Plants | Roswell Garden Club

Gardening Alert: Don’t Prune Freeze Damage Yet, by RGC Blogger Suzy Crowe

If you’re like me, this winter’s extra-cold temperatures have taken a toll on many of your plants. I’m itching to cut off the freeze damage, but that is not what experts recommend.

In a recent article in the Gwinnett Daily Post, Tim Daly, UGA Extension Ag & Natural Resources Agent, gives several great tips for assessing and dealing with freeze damage. These tips assume your plants are cold hardy and appropriate for zone 7B.

Bronze colorization doesn’t mean a plant or a branch is dead…it’s the plant’s reaction to a big chill
Scratch the bark with your fingernail. If the stem tissue is green or white, the wood is still alive…look for new growth in the spring 🙂
If the stem tissue is brown or brittle, …

In Search of Winter Color by RGC Blogger Suzy Crowe

Gardening, Horticulture, Inspiration, Plants

I like to buy plants for my containers that can be planted in the yard at the end of their bloom season. This fall I felt the need for large bursts of color and enticing texture, so I did a little research before heading out and put Brown’s Japanese Yew, Huechera, Floral Berry (St. John’s Wort), Stone Crop, Hens & Chicks, Compact Oregon Grape, and Lime Twist Sedum on my list of plants to look for.

After my first stop, Snow ‘N Summer Asiatic Jasmine, mugo pine, cabbage, and violas were added to the list. I hadn’t bought anything yet, though. At my next stop, Frenzy Juncus, an Autumn Empress Encore Azalea, a few Hazy Dark Pink Asters, and a pack of SnapdDragons jumped the list and hopped into my cart. They called my name, and there weren’t many of them, so I needed to get them right away. Oh, and 5 hot fuscia cyclamen. I love cyclamen…

National Garden Week: A Bit of Garden Lore by RGC Blogger Dotty Etris

National Garden Week, Plants

Here are some snippets of garden and herb lore for you to enjoy during National Garden Week.

A Bit of Garden Lore: Never thank someone for giving you a plant (or even a cutting from a plant) as it is thought to bring bad luck in growing that plant. It is suggested that the giver should turn their backs which allows the recipient to basically “steal” the plant.

Herb Lore is fun to explore as we grow an herb garden – either an outdoor garden or even pots on a windowsill. If outside, be sure it’s convenient to run grab a cutting when you are cooking…unless you are better at preparing ahead of time than I am. Herbs are fun to grow and to cook with, but they are really ancient and have for centuries had particular beliefs and lore associated with them. Many are used for medicinal…

National Garden Week – Got Ivy? Get Goats! by RGC Blogger Sherron Lawson

Environment, Gardening, National Garden Week, Plants

In the Spring of 2022 my husband and I realized that we could not tackle the tangled mess that is the rear of our 1+ acre lot. So instead we decided to engage goats to work on the English ivy, wild grapevine, honeysuckle, Virginia creeper, and privet in the under story of our oak, walnut, magnolia, sassafras, mimosa, and sweetgum wooded lot.

Mansell Landscaping (Arnold Mill Road, Woodstock) to the rescue! They have diversified their services to include a herd of goats which they rent out for just this work. We loved the idea of using a local company, especially with an old Roswell family name.

Barry and Joy Mansell showed up with a trailer full of 10 hungry goats ready to munch away. They stayed with us for seven days and nights enjoying a smorgasbord of greenery. Their bleating greeted us each morning as the sun rose to wake them…

National Garden Week: Planning an Heirloom Garden by RGC Blogger Florence Anne Berna

Gardening, Horticulture, National Garden Week, Plants

Ahhh!!! Spring and early summer! The time of year that stirs our mind, spirit and body into venturing outdoors and communing with nature. So you rise up, arm yourself with tools and head out to tackle the weeds, pruning and edging. After all of the ‘grunt’ work is done you head to the stores to buy your beloved summer plants. Buying plants that have been pampered in greenhouses to look their very best to entice you to buy them. At home, you follow all the rules for Southern gardening: Till the clay. Amend your soil with sand and peat moss. Mix in some all-purpose fertilizer. Plant your summer selections and water. Then the heat comes and quite possibly a drought. Or perhaps too much rain. In no time at all those lovely summer plants are not well or worse — not even alive! There is an alternative…

National Garden Week: Autumn Sage-A Perfect Perennial For Georgia by RGC Blogger Dotty Etris

Gardening, Horticulture, National Garden Week, Plants

Autumn Sage is a perennial plant native to North America – specifically native to Texas Hill Country and Mexico. It is named for Josiah Gregg, a naturalist who found it as he traveled throughout the Southwestern United States and Mexico.

It is a sub-shrub that blooms from March – November on previous or current year’s growth, attracting pollinators. It is specifically known as a magnet for Hummingbirds. It thrives in rocky soils but does well in dry to medium well-drained soils. When first planted, water 2 times a week until it is established but then it does well on its own. If it gets to be terribly hot for too many days with no rain at all, I will sometimes water it, but it seems to thrive even when neglected – perhaps that is why I love this plant so much…

Garden Week In Georgia: Member Reflections–Each Flower That We’ve Ever Touched in Truth Will Touch Us Back

Garden Week In Georgia, Plants

Gretchen: There was a wonderful RGC program about orchids by a friend of Mary Booth Cabot. He had several plants to give away and this Elephant Ear was one. It has grown by leaps and bounds and fascinates me. As you can see, the new leaves emerge from the stem of another recent leaf…and this continues.

And, each time I glance at this I think or our beautiful Mary Booth!

King: I get such pleasure from my “Friendship Gardens,” that is, gardens with plants that have been given to me by friends. They help surround my house with resonating memories of…

Garden Week In Georgia: The Many Seasons of my Friend the Amaryllis by RGC Blogger Gretchen Collins

Garden Week In Georgia, Gardening, Plants

If friendship were a garden, Amaryllis would be a friend who is always there for us. In Georgia we have many months of beauty in our landscape. Perhaps March is one of our most beautiful months for blooms. The Amaryllis bulbs that we can save from year to year might have come into bloom in February or March in our homes. When the blooms finish, it will be time to fertilize them and watch the leaves grow more lush.

In May my bulbs will be transferred to the garden where the bulbs will be replenished as the foliage continues to grow…

Garden Week in Georgia: Member Reflections–We Grow Our Gardens Row by Row, One Flower at A Time

Garden Week In Georgia, Gardening, Plants

Friends, plants, gardens, and friendship go and grow hand in hand as you’ll see in these thoughts from RGC members who share how their gardens grew, row by row, with flowers from their friends.

Roz: Most of the plants in my sun room were given to me by friends and family. These photos show plants from hiking, synagogue, and garden club friends and ONE (green pot) from my Mother.

When Mom moved out of her house in Brooklyn, she gifted me with her only houseplant. The plant ‘lived’ with me in New Jersey and then traveled with me to Georgia. I think about my Mom, who passed in 2008, when I care for her plant.

When plants from friends show significant growth and/or bloom, I send photos. During the worst of the Pandemic I spent many hours in the sun room with the plants. Although I live alone, my friends were often with me as I tended their plants.

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