Kanata-March Horticultural Society

 February 2009

In This Issue

President's Message

Next Meeting: Feb 3

KMHS Announcements:

Down the Garden Path

Topic of the month: Seeds

Members' Corner: Invasive Plants

Things to do and see

Newsletter Input

 

 

ORCHID NEEDS

LIGHT: Orchids enjoy a spot near or in a bright window. You’ll want to avoid direct mid-day sun but early morning or late afternoon sun is great. An east or west facing window is ideal. In darker or cloudy environments a shaded southern window might be best.

WATER: Moth orchids do not like to be dry to the point of wilting. They should be watered thoroughly and then not again until the media is nearly, but not completely, dry.  Once every week to 10 days is a good starting point.

SOIL MEDIA: Because the Phalaenopsis is watered frequently, the potting breaks down about every two years. Spring or fall is considered the best time to repot because the temperature is generally mild, preventing shock. Use a medium grade orchid bark mix for plants in 5" pots and above.

 

 

 

 

 

President’s Message

 

Gardening is best done among friends. A number of years ago I was at our local Costco and spotted a wonderful display of Phalaenopsis orchids in a handful of colors. Phalaenopsis is one of the most popular orchids available and you will find them for sale everywhere. Well, needless to say, when I spotted the orchids, I knew one would be coming home with me. My house plant collection was in need of more color.

 

My experience turned into a growing admiration for orchids. I later learned that my orchid is commonly referred to as the "moth orchid". Phalaenopsis are one of the longest blooming orchid genera, producing flowers that last from 2 to 6 months before dropping—absolutely amazing! I certainly got the color that I wanted in the house. I've also been successful at getting it to flower almost continuously throughout the year. It is my understanding that Phalaenopsis have also been known to bloom 2 to 3 times per year, once they have reached a mature size.

 

        

You can imagine what happened next: why a second one was added, of course. And before long it too was flowering happily for months on end. Now I was running into another problem, color balance, or at least that was what I was telling myself. Deep down I really wanted another orchid. For all of you reading, be aware: buying your first orchid can be addictive. My third Phalaenopsis had a striking spotted pink on white look, and the three of them together flowering was a beautiful sight.

 

I had become so accustomed with the continuous flowering of the other two that I simply expected the third to follow suit. A year and a half later, no blooms! I tried talking to it, but held off. I didn't want my kids to think that Daddy was losing it! Frustration was creeping in, and then I met a new friend. He had a plethora of orchids and we talked and talked. During one of our conversations I mentioned number three, the bloomless one. He systematically walked me through the important needs of orchids to determine what was wrong.

 

1. LIGHT - it was facing east, and the other two orchids love it there and are flowering well. No problem here.

 

2. WATER - I water once per week and make sure the pot does not sit in water. Again, no problem here.

 

3. SOIL MEDIA - The first two were in bark and the third in sphagnum moss. My friend immediately says, "that's it! You need to change it to bark"! The roots are too wet and the orchid is not happy.

 

So off to the gardening centre I go to get some bark. By the way, orchid bark does not come in single orchid quantities—remember my addictive note! So, in case any of you want some bark, please send me an email before one of our general meetings and I'll bring it along. So by now you're probably curious to know if it worked. Well, yes, it did. Two months after the soil media change, I got my first flowering stem and this month the first flower from number three in almost two years. Yippee!

Robert Barta. KMHS President
 

 

Our Meetings

Regular meetings are held the first Tuesday of each month at the Old Town Hall, March Road, Kanata.

 

Guests are most welcome The $5.00 charge can be applied to membership of $15.00 single, $25.00 family.

 

Greta's Organic Gardens

Next Meeting: Feb 3rd

Water Gardens and Aquatic Plants with Martin Brunet and our Annual Seed Exchange


Tuesday, Feb 3rd, 7.30 pm, Old Town Hall, March Road, Kanata

 

Martin is part of the local Gloucester company, Greta’s Organic Gardens, which specializes in organic seeds. However, Martin will be talking to us, not about seeds, but about how we can use water and aquatic plants in our gardens to add variety to our gardening and at the same time attract more wildlife to the garden.

Elizabeth Stokely, KMHS Program Director

 

Seed Exchange 2009

Come join the fun at our next monthly meeting! On February 3rd, 2009 KMHS will be hosting its third annual Seed Exchange. How does it work?

 

1)     Bag up any fresh seeds you have collected. You can use plastic snack bags, 35mm film canisters, paper envelopes etc.

 

2)     Place 10 to 15 seeds in each bag

 

3)     Label your contents with as much information as you can.

 

§         Common name of plant

§         Latin name

§         Bloom color

§         Height and width of plant

§         Bloom time

§         Your name and phone number

§         Needed growing conditions (sun, moist soil)

§         Any other useful notes (self seeds, invasive, difficult to germinate)

 

4)     Bring them in early to the meeting (6:30pm) for the volunteers to sort

 

5)     Note how many packets you brought in. This will be the number you will be allowed to select and take home.

 

After the participants in the exchange are done, all remaining seeds will be sold off to other members for $0.25 per pack.

 

I will be at the Old Town Hall at 6:30pm for anyone who would like to use the labeling system designed for this event. Please, please have your container labeled with the name of the seed, details of the plant (bloom color etc.) and any special growing instructions. I have special tags made up for identification, if you wish to use them. If anyone needs containers, I have a surplus of small baggies which the members can use. Please come early to organize your seeds.

If you would like to receive copies of the seed labels electronically or have comments for improvements to this event please contact me at redahoy@yahoo.ca

Heather Lee, KMHS Secretary

 

Key Links

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2009 Membership Form

 

 

 

 

 

 

Picasa 3

KMHS Announcements

2008 Photo Competition

 

If you were at the Pot Lock supper in December you will know that this year’s photography competition went very well indeed. Entries were of a very high standard, making the judge’s job a difficult one. In all we had over 130 photos entered in 12 categories, with 11 entrants. Points are awarded to the best three photos in each category and individuals’ scores are tallied to decide the overall winner.

 

Our top three entrants this year were Karen Haddon, in a splendid first place, followed by Norma Davidson and Heather Lee. Congratulations to you all and thank you to all our members who continue to support the competition. The best picture in show, which now graces the front of our yearbook, was submitted by Derek MacLeod, with Heather Lee mounting a very close challenge with one of her photos.

 

For those of you whose thoughts might be turning to this year’s competition, it appears (although it’s not guaranteed) that submission of more entries provides a higher chance of placing well. Some categories had few entries, so they may be areas to focus on. The categories for this year will be up online as soon as they are determined. Watch this space for more information.

 

Karl Siemens, KMHS Photography Committee

 

Bus Tours: 

 

Given the success of our visit last year to the Montreal Botanic gardens, we would like to arrange another bus tour for members this year. Do you have ideas of places you would like to visit with the society? We will have a questionnaire for you at the next meeting, so please give this some thought before you come.

 

2009 Memberships:

 

The lucky winner of our early bird membership contest was Jean Savage, who will receive a Lee Valley gift certificate for a special gardening treat for herself. We have had an excellent sign up this year already, but if any of you haven’t yet managed to renew for 2009, don’t forget to bring your membership form to our next meeting. Get the most value out of your yearbook/calendar, which is ready and waiting for you!

Jane Bouchard, Membership Secretary

 

Picasa 3:

 

At the start of our meetings and during the coffee breaks, we like to show some of our members’ horticultural photographs. Especially at this time of the year, some garden photos are most uplifting. Here’s a suggestion about an easy way to pull together a short slideshow of some of your favorite garden shots.

 

Many gardeners are now taking advantage of the ease of use of digital photography, but most of us soon end up with far too many pictures, which makes managing them a nightmare and sharing them with friends almost an impossibility.

 

Google has come to the rescue with Picasa 3, a free software package that allows you to catalogue, sort and view your photographs. Just Google Picasa 3 download, to reach the page with information and download details. Once Picasa 3 is installed on your machine, it will automatically catalogue all your pictures, wherever they are stored on your computer.

Once you have your pictures in the library, then you can start having fun. Some pictures may not be exactly to your liking and you may want to do some editing. Picasa has some of the most common photo editing tools such as cropping, removing red eye, straightening etc. Simply click on the picture you want to edit and on the left of the screen a very simple set of tools appears that you can apply to the photograph.

 

If you want to share your photographs with your gardening friends, you can very easily create an impressive slide show, complete with music. Select all the pictures you want to show, hold them in the selection box and then select Movie. You will then have the option of adding music to accompany the presentation, provided you have some digitally encoded music in MP3 format. (Get this from your youngsters’ IPod sources or just download something from the internet.) Classical music is good to accompany garden pictures and many computers now come with sample music files that you simply load into your Movie Maker folder in Picasa.

 

Once you’ve selected your pictures and music, Picasa will make a slide show. This takes a few minutes, but once it’s done, you can then display the presentation on the computer or even upload it to You Tube.

 

Just copy the movie to a disc or USB key and bring it to the next KMHS meeting for presentation: we will play it as people are arriving or at coffee break.

 

David Davidson, KMHS Treasurer


Missing Yearbooks: 

Our historian, Gisèle Robertson, is collecting copies of all the yearbooks produced by KMHS since 1981. She is missing a copy of the 1995 book. Do any of you have a copy of this that you would be prepared to part with for the society’s records?

 
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Down the Garden Path

The Christmas cactus – Part 2:  In December, I wrote about the Christmas cactus donated to KMHS in 1975 by Mr. H. Sisson. If you are wondering what happened to that plant, by going through the archives by going through the archives I found out that it was removed from the March Library in 1979 for a visit to a “Health Spa” for tired plants. It was replaced by one of its much smaller offspring. The beautiful macramé plant hanger holding it was moved to the Bill McNeil Lounge at the John Mlacak Centre.

 

Governor General’s greenhouse:  In order to get them through the 1987 winter blahs, members of the Society were fortunate to have a guided tour of the Governor General’s greenhouse. It was shortly before the visit of U.S. President Ronald Reagan and everything was just about at peak bloom. It must have been a great trip out.

 

Trevor Cole as guest speaker:  In March 1987 Trevor Cole, well known horticulturalist with Agriculture Canada, discussed the topic of hybrids. In his work Mr. Cole developed hybrid flowers and vegetables. Members were especially interested in the hardy roses that were being named after Canada’s early explorers.

 

Honours at OHA Convention:  KMHS brought home some honours from the OHA Annual Convention held in Ottawa in the summer of 1988. Members Gail Brooker and Lenore Fentiman took first prizes for their specimen flowers, while Chris Temple took second prize for decorative arrangements. The society’s newsletter, written by Darlene Scales, won second prize in its category.

 

A Puzzle for you:  I will leave you with some ideas submitted by KMHS members in the spring of 1989. If you think you know why they were submitted let me know; who knows, you may win a prize!! (Executive and directors are not eligible, as they already know the solution!). The answer will be in next month’s newsletter.

 

·         “Come Grow With Us!”

·         “Live up to your potentilla and bloom with us” 

·         “Put down roots in Kanata-March” 

·         “Grow and Show” 

·         “Gardeners have dirty fingernails and serene psyches”

·         “Gardeners are an earthy lot”

·         “Help the ozone layer – Plant a tree”

·         “Gardeners are down to earth”

 

and there are more….

Gisèle Robertson, KMHS Historian

Key links

KMHS Help To

 

 

 

Harvest your own sprouts


Pat and Melanie's photos
 

Topic of the Month: Seeds

As we have our annual seed exchange this month, I thought it would be useful to let new members know that there is a brief overview of seed starting techniques on the website on the Help To page. This covers how to care for seeds and seedlings throughout the germination process, until they are ready to find a home in your garden.

 

If any of you are craving for a glimpse of greenery, sprouting seeds on your windowsill or kitchen counter might provide a temporary “fix”, until spring comes along. The plants, as well as being decorative, would add a fresh boost to winter salads. Stephen Westcott-Gratton has an excellent how-to article in the latest online edition of Canadian Gardening. A link to this can be found on the left.

 

Finally, a little off the topic of seeds, I found a wonderful website the other day, when I was trying to see if others in the Ottawa area had also seen were a large flock of what I thought were Bohemian Waxwings. They have been haunting our fields for the last couple of weeks and are very beautiful birds, if they happen to stop close enough and long enough for us to have a good view. If you like birds, you will love the pictures on this website. I have decided to abandon my bird book in favor of this site, as the photos were mostly taken round here and are truly excellent for identifying small creatures. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.

 

Margaret Turner, Newsletter Editor

 

Key links

 

 

KMHS Help To

 

 

Invasive plants

 

Members’ Corner: Invasive Plants

 

The latest nursery ‘must-have’ or a natural invader?

The latest nursery or mail order ‘must-have’ for your garden may seem to be just what your garden needs—the colour of flower that will complement the garden palette, or perhaps the right texture of foliage to accent the house or garden sculpture. As plans for new plant purchases are made, be sure to include some background fact-checking to ensure the ‘must-have’ will not soon become a natural invader—an exotic plant species that escapes your garden and starts to wreak havoc in our wonderful natural spaces—parks, forests, marshes.

 

Two great resources can help guide gardeners in the right direction. One is a very accessible 8-page PDF document, Natural Invaders, published by Ontario Nature – Federation of Ontario Naturalists. As it is written for Ontario residents, it lists invasive plant species and native plant alternatives specific to the province. This has been put up on the KMHS website on the Help To page. Another easy-to-use resource is the website provided by the Canadian Botanical Conservation Network/Le Réseau Canadien pour la Conservation de la Flore (see link to the left). This bilingual site lists plants by herbaceous species, trees and shrubs & vines.

Sarah Dehler, KMHS member

 

 

Key links

 

 

OVRGHS

 

 

SGHS

 

 

OHA

 

 

OBGS

 

 

Centrepointe Box Office

 

 

Julie's website

Things to do and see

 

 

Feb 14th 1:30 p.m. Ottawa Valley Rock Garden and Horticultural Society presents Richard Aubert talking about “Dwarf Conifers”.

Room T130, Building T, Algonquin College, Woodroffe Campus

 

 

Feb 17th 7.30 pm. The Stittsville-Goulbourn Horticultural Society’s monthly meeting will have Belinda Gallagher of Triffids Plants, Georgetown, ON talking about “Unusual Perennials”
Pretty Street Community Centre in Stittsville

 

                 

Feb 24th, 7.30 pm. Ottawa Horticultural Society presents “Getting That Designer Look in Your Garden”, with Philip Tuba, Coordinator Horticultural Technician Program at Algonquin College.

Tom Brown arena 141 Bayview avenue (at Scott)

 

 

Feb 25th 7:00 p.m. The Ottawa Botanical Garden Society and Landscape Ontario jointly present: "Creating the Landscape You Love", a talk by Julie Moir Messervy, the landscape architect who designed the music garden in Toronto. Tickets are $35, available from the Centrepointe Box Office.

Centrepointe Theatre. Free parking.

Margaret Turner, Newsletter Editor
 

Contact us

Email the Executive at KMHS with your ideas and comments about how we can make our society better.

Newsletter Input

All general newsletter input is due to me, Margaret Turner, by the third Friday of the month.