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Leaflet eNewsletter
February 2015 Edition
In This Issue
Letter from the President
February Hort Hints
An Enchanting Exhibit at the Flower Show
Flower Show's New Amateur Horticulture Chair
Book review
Catching up on the Last Half Century
Notes from the Vegetable Garden
Essay: It's Winter, but I'm Content
Education Department News
Upcoming Events

Wed Feb 18 @ 5:30PM - 08:00PM
The Right-Size Flower Garden: Book Signing with Kerry Ann Mendez

 

Thu Feb 26 @ 7:00PM - 08:30PM
Frederick Law Olmsted & the Massachusetts Legacy

 

Thu Mar 05 @ 7:00PM - 08:30PM
Seed Starting Indoors

 

Thu Mar 19 @ 7:00PM - 08:30PM
Cold Frame Gardening

 

Thu Mar 26 @ 7:00PM - 08:30PM
Vegetable Gardening for Everyone

 

Sat Mar 28 @10:00AM - 12:00PM
Build Your Own Cold Frame


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 Letter from the President

 

Dear Friends,

Snow weary? We have just the solution. Boston Flower & Garden Show, March 11-15! At Mass Hort we are working hard on the show. The chairs of the Amateur Competitions are getting their structures and pedestals painted, volunteers  lined up, and competitors engaged. John Forti, Director of Horticulture and Education, Suzanne Higham, and the Mass Hort exhibit team are working to enchant you with our exhibit. Mark you calendars for March 11-15!

 

Just like you, the staff at Mass Hort has been working to plow and manage the impact of all this snow on our beautful propety and buildings. It has been costly to keep the property plowed and "manage" the weather.  I hope you will lend a hand with a gift to the annual fund.

 

Stay warm and safe. Think about beautiful gardens and spring. Check out our new course catalog for learning. Save May 16th for the Gardeners' Fair!

 

Warm wishes,

 

Kathy


 

Acres of Gardens...for the price of a bouquet!


Special Valentine's Day Gift Offer
The Gift of Membership to the
Massachusetts Horticultural Society

SAVE $10

Warm up these cold days with thoughts of spring 
and the Flower Show! For more information on membership, click here


Special Valentine's Day gift membership rates*:

Individual Gift Membership: $45
(regularly $55)

Family Gift Membership: $80
(regularly $90)

and enter the Promo Code "Valentine"


or contact Amy Rodrigues 
at 617-933-4961,  [email protected]


* Offer expires at midnight, February 14th. Offer valid for new or rejoining members only; 
offer not valid for renewing members


MEMBER FLOWER SHOW
TICKETS 2015


ALL MEMBER FLOWER SHOW TICKETS WILL BE MAILED TO MEMBERS IN MID-FEBRUARY



Please watch for your tickets and information on how to purchase additional, discounted tickets 
in the mail soon!


February Hort Hints

By Betty Sanders
BettyOnGardening.com

 

It's time to start pruning.  Okay, your property is under two feet of snow.  That's the bad news.  The good news is that the trees and shrubs are dormant: you can work on them without setting off an unwanted growth spurt on the plant's part.  That makes February the perfect time to begin your winter pruning.  Here's what to do.

 

First, never prune anything you can't reach from the ground.  Leave that work for professionals. 

 

Second use high quality tools.  They may cost more to purchase, but they will last a lifetime if properly cared for.  And because they are well designed, they will save you a lot of work along the way.  Any cutting tool -- pruners and loppers -- that were not cleaned, oiled and sharpened before being putting away in the fall, need to be readied before you head outside to work. A good chore for snow days!

 

And a reminder, except where there is damaged or dead wood to be removed, now is not the time to prune spring-blooming trees and shrubs.  Doing so will result in cutting off the buds that formed last summer. 

Pruning for structure on a young tree

 

Basic tree pruning's first rule is Do No Harm.  Bad pruning can do more damage than no pruning at all. When in doubt, call in a professional.  Clean, sharp tools properly used will leave healthy wood.  Re-sharpen pruners as you work and clean tools between cuts or at the very least as you move from one tree to another.  Every pruning cut should be at the branch collar-not flush with the trunk and never leaving a stump. 

 

For young, deciduous trees, concentrate on establishing a sturdy framework for later growth.  For most trees, this means pruning out all but one strong leader (the center stem) and creating a ladder of sturdy side branches (laterals) that will help determine the shape of the tree as it grows.

Proper branch cutting

 

For mature deciduous trees, first remove all dead, damaged, diseased or dying wood.  If you are not certain a branch is dying, leave it until spring when the quantity and quality of new growth will help you determine its viability.

 

Stage two is to remove unnecessary growth (such as sprouts) and badly placed or congested stems.  A good example of something to remove are crossed branches that are currently or will soon rub against each other.  The damage that results from rubbing opens the tree to diseases and insects.

A weak branch crotch - where a V-shaped angle exists between two branches - is never as strong as a more horizontal angle.  Correct this by removing the branch that is not providing sufficient outward growth.  Branches growing into the tree will soon be crossing others.

 

Thin out any areas of dense heavy growth.  Wind and birds should be able to go easily through your tree. Pause frequently to look at the tree.  Pruning too little is easily corrected.  Pruning too much is not.  If in doubt, wait for another day to do more pruning.

 

How to prune an evergreen

You must know about the growth habits of your conifers before pruning.  Many, especially pines, have only a single growth spurt each year.  These and broad leaved evergreens are usually pruned in late spring after the new growth has appeared.   Some conifers such as yews grow continually throughout the spring and summer and that must be considered when planning to prune.  To shorten or control growth on a conifer, cut a branch where it forks into side branches and one of these will dominate, maintaining the shape of the tree.  Cut it between side branches and you will be left with an ugly stump that will never produce foliage again.

 

You can read more of Betty Sanders' horticultural hints and gardening advice at www.BettyOnGardening.com.  You can see and hear Betty in the lecture hall at the Boston Flower and Garden Show on Wednesday, March 11 at 2:30 p.m.

 

 

 

An Enchanting Exhibit at the Flower Show                              

by John Forti, Director of Horticulture and Education


 

As the snow grows deeper and the days grow longer, we are all beginning to look for signs of spring. Mass Hort and the Boston Flower & Garden Show have been a part of this seasonal ritual for more than 140 years. 

 

This year, the flower show theme is "Season of Enchantment" and Mass Hort's exhibit is entitled "An Enchanted New England Woodland Walk".

 

The exhibit is designed to let the child in all of us rediscover the love of nature.  It is designed to take us from a back-yard setting into a woodland walk through nature.  An old footpath carries us past stone walls and the ruins of old landscapes into a native woodland landscape complete with a vernal pool.  The design then brings us to an enchanted woodland to discover a fairy mound, a fairy circle, and a world of natural enchantment. 

 

In nature, seasons of enchantment can be found as often as a computer screen can be refreshed.  When we explore the magic, science and beauty of nature, we teach our children to carry the love of gardening through life. Sometimes nature draws us in, and we find ourselves exploring remnants of those who lived in the landscape before us.  In the process, the generations come together to cultivate a stewardship of our environment that can only be shared when we engage with our own backyards. We develop relationships with the plants and animals we share the land with.  Sometimes when we let our imagination soar, we even discover other worlds...


 

2015 is the "year of kids and families" at Mass Hort.  Our goal in creating the "enchanted woodland" is to provide a virtual walk in nature, complete with clues to who has lived there before us, interactions with wildlife, and a world of imagination!  To that end, we have also created a discovery guide designed to help parents and grandparents take on the role of mentor when engaging kids in our back yard environment.  When kids fill out the discovery guide, they can redeem it for a special seed CD that they can plant and dance to at home!  We hope you take this exhibit as a friendly reminder from Mass Hort to get out and explore nature in your own backyard.  

The Boston Flower & Garden Show will be held at the Seaport World Trade Center in Boston on Wednesday, March 11 through Sunday, March 15, 2015. For more information about Mass Hort at the Flower Show, click here.


 

Please consider volunteering for Mass Hort at the Flower Show - discover new plants, new friends, and the "behind the scenes" of the Show. Please click here to sign up.


 

Flower Show's New Amateur Horticulture Chair                              

We are delighted to introduce Michael Arnum, who has agreed to chair the Amateur Horticulture Division for Mass Hort at the Boston Flower and Garden Show.  Michael served for more than 10 years as the Director of Marketing & Public Relations at Tower Hill Botanic Garden in Boylston, where he launched the public introduction of the Winter Garden and Limonaia (Lemon House).

     

He received his undergraduate degree in Horticulture from Cornell University and earned his MBA with a concentration in Public & Non-Profit Management at Boston University. He did an internship at the National Tropical Botanical Garden in Kauai, Hawaii. Michael has written for Horticulture magazine and served on several boards, including the Central Massachusetts Convention & Visitors Bureau, the MetroWest Visitors Bureau and the Boston Chapter of the Public Relations Society of America.  

     

He is an avid vegetable and fruit grower, having won ribbons for his peppers, watermelons, and tomatoes.  He has also had a long-standing interest in African violets and gesneriads.

     

For more than a century, and now as Mass Hort at the Boston Flower and Garden Show, which is run by the Paragon Group, the Society has showcased the best amateur talent in horticulture. As we have from the beginning, we aim to foster a love of plants, design and gardening in people of all ages.  If you think that now is the time to enter your finest plants to be judged by experts, contact Michael Arnum to ask about the schedule and the regulations. [email protected].


Book Review                               
Patrice Todisco

Revisiting the Gamberaia: An Anthology of Essays

Edited with preface, introduction and notes by Patricia J. Osmond

Centro Di, Florence: 2014 (reprint of the 2004 edition)   

 

Perfect. Poetical. Sensual. A masterpiece of composition. Perched on a hillside in Settignano with a magnificent view of Florence, Villa Gamberaia has inspired writers, artists, historians and designers for generations. In the finely crafted book, Revisiting the Gamberaia: An Anthology of Essays, Patricia J. Osmond shares Gamberaia's allure through a collection of eight classic essays accompanied by historic photographs, illustrations and plans. 

 

Written by American and British authors the essays span more than seventy years, beginning in 1901 with Janet Ross's depiction of the Gamberaia in Florentine Villas and concluding with Sir Harold Acton's Tuscan Villas, published in 1973.  Each essay provides a unique insight into the Gamberaia's design evolution while providing an introduction to the discipline of landscape history.

 

Villa Gamberaia's garden is small, approximately three acres in size.  Yet contained within is a collection of spaces so perfectly sited in relationship to the villa, surrounding agricultural landscapes and each other so that they compose one of the most harmonious ensembles in Tuscany.   As Georgina Masson extols in an essay from Italian Gardens published in 1961, the garden is "at once the loveliest and most typically Tuscan" that she had seen. "In it the light, and air and breeze swept site, advocated by all the garden authors from Varro to Alberti, is exploited to perfection."

 

Beloved by Edith Wharton for its "perfect example of the art of producing a great effect on a small scale," the garden is described by Sir Geoffrey Jellicoe as the most thoughtful domestic landscape the world has ever known.  Its individual features include a grotto, nymphaeum, gabinetto rustico, limonaia and bowling green as well as formal water parterres encircled by a cypress arcade.     

 

In the introduction to Revisiting the Gamberaia: An Anthology of Essays, Osmond shares the context in which the essays were written, providing a brief overview of Florence's cultural environment at the turn of the twentieth century, when writers, artists, diplomats and intellectuals were exploring the gardens and villas of the region and buying or renting properties outside of Florence.  Biographical notes provide background information about the individuals who have influenced the Gamberaia's design. 

 

Villa Gamberaia passed through successive owners, including the elusive Princess Ghyka and the American heiress, Maud Cass Ledyard (Baroness Von Ketteler) before being acquired by the Marchi Family in 1954.  Dedicated to restoring the gardens and villa (both of which were destroyed by the Germans during World War ll) the Marchis are passionate stewards of the property and painstakingly continue its restoration.

 

In an era in which garden images proliferate on the internet and technology allows one to "visit"  gardens virtually, Revisiting the Gamberaia: An Anthology of Essays, reminds us that there is no substitute for physically experiencing a place, supporting, as Osmond beautifully expresses, the reality that one "can never exhaust the potential for meaning that a great garden, like a great work of literature or painting, continues to elect." 

 

I had the good fortune to visit Villa Gamberaia in early November on a beautiful, sunny afternoon.  At that time I had not read the essays in Osmond's anthology,but had studied the garden in graduate school.  As I passed through the entry avenue of cypress onto the grassy terrace with sweeping views over the Arno valley and into the garden, the "sensual, practical, contemplative, mystical, childish and ordered grandeur of the individual," described by Sir Geoffrey in The Studies of a Landscape Designer over 80 years, both delighted and humbled me, as only a great work of art can do.     

 

 

Patrice Todisco writes about parks, gardens and the public realm at www.landscapenotes.com.

 

 

Catching up on the Last Half Century          

 

Maureen Horn, Librarian

 

It was 1954 when the last official history of the Massachusetts Horticultural Society was written.  To make up for lost time the Librarian proposes that during the next several months, articles will appear in Leaflet that will highlight MHS's accomplishments and challenges throughout the last half century that have proven most relevant to the Society's continuing mission.  The early articles will peer into another world, but later ones will explore territory more familiar to current members.

 

Sixty years ago, when our last history was published, the Society had already been in its Third Horticultural Hall for 90 years, and now its occupancy there is sometimes only a distant memory. At the time, Dwight D. Eisenhower was President of the United States, Christian A. Herter was the Governor of Massachusetts, and our Senators were Leverett Saltonstall and John F. Kennedy. John S. Ames was president of the Massachusetts Horticultural Society and Arno H. Nehrling was its Executive Secretary.

 

   

In the years 1954 and 1955, the Society celebrated the 125th anniversary of its founding by giving a gift to the public through an artifact collection display at the Boston Public Library called " Exhibition of Flowers in Art and Decoration."  As was noted in the most recent issue of Leaflet, our precious botanical prints will soon be presented on our website as digital records.  It was also during those years that MHS emphasized its historic support, which began in 1891, of children's work. This undertaking will always be part of our legacy of  school gardens:

 

One Summer to  Remember

 

The 1955 Report of the Committee on Children's Gardens exposed the difficulties and determination of teachers and volunteers to present an exhibition that year.  They said that the garden season started with a severe drought during May, so that germination got off to a poor start.  July and August were extremely hot, with more than thirty days when the thermometer rose to 90 degrees or more. Then, more than 14 inches of rain poured down on August 17th and 18th and flooded many gardens only a week before the Annual Children's Show.

    

There was a severe polio outbreak in the area that summer, and there was talk of canceling the show, but nobody wanted to disappoint the children.  A few concessions were made to the situation.  For example, the movies usually shown during the first day were omitted, and each teacher was instructed to bring not more than five children to Horticultural Hall to assist in the set up.  In spite of all the challenges, there were 1,166 entries to the show.

    

The jewel of the exhibits was from the large school garden, a sixty year old project, on the Cummings Estate in Woburn, which was operated by the Boston School Department in cooperation with the Park Department.  For the third year in a row, it garnered the coveted Gold Medal awarded by the Massachusetts Horticultural Society. So encouraged by the award, the children and staff of this garden, decided to place the garden in competition with adults and entered the Annual Harvest Show in October.  There it won a first prize.    

                       

To learn about other activities during 1954 and 1955 and for a list of Society leaders, click here

 

Notes from the Vegetable Garden                              
By Susan Hammond

You know you're a veggieholic when you're totally immune to magazines promising weight loss, wealth, and fame...but a headline of "New Vegetable Varieties To Try!" will lure you in every time.

 

Fortunately, there's a useful way to channel our passion for vegetables: planning this year's garden. The Garden To Table Vegetable team has been poring over the catalogs and picking our themes for the upcoming growing season.

 

We have a wide range of expertise to draw on and that is reflected in the beds we are planning. Some of this year's beds include: 1830 And More, showcasing historical varieties with a connection to Mass Hort;  The Silk Road, which will look at the way vegetables move along trade routes;  Companions, which will show how companion planting can improve plant health and yield;  It's Not Just Kale,  featuring other greens that are tasty and easy to grow at home; and Just For Kids,  which will have crops that are quick to mature and are good for getting children involved in vegetable gardening.

 

Of course, many of our favorite beds will be retuning this year, such as New and Unusual, Too Pretty To Eat, and First Time Vegetable Gardener. And on the "production" side of the garden, we're planning to have early beds of the Johnny's All-Star Lettuce that was so beautiful last spring, and to expand other early crops with cress and pea tendrils, which we tried on a small scale last fall.

 

We're also planning some new crops for the indoor garden at The Jean Mayer USDA Human Nutrition Research Center on Aging at Tufts University. This indoor garden is just the ticket when it seems like the snow will never end!

 

Even though we won't be starting seedlings for another month, we can already see the garden taking shape for the year. Are you interested in learning more?  Mass Hort has many educational offerings this year that can help you with your own gardening - or you can plan to be a volunteer with us in the spring.  Come, Learn, and Grow with us!

 

It's Winter, But I'm Content

By Neal Sanders
Leaflet Contributor


Let me admit this at the outset:  I did not see snow until I was twenty years old.  In fact, on that first occasion, in December 1969, I drove 200 miles from Gainesville, Florida to Augusta, Georgia for the sole purpose of seeing genuine flakes of the stuff falling from the sky.

My Florida upbringing notwithstanding, I have seen a lot of snow since.  A little over two years after that first encounter, I was ensconced in what I genuinely believed was the Snow Capital of the World: Schenectady, New York.  There, it is said, the snow never melts.  Instead, by June, enough soot collects on the top of the snow to support grass and flowers for a few months.

Snow totals from Marcus

I have been in one snow mecca or another ever since, including a total of 25 years in the Boston area.  In short, despite a late start, I believe I have paid my snow dues. 

My wife, Betty, on the other hand, is from the upstate New York snow belt.  She has childhood tales of reaching out her second floor window to make snowballs from the lake-effect-fueled drifts.  Her definition of a 'white Christmas' is that it must actually be snowing on the morning of December 25.  I bow to the truth that she was shoveling snow as a child while I refused to go in swimming because the ocean temperatures at Miami Beach had dipped to a nippy 75 degrees.

For nine months of the year, our disparate upbringings have no bearing on our life together.  But when the snow starts falling heavily, my wife reverts to the fervent belief that I came to New England on the back of a mango truck sometime in the last few months.  When it comes to snow removal at our home, she is the boss and I am there mostly for comic relief.

There is one final element of this story that needs to be told:  for the past fifteen years we have lived in a home with a winding, 220-foot-long driveway.  At the top of that driveway is a three-car garage that - likely as an architectural version of a practical joke - faces the street rather than 'loading' from the side.  All snow needs to be pulled away from the garage; not pushed past it.  Add an area for backing in, and you are talking about a little over 3000 square feet of asphalt that must be cleared each and every snowfall. 

Betty is the master of the snow blower

And, there is a 'part two' of that final element:  along the driveway and close to the house are glorious beds of plants and trees that should never have excessive snow piled on them.  Plus a sidewalk.  And some pathways that lead to things like our compost bin and side door into the garage. 

A truck wielding a snow plow is impractical (those front-facing garage doors leave no 'terminus' to push the stuff).  Thus, there are no easy solutions when you are serious about not damaging a garden.  This is 'retail' snow removal, not 'wholesale'.

All of this is manageable if the snowfall amounts to a few inches.  Using a 'pusher', I move the snow beyond what we call the 'no throw' zone, and we then shovel or use a snow blower to throw the stuff onto the lawn or into the woods.  Piece of cake.

The relentless series of storms that have encompassed New England for the past month had dropped more than 70 inches of the white stuff on our town.  That volume of snow calls for extraordinary measures and Betty devises the battle plan because she is the one who designed these gardens.  And so she commands the Ariens snow blower with its 20-inch-high maw and wide augur.  My job... is to clean up the edges and do any heavy lifting required.

I will be the first to admit that she does an extraordinary job of it.  The remnants of storms Juno, Linus and, now, Marcus, have been dealt with not just efficiently, but with an eye to managing snow melt if and when things warm up.  I will also acknowledge that I could not have done nearly as well.

My job is to keep the edges neat

In the meantime, though, my work on the edges is crisp and even.  I do have my pride.

Snow removal is supposed to be 'guy' stuff.  Our next-door neighbor has a tractor-cum-snow blower that is the envy of every guy on the street.  He can clear his driveway (with its side-loading garage) in half an hour, then do wheelies out in the street. 

It takes us considerably longer, but tomorrow morning, our driveway will be down to black pavement while all of our neighbors drive on a thin coat of ice.  Moreover, our mailbox is readily accessible to our carrier despite being ground zero for an entire street's worth of snow.

No, I didn't just arrive here from the land of the tropics.  Sometimes, though, you have to acknowledge that someone else has a 'better idea' of how to do these things.  Is it a product of being snow-belt born and bred?  I don't know. 

I just do what I'm told.  But, in the back of my mind, I known darn good and well that I can husk a coconut ten times as fast as Betty any day of the week.

 

 

Neal Sanders is a frequent contributor to the Leaflet.  His newest mystery, Murder in Negative Space, will be published in March.  You can hear Neal in the lecture hall at the Boston Flower & Garden Show on Wednesday, March 11 at 11:30 a.m.

 

Education Department News

                        

Mass Hort is excited to release our 2015 CALENDAR & COURSE  CATALOG! Click here to see what we have to offer to connect you and your family to the gardens and natural world this year. There are workshops for the home gardener, daily summer activities for kids, enjoyable evenings in the gardens, weekly lectures focused on food, gardening and horticultural crafts, and so much more!

 

The best news for this week is the imminent arrival of Kerry Ann Mendez to tell us about her new book, The Right-Size Garden: Simplify Your Outdoor Space with Smart Design Solutions and Plant Choice. The event will happen in the Hunnewell Building on Thursday, February 18, from 5:30 to 8:00.  You will learn how to custom design your own gardens for pleasure and utility.  To prepare for the occasion, you may want to learn more about Ms. Mendez's philosophy or subscribe to her newsletter  at her website, www.pyours.com.

 

In the instance of extreme weather conditions, the snow date for this event will be February 25, from 5:30 to 8:00. Please see our website, www.masshort.org/Events on the 18th if you wonder if the lecture will be postponed. Or, contact Katie Folts at 617-933-4973 or [email protected] with questions.