Main purpose of our club
Learning about horticulture and friends, promote the love of gardening and educate members, learning about plants and gardening, plants and fellowship, special camaraderie with fellow gardeners together and share information about gardening, educate us all on growing beautiful plants in our home gardens, build community, to gain knowledge about plants and exchange knowledge about plants and share fellowship, meet with friends and learn about plants, fun, education and great food from Laura, plants and garden education, to promote and educate members in gardening including edibles, trees, veggies, herbs, ornamentals and include wildlife, share information with others on planting tips, flowers, gardens, trees, and make us smarter to plant better and scholarships are very important that allow young people to learn and someday teach horticulture to others, promote horticulture and inform public about our club, shows and sales, to share information about plants that do well in Austin, education, fun, socialization, interacting with others over like or common interests, fellowship, fun and education, plant awareness, gardening fellowship, education, great programs on gardening, fellowship centered around gardening and sharing gardening knowledge with others
Club activities that you enjoy most
A variety, How-to programs, grow, show and build etc everything to do with gardening, hands-on projects – I always remember the staghorn fern and the saw, knowledgeable speakers, good speakers, tours, Q & A, sharing ideas and auction, raffles and the various topics and talks, lectures and demonstrations, hands on type activities and field trips and video, how to clinics on variety of topics, hands on workshops, listening to speakers and talking to people, interactive like sales and auctions, knowledgeable speakers to share their successful garden/plant practices, field trips, garden tours, interactive discussions, demonstrations on how to from propagating and cultivating, road trips, the programs are the best, field trips, Sunday Stroll was great, all programs
Suggestions for improving our club meetings
Involve membership more, present format is great, only my second meeting, bring more people to our meeting and perhaps we can do monthly announcement in the Statesman, I believe our meetings are effective and efficient with our time, and they are timely, information and fun, bring back trade a plant – bring one, take one, fewer lectures and some are good, can’t think of any, maybe a plant of the month with handout – ½ sheet and suggestions where/how to use, more educational rather than social, less clipboard passing and more sign up as one comes in the door, new varieties from Tx A&M Horticultural Division, informal get-togethers, fewer announcements and clipboards at beginning, start programs promptly, none
Program topics of most interest to you
Vegetable gardening, exotic flowers, growing, fertilizing, propagating, composting, water features, tour to Peckerwood Gardens or Yucca Do, Xeric gardening, preparing soil for planting, best watering practices, pests, identification and control of plant diseases, how to work smarter not harder in the garden, palms, I enjoy all that we have done this year, roses, trees, shade plants, mixing plants and vegetables together, tropicals, vegetable gardening, rose info, pruning, growing bougainvillea, growing iris, organic gardening and new developments including research, once a year field trip, garden tours, growing edibles and how to cook them, plants and how to grow different types and tips on local growing, after this past year lack of H20 programs that demonstrate lawn and gardens that need less water, lawn care and no water, special speakers on what they are pros in, native plants and perennials and garden design, anything about plants, all of them related to plants, ferns and bromeliads, lawns and new types of grasses, I’d like to see a “plant exchange.” It could be done via internet – an actual exchange – not give aways!
Preferred program format
An assortment, hands on like the staghorn fern workshop, demonstrations and hands on/make it, photo/plants, lectures, Q & A, garden tours, all of above especially garden tours, show and tell, lectures and demonstrations, members telling about trips or hobbies, lectures and demonstrations and garden tours, how to save your trees, a mixture of each category during the year, demonstrating, hands on/ make it, garden tours, lectures OK if not boring, I like demonstrations and hands on and tours, all of above, a miscellaneous mix, all of value and more door prizes (It’s fun to win!), we have missed several years – garden tours, more garden tours, mostly lectures, however a variety of methods are refreshing, all of them, I like to talk with an expert., all are good, although the hands on would have to be something interesting to all which is a tough call. Would like to see us on on some garden tours or “nursery crawls.” Enjoyed the Great Outdoors evenings.
Projects you would like us to work on
Water conservation methods, soaker hoses, drip irrigation, field trips to see members’ gardens, another spiller and thriller type project, your examples are great ideas, all the above, preparing hanging baskets and craft projects, all good examples like we had a few months ago – Great!, native plants for drought, hanging baskets using plants to make things, like making a basket, flower arranging, etc., mixed planter and baskets, prepare a hanging basket, I would like to see how to grow a zeroscape garden, put together window box with coco liner with plants on top and coming though on bottom like they made at Pots and Plants, install a water feature, making planters, making herb butter, hanging baskets, judging workshop, Central Texas plants, Zeroscaping, shade garden, more on bluebonnets and other wildflowers, demonstrations on sharpening tools with grinders – how to take pruners apart to do this, etc.
Recommended program speakers
Cheryl McLaughlin with Kevin Wood Landscapes (they do landscape design, installation and maintenance plus hardscape and water features, a speaker that can help with drought growing gardens, Natural Gardener John Dromgoole, Laura Joseph, Tom Spencer, Sandi Schmitz, Don Gardner, speaker about tree care, local nurseries talking about their specialty plants, professor from St. Edwards who talks about wasps, people with knowledge, like to help get speakers for the club, Ron Miller on bougainvilleas, Don Freeman on roses, Master Gardener program and how to be a MG, Scott Ogden, Paul Yura from the National Weather Service in New Braunfels, Fern Workshop – Naud Burnet from Casa Flora, someone from Botany at UT, people from other clubs, Master Gardeners, I’d recommend checking the Speakers Bureau of the Master Gardeners.
