Ashland Pond Project – Helman School

Posted on June 12, 2014 by Ashland Garden Club

Thank you Ashland Garden Club
“Thank you so much for your generous donation to Helman School!!!”

WP_20140422_006 “We have been using the binoculars down at the Pond. They are highly effective and very user friendly. Attached are some pictures of students using the binoculars to view birds in the bird houses that kindergarteners and 5th graders constructed together. The bird houses were donated by the Siskiyou District Garden Club. WP_20140422_008

When classes went down to the Ashland Pond for our spring field trips the students were thrilled to see their bird houses hung on native trees.

The tr WP_20140422_007 ees are still waiting for the tree plaques, as we are constructing the wooden mounts. We look forward to mounting those in the fall.

Thank you again for helping us grow our Pond Project. We feel extremely fortunate to have such a wonderful community that supports the experiential learning that occurs in an outdoor classroom.” Tia McLean

2014 – AGC Plant Sale

Posted on May 30, 2014 by Ashland Garden Club

The rain put a “damper” on our annual plant sale, but members and community members alike braved the rain to come out to buy plants and flowers. Sales were not as strong as they were in the past two years, but the Club managed to make enough to fund our SOU scholarship! Thank you to all those who participated.

June 13th 2014 – Feast of Will

Posted on May 30, 2014 by Ashland Garden Club

The Club’s next big member event will be creating 140 table arrangements from the flowers and greens out of their personal gardens for the tables at the Lion’s Club Feast of Will event. This annual dinner barbecue is hosted by the Ashland Lion’s Club and celebrates the beginning of summer and the opening of the Elizabethan Stage.

The Feast of Will is held in Lithia Park at 6:00pm
Tickets for the event are $15.00 and available at the OSF Box Office

Garden of the Month: May 2014

Posted on May 7, 2014 by Ashland Garden Club

The First United Methodist Church of Ashland, at 175 N. Main Street, is especially lovely at this time of year when the dogwood is in bloom.

The gardens surrounding the church are lovingly tended by church members, notably Brad Inman, Beth Hite, Toby Deller, and Evelyn Moore. Last year, we caught pictures of Brad Inman and Charlie Brown manicuring the boxwood hedges out front. Volunteers from the congregation attend work parties at the church the last Saturday of each month, tending the facilities inside and outside.

The sanctuary of the church was built in 1908, but when more modern structures were added in 2008, a formal landscape plan was formulated by John Galbraith and Byron Williams of Galbraith & Associates and implemented by Seth Barnard of Solid Ground Landscaping.

The front of the church features Japanese maples, rhododendrons, maple and magnolia trees, in addition to the boxwood and dogwood. A courtyard on the Laurel street side has a lawn for people to gather on, a low wall, many Japanese maples and crepe myrtles. Also viburnum, azaleas, daylilllies, dogwood, iris, and hydrangeas. Annuals are added for color each year by the volunteers.

The garden on Laurel nearest the street is called the Memorial Garden, where church members’ ashes can be interred. Included there are more Japanese maples, mugo pine, false cypress, mock orange, kinnikinnick, barberry, nandina and sedum. Even the parking lot has been landscaped.

Submitted by Ruth Sloan

With thanks to Sherri Morgan for plant identification.

Garden of the Month: April 2014

Posted on April 2, 2014 by Ashland Garden Club

Karen McClintock says she’s lucky her husband, Mick Smith,never saw a Front weed he wouldn’t stop to pull out. Indeed! Mick also plants and prunes, and last year brought a photinia hedge back to good health from disease. Their garden at 2790 Diane Street to the left of the walkway reflects the hard work they both put into it. Right now the Spring blooms and colors are spectacular.

They purchased the house eight years ago. The previous owner did the bulk of the hardscape and some of the basic planting. Karen and Mick, without any formal training, frequently add and rearrange. This fall Karen moved all of the iris around to mix, rather than bunch, the colors, and she’s eager to see what emerges in the next few weeks. They get occasional help (quarterly) from a handyman gardener for the biggest jobs such as pruning the grape vines that fill the side yard. Among the challenges of gardening on this property are deer, of course, a street light lamp post and three (count ‘em!) utility boxes in the front garden. They use bone meal to discourage deer and it also fertilizes the tulips. To keep everything green they use organic fertilizers sparely. In the fall they purchased and covered the front garden with wonderful organic mulch from Plant Oregon. In front of the house, in addition to the tulips, daffodils, and grape hyacinth currently putting on a show, are Japanese maple, forsythia (the one to the left of the driveway is currently at the peak of its color, the one to the right of the driveway has gone from yellow to green leaves), manzanita, bayberry, variegated pittosporum, blue fescue, shasta daisies, euphorbia, rosemary, oregano, and sedum.
In the back yard a small garden provides privacy and beauty. It includes a crepe myrtle tree, roses, lilac, lavender, huge red oriental poppies, sweet woodruff, lupine, strawberries, wall flower, azalea, nandina, day lilies, foxglove, and hellebore. They use oyster shells in back to thwart snails–with limited success. Along the back wall of the property a lovely backdrop of photinia provides the frame for this picture perfect garden.