September 28, 2021 Tour of North Park Trial Gardens

 On a lovely September evening, club members were treated to a tour of the trial gardens at North Park, with our very own Dianne Machesney as the tour guide.

Dianne explaining the trial gardens.

 

This year, there were 15 new master gardeners.  They were divided into groups of 3, and their project was to create container gardens that encompassed the 5 senses.  These containers were situated behind the cannon wall.

Touch – fuzzy leaved and succulent plants of the can

Taste – herbs and tomato plants

Eyesight – colorful plants

Hearing – wind chimes & ornamental grasses in the wind

Smell – plants that smell good, like mint, lavender and roses.

 

Evan with a sensory container garden.

Another small container garden but Do Not Eat as edible plants are sprayed with deer repellant.

A pollinator garden was put in several years ago, and consists of several pollinator gardens.  One contains all natives.  Another is where the number and types of pollinators are counted and tracked.  This a project of the Penn State Extension Intern.

    

 

The meadow garden that was put in behind the trial / pollinator gardens was put in without consulting the Master Gardeners.  A Western meadow mix was used, and this year, very few plants from the mix survived.  The Master Gardeners will be taking over the meadow, and are currently starting with a small meadow garden right behind the pollinator garden.

Compost bins with meadow garden in background.

 

In front of the cannon are the trial flower beds.  The North Park trial gardens are a satellite testing site for Penn State’s Southeast Agricultural Research and Extension Center (SEAREC).  Their main facility is in Landisville, PA, where they trial 900 annual cultivars.  This became a trial garden 4 years ago.  Prior to that, it was a demonstration garden, where plants were donated by local nurseries in the area.

 

The trial garden beds are used for trialing new varieties.  There are 11 trial beds and this year, there were 181 cultivars, consisting of 40 different genera.  The plants being trialed are for 17 different growers from California, Illinois, Germany, Czech Republic, Israel, Ohio, Massachusetts, Japan and the Netherlands.  These growers submit plugs or seeds for growing, along with sun, water and other plant requirements.  Usually, the cuttings / plugs arrive 3 days prior to the planting date, which doesn’t allow a lot of time for planning on where to plant, spacing … The plants are photographed and graded, using a scale from 1 – 5 on things like growing conditions, bug resistance, disease resistance … etc.  This information is sent to SEAREC, who shares it with the growers.  The trialing for the plants is for patent purposes, therefore, no seed saving is allowed from these plants.  Penn State receives payment for the trialing of the plants.

 

The publics favorite was Salvia farinacea  SALLYFUN , Deep Ocean.  Created by Danziger, a floriculture company based in Israel.

 

Directly behind the cannon, in front of the wall is a permanent planting of an herb garden which is maintained by one Master Gardener.  There is beautiful specimen of Eucalyptus, which is overwintered by the Master Gardener (Dianne checked).

 

To the right of the herb garden, is a perennial garden, which has been there for at least 10 years.

 

All fall maintenance for the garden is done on the same day, i.e. tearing out trial garden plants, cutting back herbs/perennials … etc.

Dianne checked with the team captain about what the plant is in the bicycle garden that looks like bear britches.  She said it is cardoon artichoke.

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Colleen thanked Dianne for being our tour guide and giving us a lot of information about the trial gardens, as well as the permanent gardens that have been put in place.  It is truly a great resource for those interested in gardening.

 

Peggy made a motion, seconded by Denny that we make a donation to North Hills Community Outreach for their campaign to build a bioshelter.  The amount to be donated is $1,0000.  Approval was unanimous.  For more information, or if you want to personally donate, the link is:

 https://www.nhco.org/bioshelter

 

A program coordinator is still needed for next year.  PLEASE consider taking on this important role for our club.

 

We will be collecting member dues of $15 at our October meeting.

 

Mary Anne reminded everyone to take note of perennials that need dividing while you are doing your fall cleanup.  You can either try potting them up now and overwintering them, dividing and replanting now for potting up in the spring, or simply dividing and potting up in the spring.  As the plant sale is our only fundraiser, it is very important that we have healthy plants for the sale, and we want to make it as easy on ourselves as possible.

January 2013 Meeting Notes

Twenty-one members came out on a frigid night for the first meeting of the year and were justly rewarded by an interesting program.

Our speaker Dianne Machesney is a Penn State Master Gardener who presented, “Pennsylvania Trees,” beautifully illustrated by her photographs and those of her beloved mentor, Esther Allen. Dianne began with the benefits of trees, calling them “green gold.”   Trees provide food, nest sites, shade, soil stability, building materials, medicines, etc.  Pennsylvania has 108 native trees within deciduous and evergreen classifications.  She showed us uses, wildlife benefits, pests and diseases. In addition, she expanded our vocabulary with new words such as petiole and allelopathy.  Dianne talked of the plants and diseases brought into Western Pennsylvania which are detrimental, if not fatal, to native species. Global warming may also be a factor in tree stress and/or die off. One tree from the Rue Family, the hop tree (Ptelea trifoliate, stinking ash or wafer tree) is on the endangered species list.  [Note: not the invasive tree Ailanthus altissima tree-of-heaven, Chinese sumac.] Her love of nature and teaching was clearly apparent.

Reference books she recommends and used for this presentation are: Guide to Trees by D. Sibley, Trees of Pennsylvania by A. Rhoads, and Trees of Pennsylvania and the Northeast by C. Fergus.

New president, Mary Anne Kurtz, began the business meeting. Treasurer, Anita Wagner, presented the proposed budget for 2013. Other topics covered briefly were changes at our bank perhaps requiring new checks; locating and reinstalling the trellis for the Passavant garden; a possible tour of the Pittsburgh Botanic Gardens; and sharing Sharon’s newly divided indoor plants.

Arrangement - Lynn Betts          Desserts - Flo Ogden & Nancy Madevy

February 26^th Program:   “Perennials for Difficult Sites” by Dot Sim

Submitted by: Rose Mary Highman