because I'm on 17 acres, but on Long Island my neighbor received complaints when his compost had a strong ammonia odor.  Odor means something is wrong with the compost pile. It could be too "hot" with too many fresh grass clippings, or the wrong materials were added.  He needed to turn and lime the pile to correct the odor problem.  Living so close together in our suburban neighborhood, however, made the odor worse for the neighbors who didn't garden and didn't understand compost piles. They called the town complaining he kept his garbage behind the house because they saw him throwing eggshells there.

Wherever you place your compost pile, you'll need two areas. One area is for 'fresh' materials added to the pile. Once these begin to decompose into compost, the fresh compost should be moved to the second area. Then you will always have fresh compost to use in the garden.

I only use compost outdoors, never bring it inside, as I'm terrified of what might hatch out of it.  All sorts of insects love compost and when you turn the pile, look for nice, fat worms (a sign of a great compost pile) and other insects.  These insects do eat the vegetative peelings and their droppings such as worm casings add to the excellence of the compost pile.

What can you add to a compost pile? Anything plant-based and some limited additional kitchen scraps:

• Grass clippings
• Leaves from autumn raking
• Flowers from the florist that die
• Vegetable peels such as potato, carrot other peels
• Apple cores
• Fruit peels
• Stems from vegetables
• Eggshells (rinse them first)
• Coffee grounds and filters
• Tea bags
• Shredded newspaper
• Cow, goat, chicken or horse manure

Don't add animal droppings from house pets such as cats or dogs. These attract vermin and may contain bacteria that you don't want to add into the pile.  Never add animal bones, fat or leftover meat.  You'll only create a smell and attract every wild animal.

Most books suggest starting your compost pile with a layer of corn husks, straw or hay; then layering manure, garden products, grass clippings, leaves etc on top like a lasagna.  The picture here is my pile. It's ugly. It's a pile of garbage. It works just fine.  I have to turn it every once in while, making sure that soil covers the peelings. The citrus peels take a long, long time to break down, so I bury them well.

My compost pile sits at the edge of the woods and has frequent visitors. The brown stuff you see on it are pine needles; not ideal, but the pines will drop them.  I used cinder blocks leftover from the house construction to build the walls of the two compartments.  I put out the compost in the evening while I cook dinner, and most of the grapefruit rinds still have pulp in them. The next morning they are absolutely picked clean. Banana peels have a habit of disappearing, as do pineapple cores. I suspect I have some very happy opossums in my woods!

What tips do you want to share with readers on composting?

House Plant Care

I spent time on Sunday fussing with my house plants. Poor babies have been neglected other than the weekly watering. My plant room faces north east, with most of the light bright, diffuse morning light.  Luckily I seem to be able to grow almost any house plant I want to in that room, and I even over winter my geraniums from the front porch window boxes in the plant room and in a spare bedroom facing the same light exposure.

This phaelenopsis orchid is still blooming. It's the one I rescued from Lowe's in late 2009.  It was on sale for a few dollars and had a big hole in the leaf. Well, the hole is still there, and it's still blooming. I've never grown an orchid before and this one is extraordinary. When the flowering branch is finished, the petals drop off like tiny moths, and a new flowering branch quickly forms. It's just stunning and I want to add more orchids to my collection.

The African violets, however, are taking over the house. Most are the solid purple colored ones.  The one fancy variety I received from my sister is still growing and it looked severely pot-bound, so I decided to repot it. Much to my surprise, it wasn't just pot-bound; there were four plants now instead of one!  I planted each one in a separate pot and am growing them under lights in the basement for the May Master Gardener plant sale, along with several purple ones I want to re-home.

I cleaned up some dead leaves, gave a few plants a good rinse to rinse out any salts that had accumulated in the pots, and general tidied them all up, ending by giving each one a shot of fertilizer.  One of our next household projects will be to create custom-build, tile topped plant bookcases under the windows.  My plant shelves consist of snack tables with a board over them.  It's ugly but efficient.  My very handy husband has since sketched out a custom build shelving system that will go around two walls of the room. Tile will fit on the top and keep moisture off the wood.  Underneath, room for more books.  On top, room for more plants.

Does he know me, or what?

Blooming Out of Season

There are so many garden plants blooming and budding out of season right now that I thought I would capture this in photographs. The steady warmth and spring-like days in January fooled many of the early spring plants to bloom as early as mid January, and now we have others starting to bud and bloom before their time. I want to tell them, "Hey! No peeking!"  Below are pictures I took today, February 3, 2012, around the garden.  Most of these plants are blooming or budding approximately two months earlier than they should.  

The question I used to get when I worked the phones at the garden center many, many years ago when such a winter occurred was, "What can I do to save my plant?"  Because if a hard frost or snows comes before the true spring dates, we'll certainly lose the flowers, and potential fruit on many of the trees, for instance. 

The answer is, "Nothing."  Nature has gone through this type of winter once before, if not thousands of times before in the history of the plant kingdom.  The plants will survive.  It's going to be an interesting spring, however.

Lilac bud

Daffodils. They're in a micro climate near a clothes dryer vent, but still don't usually bloom until April.

Candytuft, typically blooms in late April - May in my garden

Phlox...almost always blooms in mid April

Fruit Tree Pruning Workshop in Prince Edward County, Virginia

The Heart of Virginia Master Gardeners group is hosting a free fruit tree pruning workshop in Farmville, Virginia (Prince Edward County.)  It's co-presented with the Town of Farmville.  The event will be held on Saturday, February 18, 2012 at 1 p.m. at the town fruit orchard at the YMCA, 580 Commerce Drive, Farmville (near the Lowe's.)  Dress for the weather and bring your own pruning shears for some hands-on learning.  The program is free and open to the public.  And yes, if all works out, I'll be there with the Master Gardeners.

Growing fruit in the home orchard is a great way to raise your own organic fruit.  You don't need a huge amount of space, either. Dwarf varieties take up only a little room - maybe as much room as a dogwood tree. Many fruit trees have beautiful blossoms in the spring, offer attractive shade during the summer months, and produce fruit in the summer or fall.  It's like The Giving Tree in your own yard!  Friends of mine planted fruit trees in their front yard, all along the walkway leading from their driveway to the front door. They purchased mature dwarf trees from the nursery and each tree has so far produced delicious fruit within a few years.  Edible landscapes are wonderful.

Consider planting a fruit tree suitable for your climate and location. Remember to check a good reference book or with your nursery and garden center on whether or not you'll need one tree or two of different varieties. Some fruit trees are self-pollinating, meaning that one tree will bare fruit even if it's standing sentinel in your yard.  Others require a tree of a different variety for pollination. In our apple orchard, for example, we planted two varieties specifically for pollination at either end of the stand of 10 trees.  This way, we figured at least some pollinators would find their way around.

Check with your local County Cooperative Extension Office for more information on fruit tree growing in your gardening zone.

Time to Order Tomato Seeds

It's time to order tomato seeds, and as I began to think about choosing which types of tomatoes to grow in the garden this year, I started thinking about all the tomatoes I have grown over the years. I'm partial to big, juicy beefsteak tomatoes. I like to slice them up and put them in salads. I live on tomato sandwiches for most of the summer, which makes it easy to lose weight. When you put giant, juicy slices of tomatoes between lettuce and sprouted grain bread, you're going to lose weight, although you won't go hungry!

This year, I'm sticking with the tried and true varieties.  The cherry tomatoes will be Sweet 100s.  I am not a huge fan of cherry tomatoes. We always have more than we can eat, even if I sit around snacking on them all day.  But my husband loves them, so I will plant a nice flat of them. Any extra plants will go to the Master Gardener plant sale at the Heart of Virginia Festival in May.  By the way, any of my extra seedlings plus a whole bunch of perennials from the gardens here at Seven Oaks are going to be donated to the plant sale, so stay tuned and check back here in April for the final list.

The other old favorite I'll grow is Early Girl. You really can't go wrong with Early Girl. My dad grew it, Mr. Hoffman next door in Floral Park grew it, we grew it in Huntington and it grows fairly well, although not great, here in Virginia.

I want to try one new variety but I am going to leave that until the last minute.  I plan to choose one of the Virginia recommended varieties from my master gardener manual and test it against Early Girl to see if it healthier, hardier or tastier.

I can hardly believe that it's February.  It's another 60 degree day and I've got heather, pansies and a perennial whose name escapes me blooming merrily along outside. The daffodils are 4" up and growing in the orchard and I have peach trees that look like they're going to bud at any second. I keep hoping they will hold off, since budding now means no fruit (or at least I think so) - the pollinating insects aren't ready, and I'm sure we will get another frost before April!

But I can order those tomato seeds.  Time to log onto my favorite catalog site and get going!