Gardening Update November 9, 2012

Katie did a wonderful job today working with the coleus cuttings.  They are growing and looking fabulous!  Everyone of the cuttings survived!  The winterizing of the Flag Pole Garden continues.  Katie worked on more deadheading and weeding.  She found the resident Praying Mantis in the lilies.  Khrys joined us and we reviewed more of the VA Tech article talking about perennial maintenance.  Next week I WILL remember to buy the mulch and we will continue working on winterizing the garden!

Cereal Success

Over seventy boxes of cereal were collected from students and staff at Strasburg High School.  Both Matthew's Pantry in Fort Valley and Keep the Change Food Pantry in Strasburg were the recipients of this year's collection.

Bulbs!

On Friday, November 2, 2012, Khrys planted a bag full of daffodil bulbs in the Flag Pole Garden.  Master Gardner, Carolyn Wilson donated the bulbs for the garden.  Khrys did a fabulous job and even found a hibernating frog!  Khrys weeded as he went along and learned a great technique for popping the bulbs in using a spade.  Well done!

                                                

Gardeners at Work!

Fall Gardening

October 5: Katie and Larina checked the cuttings.  They are doing very well. They did some more weeding and deadheading in the garden and reviewed the VA Tech article on perennial gardens.
Oct. 12: no meeting
October 19: Katie and Kyrys went to the greenhouse for soil and pots.  It was too wet for outside work so the students worked on the propagation project.  They started some cutting in water a few weeks ago.  Today they potted these rooted cuttings and took some additional cuttings from the large coleus plant.  The new plants were watered and checked.  They are doing really well!  We read and reviewed the mulching section of our article.  We will not meet next Friday.  In two weeks we will meet to mulch and plant daffodil bulbs. 

SHS Flag Pole Garden Project

• The Master Gardener SHS Flag Pole project continues!! On September 14 Gary and Katie met to start the fall project.  They read and reviewed the VA Coop. Extension publication: Planning the Flower Border.  The students put in some hard manual labor and some serious "dead heading" (removing spent blossoms).  
• Sept. 21, 2012: Katie, Khrys, and Larina met to discuss the purpose of the garden and the type of tools that will be needed.  We reviewed the above article and talked about the importance of year-round color and some plant possibilities given our growing zone.  The students had the opportunity to view a good bug (a large Praying Mantis) and a "bad" bug: a grasshopper chewing on leaves.  Some time was spent weeding and dead heading.  Back in the library the students used the encyclopedia to read more about the Praying Mantis and how valuable it is in the garden.  This fall we will be looking for the egg cases. 
• September 28, 2012: Katie and Larina discussed and worked on plant propagation (rainy day plans).  The students reviewed various methods of propagation and worked on taking cuttings from a large Limeaide Coleus plant.  They tried starting the cuttings in a potting soil mixture as well as trying to root the cuttings in a cup of water.  We will watch to see which cuttings work out better.  Hopefully, we will produce some beautiful new plants!

Update

The cereal collection is up and running...don't forget to pick up an extra box or two this weekend to support our community service project!