Ladner Seedy Saturday Presents Bill Bischoff

Ladner Seedy Saturday is pleased to have Bill Bischoff speaking about Hardy Cyclamens this weekend. Please join us in welcoming him. Bill wrote the following about his presentation. He will be speaking at 12:15 pm at Ladner Baptist Church in the Fireside Room, 5624 Ladner Trunk Road in Ladner.

"With this presentation we aim to entice more gardeners to the pleasures of growing “Hardy Cyclamen”, in their gardens. Our talk is based on some 22 years of “hands-on” experiences in our garden in Surrey, BC. The genus of Cyclamen contains some 22 species, including many sub-species, varieties, and cultivars. The individual species bloom at a specific time of the year. By careful selection, one can have Cyclamen flowers at every month of the year. Most growers however, cultivate these Garden-Jewels for their almost endless varieties of leaf-forms and patterns. The species of Cyclamen hederifolium, as an example, has so many different and enticing leaf forms and patterns, that I must say that I have never seen two plants exactly the same. Most of these species keep their leaves during the winter, thus decorating our gardens during the otherwise rather bleak winter moths. During the hot summer months however, with the exception of one ( C. purpurascens ), all Cyclamen are dormant. Cyclamen purpurascens, is evergreen throughout the year and has also the longest flowering period. Also very important is that Cyclamen are hardly ever damaged by wild-life. We will explain their natural and geographical distribution, the sources of their names and their use throughout time. Included in the presentation will be cultural requirements, soils and planting instructions. Most Cyclamen like shady areas, where some species grow best in full shade. We grow many species and varieties under trees and bushes, especially under Rhododendrons. Members of garden clubs are invited to visit our garden to see first hand the success we had with these plants. Some plants are available for sale throughout the year."

By Bill Bischoff

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Its Official!

Its official. We finally received our incorporation papers. I know, what does that have to do with a community garden? Well you just don't start planting as we found out very quickly. You have to apply for a name for your society through the provincial government. First you apply for a name by checking trademarks and copyrights. Luckily Ladner Community Garden Society wasn't taken. You pay a fee for the name right away. The next step is applying for incorporation. You want to form a society and have directors as you can't lease public space without going through this process. Okay, another fee, a hundred dollars to be exact. Applying for incorporation is writing bylaws which can be painful at best if you want to write your own. Thank you Mark for doing such a wonderful job writing our bylaws. If you don't write your own, there are easier ways such as following out set bylaws as given in the Society Act. Our hard work as paid off as we received our red seal of approval

Growing Your Own Food

Carrot harvest Growing your own food just became even more important than ever. As prices increased this fall we saw lettuce and cauliflower go up in price. Reasons for that are many but the drought we had could be one of the reasons. Overall the transportation costs of everything are up due to the high cost of fuel and that's being passed on to the consumer. Of course, many of us are not earning any more than we did before. I predict that 2023 will see another resurgence of food growing like we did at the beginning of the pandemic. Some of us may be doing it with less space than we had before so that creates more challenges. Just to let you know how popular gardening has become, our community garden has a waitlist of over twenty people. They may not get a spot in the garden for several years. It's probably time for a new community garden to be set up in the community. To save money in the winter think about growing crops that store well like carrots, potatoes, win

Ladner Seedy Saturday is Only a Few Weeks Away!

Yes, it's time for Ladner Seedy Saturday and Garden Expo 2018. Our organizing committee is busy behind the scenes registering new and returning vendors, booking speakers and organizing the seed swap for the event. Are you a vendor wanting to come to Seedy Saturday? We still have a few tables left for lease. I am excited about our two speakers coming this year. Janis Matson is a well known garden speaker and owns Shoreline Landscape Design. Janis is an instructor at Kwantlen Polytechnic University in Langley and also teaches classes at VanDusen Botanical Garden. Janis will be teaching us how to use ornamental grasses in the home garden. Our next speaker is Randal Atkinson. Known as West Coast Garden' s Plant Expert Extraordinaire, Randal is the go to person for design, plant selection, growing and care of plants. Randal is passionate about gardening and loves sharing his knowledge with the public. You can often see him teaching classes at West Coast Garden centre

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