A new year brings a new range of events and speakers to the Williams Lake Garden Club.
For over 11 years now the Williams Lake Garden Club has met for monthly meetings to socialize, discuss gardening techniques and learn new skills from one another.
Held at the Senior Citizens Activity Centre on the first Thursday of every month at 7 p.m., this year the club has a wide range of fantastic speakers and events for the season starting March 7.
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Founding member of the Williams Lake Garden Club, Carol Thiessen, said she’s always found the topics to be informative for growing both perennial plants and vegetables.
This year the topics of their monthly meetings hit on a wide range of ideas and are presented by a mix of experts in the field.
Thiessen recalled that, in her youth, she herself had often lived on the fruit and vegetables that came from the gardens and orchards on her family’s land.
Today, with the cultural move towards organic homegrown food, she believes that a wider interest in gardening has been rekindled in people once more and is something the club has benefited from.
“It’s healthy for me. I don’t know how some people survive on boxed food, it’s not as good (in my opinion),” Thiessen said.
While she encourages people to become full members of the club for $10, which grants access to all their events and discounts at select local garden centres, Thiessen said one could also simply pay $2 to attend any one workshop that they’re the most interested in.
“It’s $2 to come for one evening and it’s $10 for the season, we go from March to October so that’s eight months. It’s a pretty good deal and the club is a not for profit (organization),” Thiessen said.
For their first meeting of the year, happening this Thursday on March 7, Thiessen asked that attendees come early so that they have enough time to register everyone before the meeting.
A complete list of the dates, presenters and topics for each meetings are as follows.
March 7- Roger Stratton, Horse Lake Garden Centre
Topic: Trees, Shrubs and Perennials for the Cariboo
April 4 - Bob and Linda Osmachenko, Williams Lake
Topic: Vegetable Gardening
May 2 - Don Bassermann, Prince George
Topic: Container Gardening.
June 6 - Gwen Odermatt, Master Gardener, Langley
Topic: How her garden has evolved over 40 years, and what it’s taught her
June 8 - Maureen and Evert Byman tour and workshop and tour Maureen’s garden, where peonies will be in bloom. Evert will present a workshop on making a garden obelisk from wood (cedar) or copper piping. A list of materials will be provided for participants, and Evert will supply the tools.
June 15 - Marg Evans
- Tour of her xeriscape garden at Deep Creek, 1 - 3 pm
July 4 - Mary Alice Self - potluck in her garden 5 - 7 pm
(In lieu of a regular meeting)
August 1 - Brenda Sanden, Horsefly (President of Thompson Shuswap Master Gardeners Club)
Topic: Square Foot Gardening
September 5 - Grace Morrice, Master Gardener, Prince George
Topic: The importance of good soil
September 7 - Sharon Rosk, Horsefly Lake (meeting place: TBA)
Topic: Flower Arranging Workshop 10 am - 12 pm
October 3 - Maureen Byman, West Fraser Road
Topic: Watering
For more info contact Leanne @ 250398-8246 or go to the Williams Lake Garden Club Facebook page.
patrick.davies@wltribune.com
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