In a community known for nature preserves, prairies and dedication to open space, Lake Forest city officials and residents are focusing on the importance of native planting to help conserve water, promote a healthy ecosystem and connect better with nature.

“Native planting is a subject that’s growing in momentum, not just communitywide but I think on a larger scale,” said Ald. Michael Adelman, 4th Ward. “What we’re trying to do is bring an awareness to residents of a possible new direction that we should all be thinking of going, even as we have evolved into a populated community.”

Adelman led a community forum last week that centered on native plants, the benefits they provide to natural habitats and ecosystems and the ways individuals can incorporate them into the manicured landscapes of their homes.

Four main speakers led the discussion, including Nathan Aaberg of Conserve Lake County, Trish Beckjord of Midwest Groundcovers, John Sentell of Lake Forest Open Lands and John Mariani of Mariani Landscape.

“It’s very encouraging that the City of Lake Forest would have a community forum focused on native plants and that we had people from a variety of age groups there with a lot of interest,” said Aaberg, associate director of Conserve Lake County. “The fact that the village is being proactive and thoughtful about this says a great deal about the city.”

Conserve Lake County helps people in Lake County preserve open land and take care of natural habitats in their communities and homes. It also offers education and advocacy for nature.

Aaberg’s presentation centered on using native plants to conserve natural habitats and species as well as ways to connect people with their environments through a program that offers free consultation on their properties.

“There’s just a lot of people in Lake County who care about nature, and we just want to be the hands and feet that help them to really act, engage and take care of nature,” Aaberg said.

Aaberg also mentioned that Conserve Lake County is holding weekend plant sales throughout May and early June at the Almond Marsh Forest Preserve in Grayslake, with more than 100 species of native plants.

Discussing how people can introduce native plants to their home gardens while maintaining the manicured look of traditional landscapes, Beckjord and Mariani emphasized that native and non-native species can coexist.

Beckjord specializes in sales, consultation and market development for native plants with Midwest Groundcovers, which provides plants and landscaping services to contractors and garden centers, according to its website.

Mariani is design director of Mariani Landscapes, a family-run business in Lake Bluff offering landscape design and maintenance to residential and commercial clients, according to the firm’s website.

Sentell, president of Lake Forest Open Lands, said the mission of his organization is to care for Lake Forest’s natural heritage and environment. In an effort to protect these natural habitats, Sentell said native plants are more cost-effective, require less water, nurture the soil better and can be just as beautiful as non-native varieties.

“With the advent of the emerald ash borer, it’s going to take a toll on our tree population,” Sentell said. “When replacing these trees, planting a native oak tree is one of the best things you can do for nature. I think we’d like to see that Lake Forest can demonstrate to other communities a sense of responsibility to nature.”

Chuck Myers, the city’s superintendent of parks and forestry, said he wished more people had turned out for the forum but that the speakers had done well.

“I thought it was excellent,” Myers said. “They brought awareness to the people that were there, and I think they did a pretty good job of dispelling some myths about native planting, including that a bunch of overgrown weeds shouldn’t be confused with prairie. Beautiful plantings can be had through using natives.”

triblocaltips@tribune.com

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The year of bliss. That’s what the Garden Media Group, one of the top trend-spotting agencies in the U.S., has designated 2013 — the year when gardeners turn their backs on trouble and strife and more actively seek joy and bliss in their everyday life.

“Connecting with nature is a necessity, not a luxury,” says Suzi McCoy, head of the Pennsylvania-based GMG, which releases a Garden Trends Report every year.

“People today want to find bliss in everyday life. Being in nature — either in a garden or park or filling your home with indoor plants — adds immeasurable happiness and wellness to our lives.”

Ms. McCoy says more people are “fed up with complexities of modern life” and are turning their backs on fear and looking for ways to find greater happiness and turn the “ordinary into the extraordinary.”

In its 13th annual report, GMG looks at various emerging and existing trends across North America, as well as in other parts of the world.

Drawing on various research and marketing data, GMG says people are re-evaluating their values and priorities and redefining happiness. They are ultimately coming to the conclusion that gardening is a way to achieve joy and satisfaction, Ms. McCoy says.

People today want to find bliss in everyday life. Being in nature — either in a garden or park or filling your home with indoor plants — adds immeasurable happiness and wellness to our lives

The report also sees the horticulture industry becoming much more aggressive in its presentation of the benefits of gardening as a way to protect the environment, improve health, reduce crime, make the air cleaner and even help kids to become smarter.

Two of the important trend “wave makers,” says GMG, are top horticulture advocates Marvin Miller and Charlie Hall.

Mr. Miller is market research manager for Chicago-based Ball Horticultural, one of the biggest plant companies in the U.S., and president of America in Bloom, an organization that promotes beautification through education and community involvement.

Mr. Hall is a professor in the department of horticultural sciences at the Texas AM University.

Both men are considered highly effective advocates of the benefits of gardening to heal and restore, as well as a way to make the world more beautiful and improve living conditions, all of which result in a greater sense of well-being in a community.

Mr. Miller has produced popular videos demonstrating why plants are more than merely pretty objects, but actually help reduce crime, clean the air and improve health.

Mr. Hall has shown how quality landscaping is a way of increasing property values. He has also argued convincingly that putting money into parks and botanical gardens is a way to create new revenue streams from ecotourism for cities.

Both men, according to GMG, are having a significant impact on the thinking of leaders in government and community circles at all levels, and especially on consumers who agree that there are clear benefits to be gained from gardens.

In terms of specific gardening trends, native and drought-tolerant plants are expected to be even more popular in 2013.

There is also evidence of undiminished enthusiasm for small-space gardening, especially with an emphasis on growing plants in containers.

Gardeners are expected to be smarter spenders in 2013 — pausing to think more critically before spending and making fewer spontaneous purchases.

The rise of WINKs (women with no kids) as a distinct consumer demographic is expected to have an impact on sales of plants and general gardening items this summer.

Interest in firepits, outdoor kitchens and luxury outdoor living spaces is expected to continue in 2013, with a greater accent on professionally installed landscape components, such as customized seating and irrigation systems.

Demand for ready-to-place potted plants will increase, along with more interest in making better use of colour-injecting summer annuals and foliage plants.

But most gardening experts agree that the No. 1 trend in 2013 will continue to be the interest in growing edible plants, as more people decide to try their hand at growing their own food, either in vegetable, herb or fruit gardens, or in containers on decks, patios and balconies.

James Wong, a leading botanist at Kew Botanic Garden in London, is creating a stir within this edible-

gardening craze by focusing on growing unusual rather than traditional vegetables.

His book, Homegrown Revolution, has become a bestseller, in which he puts tomatillo (Physalis philadelphica), at the top of his list of unusual vegetables. This is a lime-flavoured tomato-like fruit that Mr. Wong claims knocks spots off the tomato.

He also focuses on harvesting fiddlehead ferns, day lily buds and bamboo shoots and talks about ways to use dahlia, fuchsia and hosta in the form of roots, berries and shoots respectively.

His other ideas for food gardeners include spraying plants with garlic to deter slugs and snails, sowing in sequence to sustain harvests, and practising multiple-crop planting to reduce weeds, attract pollinators and maximize yields.

There is also expected to be even greater focus on clever plant marketing in 2013 as nurseries explore more creative ways to sell plants.

Costa Farms, of Florida, the biggest supplier of indoor plants in North America, has already teamed up with Miracle-Gro to promote Plants for Clean Air (02 For You) as a way to raise awareness of how plants can be used to boost indoor air quality.

Van Belle Nursery in British Columbia has launched a Bloomin’ Easy blue-pot series of shrubs designed to guarantee success for beginner gardeners.

The nursery is also taking a technological leap by making it possible for consumers to access information and advice via their cellphones.

And Proven Winners, a worldwide promoter of garden-worthy plants, will continue to dominate the summer plant market with an expanded line of colourful combinations created specifically for small-space gardens.

It all sounds blissful to me.

Postmedia News

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Photo

Mark Kindschi

EDGERTON — Mark Kindschi soon will start wearing a one-piece suit with sting-proof gloves. It’s a fashion choice certain to turn heads at his job at Edgerton Hospital.

By June, Kindschi, the hospital’s human resources director, could have hundreds of thousands of new personnel to take care of at the hospital.

The hospital plans to establish an apiary—a honeybee colony, for the uninitiate—and Kindschi, a lifelong beekeeper, will be in charge of caring for the bees there.

The bees, eventually about 360,000 of them, Kindschi said, will live on the community garden grounds at the south end of the hospital campus. All they’ll need is a home, pollen and water.

Kindschi said hospital CEO Jim Pernau began discussing the idea a few months ago of increasing pollination at the hospital’s gardens, which are used to grow healthy food and herbs for local residents and to stock the hospital’s cafeteria and food and patient services with fresh produce and flowers in the summer.

“The gardens were new last year. He believed that we could have had better production had we had better pollination. That’s where the bees come in,” Kindschi said.

Pernau then learned Kindschi is a beekeeper. He approached Kindschi, excited about the potential of a bee colony at the hospital.

There was no question who would become the resident beekeeper.

“I’m the guy that’ll be taking care of the bees, that much is for certain,” Kindschi said.

Kindschi, an Edgerton resident, has been keeping bees for 35 years—since he was a high school student.

He said the hospital’s plans for an apiary include six commercial hives and would provide enough bee power to pollinate the 30-acre community gardens, some of which are divided into residents’ plots.

The same bees will pollinate flowers, landscaping and wooded areas all around the hospital’s 80-acre “healthy village” campus that winds outside the hospital along North Sherman Road.

The hospital’s bees also will benefit the flower and vegetable gardens for neighbors in the immediate area.

“The bees will cover a lot larger area, a lot more ground than just our hospital. They will provide pollination service for up to a mile and a half around the hospital,” Kindschi said.

The hospital is planning to plant a fruit tree orchard next year. The idea is to give patients and visitors a place where they can pick fruit off the tree and eat it on the spot.

The bees will be a boon to that plan, too.

The hospital’s apiary plans haven’t yet touched on honey production. Kindschi said that would be an ancillary part of the bee colony.

“If there is an excess of honey, we will harvest it and utilize it in the cafeteria. It’s not the primary reason for our beekeeping, but the honey will not go to waste,” Kindschi said.

“Italian bees are a pretty docile temperament honeybee. They’re a pretty nice and friendly honeybee. They’re not at all aggressive.

The bees will be most active from mid-spring to fall, but their hives on the hospital grounds will be their year-round home.

“They cluster up in the hive and shiver through the winters. Then in spring, they wake up and get going again,” Kindschi said.

Kindschi’s work as the hospital’s de facto beekeeper will be unpaid volunteer work. He’s also planning beekeeping classes at the hospital over the winter, and the hospital is considering letting him give tours of the hives so residents can see how beekeeping works.

“It’s surprising the number of people who have heard about this plan who come up to me and say, ‘Hey do you have an extra bee suit?'”

The hospital’s apiary plan is still being reviewed by the city, and it faces zoning and conditional-use hurdles before it can be put in place. City officials say the plan could get approval by mid-June.

Under proposed city rules, beekeeping would be allowed in big business and commercial tracts on the outskirts of the city—not residential areas, although some nearby communities outside of Madison allow backyard beekeeping.

For their part, the hospital’s bees are now living in Rock County—and they’re eager to get moving, Kindschi said.

“They’re at an undisclosed location,” Kindschi said, laughing. “No, not really. They’re on the rural property of a friend in the town of Fulton. They’re doing their thing out there, and as soon as we get this zoning issue approved, I’ll move them on the (hospital) property.”

What was once a cement basketball court in north Casper is now the location for 33, 4×8-foot rentable garden plots. Transformation to the Seeds of Sharing Community Gardens comes following hundreds of hours of volunteer hard labor from a wide range of local organizations.

Situated on the grounds of Winter Memorial Presbyterian Church off St. John’s Street, the community garden organizers held the first garden plot registration and neighborhood barbecue May 11. A second such event will take place June 8.

Raised beds rent for $10 for the season and include water and access to tools and compost.

North Casper resident Christopher Weber rented two plots for his family of five.

“I love gardening. We live in an apartment complex and there’s no place for us to have a garden. I lived out in northern California many years ago and was part of a big community garden there and spent a lot of time working the garden and learned to really appreciate not just the gardening aspect, but also the food. Your peppers, your tomatoes, whatever you’re growing out of the garden … it tastes better.”

With no grocery stores located in north Casper, Lori Lancaster, a member of Shepherd of the Hills Presbyterian Church, said addressing that fact is one goal.

“North Casper is kind of a food desert when it comes to fresh produce. There aren’t any grocery stores here except for the Mini-Mart and so we thought it would be a good idea to bring the gardens to the community, both for the gardening and to provide them with fresh vegetables for their homes,” Lancaster said.

Shepherd of the Hills is one of three principle groups behind the project. They’ve provided leadership and hands and feet on the ground, as well as financial support. The initial vision came from members of the Winter Memorial Church. Casper’s Young Rotarians network, Rotaract, have been instrumental in grounding the vision.

Last summer there was a big push to transform the property. Volunteers transformed both a basketball court and the adjacent James Reeb Memorial children’s playground into raised-bed garden spaces.

Additional muscle came from the likes of the Natrona County High School football team and Casper firefighters. Concrete was taken up, dirt was moved, trees were planted, walkways created, raised beds constructed, and a storage shed built.

Grant monies purchased new equipment for the playground. That equipment now awaits installation.

“It was like a beehive here for a while, building the frames and it was fun,” said Sandy Patten, former member of Winter Memorial’s congregation. Patton worked two garden plots last year and donated much of what she produced to Joshua’s Storehouse. Joshua’s in turn has donated seedlings and seed packets for gardeners.

A grant from Home Depot bought construction materials like lumber, hardware and landscaping rocks. Home Depot volunteers also helped move in some very heavy stones that surround the beds.

Heather Webb, Rotaract Community Garden Committee, said the first season of growing began a little late and growers had to drag hoses out to their gardens from the church. This spring, however, thanks to a push from Rotaract volunteers, installation of water spigots next to the garden plots was completed.

A tool drive secured plenty of shovels, trowels, rakes and hoses — everything needed to make gardening possible. A compost pile molders on site.

Webb said they’re doing everything they can to keep the gardens pesticide- and herbicide-free, including an agreement signed by plot renters to keep the garden natural. “That way people will know what’s going into their food with no random chemicals sprayed on anything.”

Webb said they hope to make some beds easy access for elderly gardeners who find the rock walkways difficult to navigate.

Webb, also a member of the Downtown Farmers Market committee, said they spent time at the market questioning folks there about what they would want. “We actually set up a booth and asked people what they were interested in as far as a community garden and it was amazing how many people showed up and said, ‘This is where my neighborhood is and I would love that’. So I think the need and the want is really here,” Webb said.

Webb acknowledges the existing community plots at the Natrona County Agricultural Resource and Learning Center near the fairgrounds and said the Seeds of Sharing Community Gardens simply means more plots available at an affordable price.

“Many of the same people have been working those plots for years, which is really nice for them, but then the plots never seem to open up. So having these available to people, plus getting the soil in there, talking to gardeners about what’s going on in the ground, also builds a large sense of community when you’ve got people working side by side. You get people who’ve lived across the street from each other for years and now they can know each other from the garden. That’s a large part of the community garden project.”

A second garden plot rental event on June 8 invites anyone interested — you don’t have to live in north Casper — to take a look at the gardens and sign up. Plus there will be a barbecue hosted by volunteers from the Food For Thought Project.

Rotaract hopes to recruit a licensed contractor to install the children’s playground equipment this summer.

The next garden signup and barbecue happens from 11 a.m.-2 p.m. June 8 at the Seeds of Sharing Community Garden site, 900 St. John’s St.

For more information or to reserve a garden plot, call 235-3536.

Ash disease update meetings

Monday, May 20, 2013

Forest owners are being urged to attend a series of public information meetings on the ash disease over the next 10 days.

The 22 meetings, which will begin this evening, will be held in local Teagasc offices.

A total of 36 forestry plantations have tested positive to date for the Chalara Ash Dieback disease at various locations countrywide.

The disease has also been confirmed at 15 horticultural nurseries, eight roadside landscaping projects, three garden centres, two private gardens, and 10 farms.

It was first confirmed here in Oct 2012 at a forest site planted in 2009 with saplings from a consignment of imported plants. All findings to date have been associated with imported plants,

Legislation has been introduced north and south in order to implement an all-island approach to tackling the disease.

Agriculture Minister Simon Coveney told Galway West TD Sean Kyne in a written reply to a Dáil question that a text alert will go out to 90,000 farmers about the information meetings, which Teagasc and Forest Service staff will address.

A survey has been extended to cover ash plantations established since 1992 as well as trees planted under AEOS and REPS.

Arrangements have been put in place to remove all ash trees from sites where the disease has been confirmed and from associated sites where trees from the same infected batch has also been planted. About 535 hectares of ash woodlands have been identified for removal. A grant scheme to support forest owners in the removal and destruction of infected, and potentially infected, trees and to replant with alternative species has been introduced.

Home

“Things that survived the drought, and did well, have also become popular,” Heidgen said.

He said many gardeners, for instance, learned last year that, if they kept up with watering, the heat produced bumper crops of tomatoes, squash and other backyard fruits and vegetables.

At the Wasco Nursery on Sunday, Brian Wiedenhoeft, of Geneva, said he intended to again plant annual red and white petunias this year along the front of his home, as he has for years.

He said the planting marks his only foray into gardening each year.

“It really makes the front of the house pop, you know?” Wiedenhoeft said.

He said the petunias, while noticeably smaller, seemed to pull through last summer’s drought. And that, he said, reinforced his decision to plant them again this year.

Others out on Sunday had more ambitious gardening and landscaping projects.

Maureen and Ray Zmich, of the Windings subdivision, west of St. Charles, said they were in the process of reclaiming a portion of their wooded lot that had become overrun with invasive weeds and shrubs.

The work included clearing the invasive plants, creating trails with mulch and stone, and replanting other, more desirous flowers and other plants.

“We were out all morning (Sunday),” Maureen said. “And we just ran out of plants.”

KNOW MORE: Want to know what you can do to succeed at your next gardening project? Meagan Provencher of the Wasco Nursery, west of St. Charles, and Joe Heidgen of the Shady Hill Gardens near Elburn, offer some tips:

– Don’t think it’s too late to plant. Did you run out of time to plant in May? No worries, said Provencher. “We plant from early spring to Christmas,” she said. “It can be done.”

– Take the time to improve your soil. Heidgen recommended using compost, peat or other organic material to augment your dirt. He also recommended changing at least half of the soil in planting containers annually. “It can be boring, but it’s a lot of the determination in how it’s going to turn out,” he said.

– Don’t overthink things. Don’t become too consumed with worry about pests or diseases. “I kill stuff all the time,” Provencher said. “Just take it and learn from it.”

The 14th Annual Baton Rouge Area
Tour of Ponds and Gardens
Saturday, May 18 (10AM-5PM) Sunday, May 19 (12noon-5PM)

Baton Rouge, LA.(April 8, 2013) Harb’s Oasis and Deep South Koi and Pond Society will host the 14th annual Baton Rouge Area Tour of Ponds and Gardens, Saturday, May 18 thru Sunday, May 19. Tickets are available at Harb’s Oasis, 225.756.2720. The Tour of Ponds and Gardens’ tour book includes all the pond descriptions, locations and directions.

Since the Tour’s inception, over $110,000 has been raised and given back to the community to such charities as Susan G. Komen Foundation, Woman’s Hospital, Hilltop Arboretum and Brave Heart. The 2013 Tour of Ponds will benefit Brave Heart-Children in Need and Yelp!BR. Brave Heart is a non-profit organization focused on improving the quality of life for children who are experiencing the emotional trauma of being removed from their home due to abuse and/or neglect. Their goal is to offer comfort and give these children the tools to grow into productive citizens who in turn will contribute in positive ways to our society. Yelp!BR is a non-profit, no kill adoption organization founded in 2009 that finds homes for shelter dogs in Baton Rouge. They have found permanent homes for over 200 dogs that would otherwise have been euthanized.

Deep South Koi and Pond Society is a nonprofit club whose purpose is to promote interest in koi and water gardening in the South Louisiana area. Monthly meetings at club members homes offer the chance to see a variety of ponds, ask questions and get tips from pond owners and guest speakers. The club also sponsors activities throughout the year including the Tour of Ponds and Gardens, fish sales, and various educational and social activities. Visit www.deepsouthkoi.org for additional information.

Harb’s Oasis Landscaping and Garden Center has been in business since 1980, owned by Charbel Ruth Harb. They are the originators of this tour which began in 1999 to raise awareness of water gardening and the beauty of adding water movement to the garden along with giving back to the community. Harb’s Oasis has landscaped or built a majority of the water gardens on the tour, and is pleased to join Deep South Koi and Pond Society in presenting this exciting event. Visit www.harbsoasis.com for additional information.

Every year pond tour participants open their yards to showcase their beautiful and unique ponds. It is easy to get the inspiration and the information needed to make informed decisions about ponds, water gardens, fountains and landscaping, when you see the wide array of incredible designs that have been implemented in our area. Don’t miss this once a year opportunity to interact with homeowners and professionals about water features, fish, flowers, plants and outdoor entertainment areas, as you discover the drama that water in motion brings to the home and garden.

When Erick
Blaudeau and Bill Dailey and first saw the rambling house on Verna Court in the Faubourg St. John
neighborhood, the building evoked a strong response.

“For Erick,
it was ‘No, no, no,’ but I could see the potential,” Dailey said. “We owned
about three houses at the time and we sold all of them except for a condo that
Erick could stay in if the project went badly.”

It didn’t, of
course, and now almost 10 years later, their purple “dragon house” stands out
among its neighbors on the tiny side street between Esplanade Avenue and the Fairgrounds (a
stone’s throw from the New Orleans Jazz Fest’s Acura Stage). Painted a striking
eggplant color with coral and pea green accents, the Craftsman style house
displays atop its porch roof a copper dragon finial, the source of its name. A
spectacular garden of palms, ferns, cacti and bromeliads fronts the two story
house and complements the home’s vivid exterior.

“It’s a far
cry from what it looked liked back then,” Dailey said. “When we first saw it,
it was painted a muddy brown color all over. There was no landscaping at all
because the previous owner had cut down all of the oaks that had surrounded it.
Most of the Craftsman details were hidden by awful awnings.”

According to
Dailey, the inside was even worse. A ceiling threatened to collapse in the
stairwell, filthy pink shag carpet covered floors in some rooms, and holes had
allowed moisture – and varmints – inside.

“Erick is a
radiologist and he was working long hours at Charity, so to preserve his
sanity, he stayed at the condo downtown most of the time,” Dailey said. “Our
friend David Padgett agreed to lend a hand on the renovation and he and I got
to work.”

Out went the
carpet, uncovering gleaming wood floors. Dailey and Padgett also removed
acoustical tiles from the ceilings and used baby oil to rub down the home’s
magnificent millwork to moisturize it and bring out its luster. They pinned up
sagging ceilings, patched holes, removed the awnings and got the house ready
for the next phase: Painting, furnishing and landscaping.

“We spent
all day, every day here working,” Dailey said. “When I couldn’t work anymore,
I’d flop down on a mattress on the floor and go to sleep. There were times that
I was so tired I didn’t care what crawled over me in the middle of the night.”

The
brilliant hues on the home’s exterior hint at the vibrant palette to be found
inside. A stair accessed through a door on the front porch leads the way to the
upstairs quarters (the partners’ main living area) and signals what to expect
in the way of décor. Painted a vivid melon color, it features a hand painted
ceiling and an expansive array of art work on its walls: Antique prints of palm
trees, papier maché masks, vintage black and white photos, and small paintings
all mix comfortably with one another.

At the top
of the stairs is the living room, where works by artists including George Dureau
appear on walls and easels and where the furniture flaunts exotic upholstery.
Forget about isolating a single special piece of artwork on one wall; these
walls exhibit all manner of art and artifact side by side. Consider, for
example, that a painting by Fernando Botero, the well-known Colombian artist,
can be found on the wall of the laundry room.

“I just ran
out of walls,” Dailey explained.

A lime-hued
dining room follows, centered on a long narrow table with high-back, woven rush
chairs. The hearty brick dining room fireplace relates to the one in the living
room in grandeur and scale. Overhead, dark wood beams crisscross the rooms’
ceilings. A sitting area off the dining room used to be an open porch before
the previous owners closed it in and installed casement windows.

“We decided
to keep the enclosure because we liked the light from three sides,” said
Dailey. “But what we didn’t like were the casement windows, which were all one
piece of glass.” Dailey studied the home’s architecture, especially the
configuration of panes on the windows, then made wood grilles to attach to the
exterior of the sunroom’s windows to create the illusion of multi-paned sash.

Blaudeau and
Dailey have travelled the world and display their collections throughout their
home. Wood carvings from a cannibal tribe in Bali, glimmering fabrics from the
Far East, tribal cloths from Africa: All can
be found.

The kitchen
connects to the dining room via a pantry, its shelves covered with fanciful
paintings of monkeys, a favorite theme of Dailey’s. The partners decided that a
dramatic updating of the kitchen was not what they wanted for the house.

“It was the
era of sleek granite countertops and stainless steel appliances,” Dailey
explained. “Those just did not seem to fit what the house is all about.” So the
original cabinets remained and the room was repainted in Dailey’s signature
Crayola style: Golden yellow for the walls, red for the wainscoting and coca
for the trim and cabinets. The colors serve as a perfect backdrop for the
owners’ collection of oversized folk art.

Blaudeau and Dailey reserve the downstairs of the mammoth
house for a constant stream of family members and out-of-town guests, especially
over Jazz Fest weekends because of the home’s proximity to the Fairgrounds.
With 11 rooms on each floor, there is plenty of space for everyone. Guest
quarters exhibit the same personality as the upstairs, but the house would not
appeal as much as it does without the lush front garden.

“I put in a
traditional garden at first,” said Dailey, who with Richard Sacher owns American Aquatic Gardens
on Elysian Fields Avenue.
“But when I drove up one day, I realized it was all wrong for the house, so I
took it out and started over.”

Today, fan
palms and ferns of many varieties complement one another in the space. Cacti
and bromeliads add texture. Proportions are perfect, thanks to Dailey’s
knowledge of how to arrange greenery of varying sizes and textures. A striking
metal orb serves as a fountain and various garden sculptures – a Thai lion, for
example – nestle into the foliage. Along the driveway, vintage doors painted
with exuberant sunflowers serve as a privacy fence. The sunflowers – like the
“rug” on the downstairs floor and the patterns on the stairwell ceiling – were
painted by Dailey, whose studio occupies a room downstairs at the rear of the
house.

“When we
first bought this house, one of my friends broke down in tears, certain that I
had gone over the edge and would go bankrupt trying to fix it up,” Dailey said.
“Now they make the downstairs their second home and love the place as much as
Erick and I do.”

When I first moved to Central Florida, I thought that with little effort I was going to have a yard with gorgeous tropical plants. I wanted my yard to look like it was from the set of Tarzan or Jurassic Park. Little did I know that most lush, tropical foliage plants need moderate amounts of water and plenty of relief from the afternoon sun.

After my first investment of fuchsias kicked the bucket within a month, I knew it was time to rethink my landscape plans.

One of the reasons I have difficulty growing tropicals at my home is because Lake County is in a transition area. We are considered to be in a subtropical climate, which is between tropical and temperate. Some plants like ixora and tibouchina are best suited for Orlando, Tampa and south Florida. These plants have no business being planted as a perennial in our area.

After my failure with both fuchsias and tibouchinas, I was on a mission to find plants that looked tropical but would survive Central Florida’s frosts and freezes. I poured through magazines and Internet resources to find ways to achieve that tropical look. Large, thick and bright foliage seemed to be a recurring theme.

There are several plants we can grow in Lake County that fit this description. One example is variegated shell ginger.

This plant grows along the front entrance of Discovery Gardens to give the viewer that lush tropical feel. It has large, yellow striped leaves and is hardy in our area. It can withstand most frost and freezes, especially if grown under a tree canopy. Var iegated shell ginger does prefer light shade but can take both full sun and full shade. Shell ginger without variegation (yellow markings on the leaves) is a similar option.

Bromeliads give instant gratification to the home gardener as you don’t have to wait for a bloom to enjoy their beauty. Their foliage is coarse, thick and colorful. Colors can vary from light orange, to chartreuse green and burgundy red. The heights can also vary as some bromeliads can reach three feet tall while others may only reach six inches.

Bromeliads will need protection from frosts and freezes and most will benefit from afternoon shade. Morning sun is also beneficial as it brings out foliage color.

When shopping for bromeliads look for cold hardy types such as puya, aechmea, nidularium, and vriesia.

Other favorite tropical plants include the green, white and hot pink stromanthe, the wall-climbing magenta bougainvillea, and the variegated pothos vine.

Plant any foliage plant with large leaves and bold colors and it may look like Tarzan will walk out of your yard, too.

“Saturday in the Garden” is a new speaker series offered by UF/IFAS Extension, Lake County on the first Saturday of each month. The speaker series will be held at 10 a.m., June 1, and will feature an hour-long class on Florida friendly landscaping.

Learn how you can have a beautiful, low-maintenance landscape while protecting Lake County’s beautiful environment.

To register for the Florida friendly landscaping class, go to http://june2013saturdayinthegarden.eventbrite.com. The fee for the class if $5 for adults, and free for children under 16 years of age.

Following the class, feel free to explore the Discovery Gardens, our 3.5-acre gardens next to the ag center. The gardens will be open from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. on June 1 and every first Saturday of the month. You may enjoy the gardens without attending the class, and picnics are encouraged. Entrance to Discovery Gardens is free.

Visit both our plant clinic and Discovery Gardens from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m., weekdays, at the ag center, 1951 Woodlea Road Tavares.