The Success of Mississippi State’s “Southern Gardening” by Garden Rant

These days I follow dozens of gardening channels on Youtube, especially those of Extension universities, where there are hundreds of good veg-growing videos are to be found. Except for the topic of turfgrass, videos about ornamentals are a lot less common.

So naturally I noticed this guy – Gary Bachman, with an actual Ph.D. – teaching ornamental gardening for Mississippi State’s “Southern Gardening”. The videos – now 190 of them – are made available at no charge to TV stations across the South, about 90 percent of which DO air them on their local news shows. Southern Gardening launched in 1996 and Bachman became the second host of the show in 2010.

In a phone call, Bachman told me that for Mississippi State it’s about using nontraditional ways to teach the public to garden. Besides local TV, the videos are available on Youtube, on Facebook, and as a podcast. Bases covered.

The approach taken in the videos is very much “Here’s how to have a pretty garden.” In fact, Bachman told me was directed to make “pretty videos that get people into gardening” and “We need sexy color to get people’s attention.” I call that knowing your audience.

Something else nontraditional here is Bachman himself, with his costumes, TV spoofs (see “CSI: Crimes against Horticulture”) and the occasional witchcraft.

It sure seems to be working. Southern Gardening is the most recognizable Extension activity among the public, with a weekly audience of 400,000, in-state alone. The Southern Gardening newspaper column that Bachman pens each week is also popular, adding to SG’s total weekly reach of 2 million people.

Which makes me wonder how, with other Extension U’s seeing reductions in funding, Mississippi State has continued to provide such extensive public outreach? Bachman says it gets funded because the audience numbers generate LOTS of “contacts,” which in the Extension world is how states assess its impact. And the public clearly loves it.

Episodes are filmed in-house by the University’s Agricultural Communications Department, using a team of three when they’re on the road.

I wonder too if this Extension program in particular benefits from national Extension’s roots in agriculture, which is still such an important segment of the Mississippi economy. Their extensive programming for farmers includes the weekly show FarmWeek.

I was also curious about Bachman himself, with his aging hippie look (my tribe!) and no Southern accent to be heard. Turns out he grew up in Detroit, where he stayed through his first career with a tool company. Then afflicted with an itch for change, he moved to South Carolina to study horticulture at Clemson.

Having moved northward from the South myself, I wondered how he’d adjusted to the reverse migration, landing in the Deep South, no less. Well, shut my assuming-too-much-mouth, he informed me that he and his wife LOVE living on the Gulf Coast in the little town of Ocean Springs, population 10,000.

Sure enough, it looks as pretty as it sounds, and they’re ready for retirement, beating the migration southward from places like Detroit.

The Success of Mississippi State’s “Southern Gardening” originally appeared on Garden Rant on July 14, 2017.

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At A Glance: More On The News From Branch

The Stuart garden dining table was so many years in the making. To see that table in production is a dream come true. I am a designer, first and foremost. To see a design come together and get built is what keeps me designing. I am very lucky to have a steady stream of clients [...]

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The Garden and Nursery Boat by Allen Bush

Photo from the 1924 film: The Dramatic Life of Abraham Lincoln.

I stared out my elementary school window for years, bored out of my skull, determined to forsake fractions for adventure. The Ohio River, my escape route, was a few miles away.

My curiosity for the river life was inspired by Huckleberry Finn and amplified years later by Harlan Hubbard’s Shanty Boat and the follow-up, Shantyboat on the Bayous, both published in the 1950s.

Carolyn Brooks must have read my mind when she sent me an email a few weeks ago:

“I am attaching a charming little clipping I found in an 1837 issue of the New Orleans True American. I never know what to do with the wonderful little tidbits I find on subjects completely unrelated to whiskey, but I try and think of somebody who might appreciate them.”

The clipping pertained to botanical goods for sale from the boat of John D. Stack, at a landing in New Orleans that year.

Ad from the New Orleans “True American.” March 2, 1837.

Carolyn Brooks is an historian, currently researching whiskey and brandy arrivals and sales in New Orleans. “Cargoes of whiskey” were shipped down the river, but I had never heard of a garden and nursery boat. I was fascinated with the image of a boatload of plants making its slow way to river ports and gardens unknown.

Harlan and Anna Hubbard navigated the rivers over 100 years after John D. Stack. The Hubbards were resourceful but didn’t care about making money. If they’d been from the same era as Mr. Stack, I can imagine the Hubbards might have tried to barter one of Harlan’s paintings for a half-dozen “splendid double dahlias” and a “variety of garden seeds” from J.D. Stack.

In the foreword to Shantyboat on the Bayous, Don Wallis quotes Harlan Hubbard. “We went to the riverbank, built a shanty boat and began a new life together.” They departed from Brent, KY, near Cincinnati on the Ohio River, and “negotiated the treacherous Mississippi River—“a fool’s graveyard” with their “tools, books, dogs (Skipper and Sambo), bicycle, scraps of material, summer and winter clothing, violin, viola, cello and equipment for painting.” They reached the Louisiana bayous in a little under four years (1946-1950).

The Hubbards stopped to plant vegetable gardens along the way and eventually came back and settled at Payne Hollow, along the Ohio River in Trimble County, KY. Here they gardened, fished, played music, painted and lived a simple and happy life.

Harlan Hubbard. Photo: Shantyboat Living

Carolyn Brooks emailed more information about J.D. Stack, the flat boater and nurseryman. “I am a research nut,” she said.

“John D. Stack lived all of his adult life in Steubenville, OH.  He is listed in the 1850 federal census as a ‘gardener’ and in the 1860 census as a ‘horticulturalist.’  In 1850 he appeared to be rather prosperous with a personal estate of $6,000, but by 1857 he was forced to sell large amounts of his property, and by 1860 his personal estate was listed as $200.”

Ad from the Vicksburg Weekly. January 17, 1837.

Carolyn adds: “The flatboat trip may have been a one-time venture.  I did find one more wonderful ad from a stop in Vicksburg, MS, obviously on that same trip. He probably made multiple stops as he made his way down the river. Then, as you probably know, the flatboat would have been sold and broken up in New Orleans. It is amazing to think of navigating a flatboat down the river system so far, but it was quite common for the boats to come from Pittsburgh and its environs.”

Years have gone by since I began plotting my future on the river. I didn’t keep pace with my childhood dream. I never made it past the McAlpine Locks and Dam, near downtown Louisville. But I still daydream about floating down the Ohio River and the mighty Mississippi.

Engraving from steamboattimes.com

I can see it now.

My own flatboat, or shanty boat, is loaded, full of plants for sale or barter.

One week only…25% off of aromatic aster, Japanese roof Iris, Joe-Pye weed, crinums, phloxes and seedling white oaks!

Coming soon to a river town near you.

The Garden and Nursery Boat originally appeared on Garden Rant on July 12, 2017.

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DIY Retaining Wall Makeover

The post DIY Retaining Wall Makeover appeared first on Miss Smarty Plants.

Its been a crazy busy time for us– there seem to be an unending number of projects and tasks for us to take on in our new home. Nonetheless, this DIY retaining wall project has been one of my favorites!  We spent about two hours working on this and I couldn’t be more please with the results. Just see for yourself…

We were lucky to have a pile of this limestone already on site. Before starting we decided to use what we had, not to buy any more, but hopefully to get the height we needed.

The old railroad ties originally used for this retaining wall have seen better days. This is on the backside of our house, and the saying “out of sight, out of mind” was probably never more true than here. The others around the house have been replaced, but this is tucked between the deck and garage and didn’t seem too important. Until now, that is!

Our first step of this DIY retaining wall project was to remove the old railroad ties that were already in place. Due to the fact of their 20+ years in this location, they were easy to pull off and remove.

It is difficult to see, but when we did this project in late April, the hostas and ferns in this bed were just starting to show buds. It was nice to have most of the soil stay in place so as to not disturb these too much. As you can see in the first photo, they haven’t skipped a beat and look great now.

With the old wall removed, our first layer of limestone had to be done right. This first layer was leveled and extended a few feet further (under the deck) than the earlier version. We did our best to alternate long pieces of stone with short pieces, hoping that for our next layer we wouldn’t have any seams right on top of each other.

 

To keep this DIY retaining wall project as simple as possible, we didn’t cut any of these stones. We tried our best to get the “seams” at the front to be tight so that if the stone was broken at an angle, that angle would be open to the interior part of the flower bed.

On the corner we also alternated the crossing of the ends to help with some added strength.

The layers continued to build really well!  It was surprising how quickly these came together. Knowing that we were only using the limestone we had made it easy to know when to stop– and also when to not be too picky!  As we got near the final few layers we tried to keep some of the longest pieces as our top piece. The smaller sections were easy to secure and include lower down.

The before and after of our DIY retaining wall project. What a difference a couple of hours will make!

 

 

 

The post DIY Retaining Wall Makeover appeared first on Miss Smarty Plants.

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Garden Bloggers take DC (area) by Elizabeth Licata

Outside the Hirshhorn in DC (by Jimmie Durham)

First, it must be stressed that I am not a good tour taker. I love looking at gardens, but I can enjoy a smaller garden pretty quickly, and then I’m done. I’m better in big public gardens, where you can keep moving and there’s always something different around the corner. That said, I found plenty to absorb my attention during the recent DC-area garden bloggers get-together, which was packed with really cool gardens, small and large. Organizer Tammy Schmitt did a great job. However, I was not able to see all the gardens on the schedule, as it was my first trip to DC and I had to take time out to see all the iconic sights that are probably old news to most of you.

Hillwood

And finally, just one more caveat. I was probably the only person there shooting with an iphone. One blogger had three cameras with her, two hung around her neck at all times, and everybody else also had professional SLR equipment. Click here, which has the posts from the event,  to view the superior results.

Without further ado, here are my Fling takeaways.

Capitol area gardens include many of the same plants as WNY gardens. I was pleased to see extensive use of plants that have long been mainstays for me, as with this hakonechloa/hollow log array above. This was a minimalist space in Bethesda; I say minimalist because just a few plants (including my other favorites, Verbena bonariensis and tall rudbeckia) were used in profusion.

Dumbarton Oaks

I must be harboring a lot of 1 percenter envy because I really do love the large estate gardens, such as Hillwood (former home of Marjorie Merriweather Post) and Dumbarton Oaks (historic gardens designed by Beatrice Ferrand). Highlights of Dumbarton include a large pebble garden and many traditional water features, including a big stagnant pool/amphitheater I kind of liked. Hillwood had beautifully divided areas; you were always discovering different little garden rooms.

My favorite private garden (though I missed some great ones on Sunday) was a lush, layered space in Bethesda (2 views above) that was relatively small with an elevated back garden. As you can see, this elevation was used to create a wonderful waterfall/pond. There were also great combos of perennials and annuals in the beds. That’s really something I should do more often.

National Arboretum

MLK memorial

The best day was spent with fellow Ranter Susan Harris, who graciously took me around the major DC sites, as well as Dumbarton Oaks, the National Arboretum, and Tudor Place (another estate garden). We caught up over a fun lunch in Georgetown, and I’m looking forward to more catching up with Susan and other Flingers when the GWA takes place in Buffalo next month.

Susan in DC

I leave you with words from the FDR memorial, kind of sad to read, these days.

Garden Bloggers take DC (area) originally appeared on Garden Rant on July 11, 2017.

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The Stuart Garden Dining Table

Though I have not posted in a good while about the Branch Studio, their work has been newsworthy. Every week they are shipping out stock and custom made steel ornament for the garden. It has been an incredibly busy season so far for them. Stock? Branch manufactures a stock line of garden boxes, pergolas, and [...]

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I’m a City Center Gardener by Susan Harris

People in my town routinely pass this garden spot as they walk from the parking lot to the town center (appropriately named Roosevelt Center, since the town was built as a New Deal works and housing project).

But walk a few more steps and just before reaching the Center you see this pitiful sight – only imagine the bare space covered in weeds most of the year. Besides weeds, there were established Nandinas and some sad, crispy hostas and a hydrangea, left over from a shadier era before the first tree there died.

Why the weedy mess? Because the city stopped using herbicides without having an alternative weed strategy.

Avid gardeners will understand my reaction to the high-visibility weed patch, which was to get SO sick of the eyesore that I finally adopted the spot. I did it not guerrilla-style, but with the permission of the city’s director of horticulture, who immediately saw the adoption as lightening his crew’s workload.

So here’s the first stage of the much-needed make-over, with two Anthony Waterer Spireas the city let me move from a spot they weren’t noticed, two pink single Knockout roses that’ll stay 3′ tall or so, some free Phlox and Siberian iris, and in front, several clumps of of Sedum takesimense from my garden.

Sedum takesimense

I have high hopes that the Sedum will do what it does so well – fill in so quickly and thoroughly that nary a weed will ever land on it and germinate. A green mulch to end the cycle of weeding and mulching.

Before the Sedum spreads to fill in the space, though, it needs protection from foot damage.  A city gardener once told me that if it’s convenient for people to step on plants in public areas, they will. His preferred plant-protection scheme is to use stones, the bigger the better, and I’m on the prowl for some free stones to install among the Sedum.

Public Space Gardening

Like most public gardens, this one will take some abuse – maybe plants getting stepped on (though hopefully not stolen), and definitely cigarette butts and other trash being tossed on it. But in the few weeks I’ve been watering this garden  and pruning the many overgrown Spireas nearby, I’ve loved the passersby and their questions, even “Do you know what you’re doing?”

The question I hear the most, though, is “Why are you doing this? Are they paying you?” The incredulity on their faces reminds me that we gardeners are really a tribe apart. You guys know why I’m doing it, right?

I’m a City Center Gardener originally appeared on Garden Rant on July 3, 2017.

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