Hosta fairyland
Plant’s lovers hold convention this weekend
About 90 “hosta-holics” are gathering in Memphis this weekend to indulge their passion for the most popular shade perennial in America.
Members of the Dixie Regional Hosta Society are learning about their favorite plants, shopping for their favorite plants and visiting local gardens filled with their favorite plants.
And when they sit down to dinner at the Memphis Hilton, their hosta headquarters, they will see miniature hostas planted in fairy garden centerpieces along with sedums, other small plants and “structures” where the imps can hide until they are ready to make mischief and delight.
The fairy gardens are the work of two members of the Mid-South Hosta Society, Janet Ferrell and Sandi Tucker, who love both hostas and fairies.
“Ja net came to me and said she had to make centerpieces for the banquets and didn’t have a lot of money to spend,” Tucker said. “I suggested making fairy gardens with miniature hostas.”
The women have a lot of experience with them as perennial helpers of Paul Little, who frequently creates fairy gardens using the sedums and other small plants he grows and sells at his Little Hill Nursery.
Little and his helpers have also put on numerous fairy garden workshops for children and adults at the Memphis Botanic Garden.
“Ideas for fairy gardens just pop into my head,” Tucker said. “As I’m walking along, I see something and think, ‘That needs to be in a fairy garden.’”
She saw a fish in a long pine cone, gave it some big eyes and placed it in a “pond” of blue glass marbles.
In her hands, a piece of a gourd becomes a domed fairy residence. In another, hunks of bark and a thistle turn into a teepee.
“Miniature gardens tend to spark everyone’s imagination,” Tucker said.
Proportion is important in put- ting them together.
“Just think, “if this was a little hut, how big would a tree or shrub be next to it?’” Ferrell said.
The miniature hostas used in the centerpieces came from society members, including Ferrell’s husband, Bill. Their Cordova garden will be one of seven on tour for the conventioneers.
To keep centerpiece costs down, Tucker and Ferrell used two 12-inch plastic saucers that typically catch water from plant containers.
The bottom of one is drilled with drainage holes; to keep the tables clean, the other is not. Both are spray-painted in dark neutral colors.
“We had a lot of fun doing them,” Ferrell said. The centerpieces will be sold at the end of the convention.
( Tricia Hunt, owner of Millstone Market in Germantown, will present a free program on miniature fairy gardens at 1 p.m. Saturday at the garden of Martha Drannon, 8596 Woodlane in Germantown. Drannon’s garden is on the “Through Our Garden Gates” tour organized by Memphis Area Master Gardeners.)
Most of the lectures, tours and other activities are limited to registered attendees of the hosta convention. But everyone is invited to browse and buy from vendors set up in Grand Ballroom B at the Hilton Memphis, 939 Ridge Lake Blvd.
Hours are 8 a.m. to 7 p.m. today and Saturday.
You’ll find lots of hostas, including new and hard-to-find varieties and also sedums and ground covers from Paul Little, rare plants from Rita Randolph, shade lovers from Fern Ridge Farm and Dan West Garden Center.
Rocks, fossils and beaded jewelry will be offered by Memphians Cornelia and W.C. McDaniel.
GREEN THUMB
MASTER CLASSES
Applications for University of Tennessee Extension’s master gardener 2014 program are available at memphisareamastergardeners.org or by contacting Dr. Chris Cooper at 752-1207.
This year only 25 students will accepted into a class offered from 9:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Wednesdays starting the second week in January and continuing until mid-April. Classes are held in the extension offices at the Agricenter and cost $150.
The deadline for submitting applications is July 31. Applicants will be interviewed before being accepted into the program, which provides education and training to volunteers who work will at the extension service and at other nonprofit and community organizations.
“This year, I’m focusing on quality, not quantity of students,” said Cooper, extension agent for the county and interim master gardener coordinator for the state.
By contrast, this year 80 students signed up for classes held in the morning or the evening.
Cooper said he has observed how enthusiastic and tightly knit participants are in the small classes offered in small towns and wants to see how it might work here.
He notes that the Memphis Area Master Gardeners now has some 460 members, all contributing a minimum of 40 volunteers hours per year. Lots of them do many more.
“We’ll see how this works,” Cooper said. “We can always tweak it again.”
DAYLILIES DISPLAY, SALE
Daylilies, considered to be the most popular perennial for sunny areas, will be on display and sale from 1 to 4 p.m. Sunday at the Memphis Botanic Garden.
The Memphis Daylily Club is organizing the free show of blooms, floral designs and photographs. Anyone may enter the bloom contest by bringing cut stems with flowers to the botanic garden from 8:30 to 10 a.m. Sunday. You must know the name of daylily variety you are entering. Contact Christine Arpe Gang at chrisagang@hotmail.com.