Greenhouse Duty Blog

By

Camilo B, Colton G & Austin M.

This weekend was all about the transition from the Poinsettia to the Hydrangea Crop. Early in the week we received the shipment of Hydrangeas (285 in total); we received 4 cultivars (‘Rosa, ‘Early Blue’, ‘Vanilla Sky’ and ‘Chique’). Another Important theme throughout the Weekend was to clean spotless. We worked as a team to take care of all out tasks given for the weekend and overall we had a great experience.  The Crops were walked every day, hand watering single plants in needs of it and removing dead foliage. Opening and Closing Checklist fully completed and Cash register opened and closed following procedures.

Friday, December 15^th, 2017

A major part of the day went repotting the Hydrangeas. The ‘Chique’ came in 6” pots; they remained in those, while all the other cultivars that came in 4” pots, all were repotted into 7” Azalea shallow pots. After they were organized on the benches, placing drip lines in each pot. The Poinsettia crop was walked and rearranged where it needed, to free some space for new plants coming in.
Jeff changed the Greenhouse temperature settings for the Hydrangea Crop on Priva, he also changed the EC and pH requirements on the board. 
Night = 14-15°C  Day = 18-19°C
EC = 1.5-2.5      pH = 5.8-6.2

We also re-potted the Variegated Lavender Scallops. Each leaflet has grown new mini plants, which were even shooting roots out. They were all placed into new 2.5” mini pots, labeled and placed back on the benches for future gifts.

We also cleaned up, washed the Hydrangeas pots, took the Compost to the back with the RTV and brought some new soil in to defrost over night for future use.

Today’s sales were good; a few clients came and purchased Poinsettias.

Saturday, December 16^th, 2017

Today was a fun day, it had a combination of labor and smart work. We needed some new Begonia cuttings, so we chose varieties that had not yet been used and produced a whole new tray full of cuttings. Each one of us chose one and did 16 new leaf cuttings, following the guidance of Fanshawe’s very own Mr. Vivarium. Austin Picked Plum Paisley, Colton picked Escargot and Camilo had the Gryphon Begonia.

We did some updates on the Culture Charts to explain the new tasks completed and placed the insect monitoring yellow sticky cards around the greenhouse. We left them overnight to catch our bugs. We checked through the cuttings in the misting chamber to try and repot anything that needed it. We thought the Tradescantia zebrina was ready, but it turned out not to be, we put it back in the misting chamber. Since the day before we used up all the Cacti Soil Mix repotting the succulents, we mixed a new batch for future use. Another assigned task was to maintain and water some plants indoors, specifically the 3 Ficus nerifolia in front of the Bookstore and the one Yucca plant in the library.
We started the facilities clean-up process as well, by washing the greenhouse floors thoroughly.

We also did the EC and pH reading on the Poinsettia Crop, turned out we had to do it for the Hydrangea Crop instead. Funny little detail we corrected the next day.

Sunday, December 17^th, 2017

The last day was fun. Since we realized we had done the EC and pH Readings on the wrong crop, we preceded to re do it on the right Crop. We found that our new Greenhouse Guests (the Hydrangeas) are within what we are looking for in terms of readings.
‘Chique’ à EC = 1.9 & pH = 5.5
‘Early Blue’ à EC= 2.3 & pH = 5.1
‘Vanilla Sky’à EC = 2.1 & pH = 4.8
‘Rosa’ à EC= 2.0 & pH = 5.2

We did some hand watering by individually checking which plants needed it, finding that the grasses and the congress plants needed a good soak.

Today was Clean –up Day, we made sure to put some good effort on this one as Sue said it was important, especially with the transition in crops.

We only had 1 sale, a very nice Family came in and purchased 4 mini Poinsettias.

Weekend Duty Blog: Getting ready for Christmas, Congress and Hydrangeas


Rebecca and Connor


Friday


First thing on Friday morning we met with Jeff in the greenhouse. He explained the opening circle check for the greenhouse and outlined some of our duties for the weekend. While its hard to give up your weekend for school it seemed really nice this time of year to be in a warm tropical feeling greenhouse while the weather outside is cold and snowy. On our first day of work we spent a lot of time walking the crop and inspecting the poinsettias. We found several that were wilted: some of them were under watered and it was nice to see them return to their healthy form the next day after being properly watered.

One of our main tasks for the week involved condensing the poinsettia crop to as few benches as possible to free up space for the new crop of hydrangea plants that will be arriving during the week. Hydrangeas are popular in spring and around Easter time so it may seem early to be bringing them in so early but it takes months to get the small immature plants to a good size and for them to have flowers that will catch the eye of customers. Growers need to know how long their crops take to flower and be of a good size and to time this with popular times of the year for flower sales. No one is going to be interested in buying a poinsettia in January and very few customers care to grow them on in their homes to will likely buy one every year, meaning holiday plants can be lucrative for greenhouse owners. Considering the trend that the Christmas season seems to begin earlier and earlier every year it would be interesting to know if growers have had to change their yearly schedules to accommodate this.

On Friday we sold quite a lot of poinsettias to Fanshawe students and staff. We also sold a few succulent arrangements. A lot of what we sold was going to be given as Christmas gifts. In coming years it might be interesting to sell other plants intended as gifts, such as succulents or Christmas cacti in holiday themed pots or packaging. A lot of people were looking for gifts but were worried the poinsettias were too large, required too much watering and attention, or would be a hazard for pets so it might be good for sales to have something different to offer them.

Saturday

On Saturday we removed the water emitters from the drip lines on the empty benches and began soaking them in bleach and water to sterilize them. It is important that these emitters and cleaned before the new crops arrive so that any germs or diseases are not transmitted. We also began cleaning up any dead material from the hanging baskets as the plants in flower will be used for Fanshawe’s display at congress. We did not do very many sales on this day so we spent a lot of time spacing plants, cleaning, and doing a lot of cuttings from the stock baskets.

Sunday

On the Sunday morning we had arrived at the Fanshawe Greenhouse surrounded by snow which made the Greenhouse look much more like Christmas with all of the vibrant coloured poinsettias popping out and contrasting against the fluffy white bed of snow. After following the daily opening procedures, we decided it would be fun to start the day with doing some postage stamp-style leaf cuttings on some of the various types of Begonias we have in the greenhouse including the ‘Metallica’, ‘River Nile’, as well as the ‘Irene Nuss’ varieties of Begonia.

We had watched a very brief video posted by a previous Fanshawe Horticulture student on some techniques on taking Begonia cuttings, and had learned a technique of applying paper clips to pierce the leaf cutting so that it can be pressed against the media to help it to root-out much better. After all the cuttings were completed, we decided to once again work on some of the spacing within the Greenhouse compacting both variegated varieties of the poinsettia crop onto one bench as to free up even more space for the upcoming hydrangea crop that is going to be introduced into our greenhouse very soon. With more benches open we decided to remove and sanitize the emitters on the free benches preparing them for the upcoming crop. We had also watered our perennial section in the greenhouse giving it some additional fertilizer to boost both the strength and look of these plants so that they appear their best for the upcoming show at Congress located in Toronto. Sunday was our slowest day for customer foot-traffic, but fortunately we sold one of our Christmas styled planters giving us the opportunity to design and build another one to introduce to the store front. We spent a good amount of time on the Sunday cleaning and sanitizing the greenhouse to be ready for the following week.

The end.


:)

Weekend Maintenance Blog – November 24^th – November 26^th, 2017

During this weekends maintenance duty session, there was an excessive amount of grasses that needed to be trimmed down and domed. Many other perennials including; Rudbeckia triloba, Bergenia cordifolia, Iris sibirica, Hemerocallis, and Hylotelephium telephium, needed to be cut down for the winter months.

Day 1

We first started alongside the H building, removed leaf litter, also pruned any dead limbs and interfering branches off of the surrounding shrubs within the area adjacent to H, F and M buildings. After removing most of the grasses, weeded the beds, and cleaning up after ourselves, it was then time for lunch. 

   

After lunch we removed any weeds that were visible and growing within the yews along the wall of H building. Noticeably there were significant numbers of Atropa belladonna (Deadly nightshade) weeds within the hedge of yews. Any garbage found within the gardens was disposed of and all pathways were cleared off alongside F building (where students wait for the #27 bus).  Once we had conquered the gardens bordering H and F building, it was time for our last break.

The crew picked out the dead foliage within the patches of Bergenia cordifolia that are located alongside H and M building. While in that area we removed the leaf litter from the drainage basin that is located across the walkway, opposite the Taxodium distichum’s (Bald Cypress). When we finished the job, it was time to clean up, pack away tools, and lock up all tools and equipment.

        

 NOTE: While James was trimming the grasses, he accidentally hit a sign within the grass and doing so snapped a blade on the hedge trimmer. James went to Jeff and informed him of the mistake and explained what damage had been made. Also, all jobs were completed together and as a team, all crew member participated.

Day 2

The maintenance crew trimmed the Rudbeckia trilobal Black Eyed Susan’s along the East wall of M building. We also pruned the Cotoneaster within the M building garden.

There was a Bergenia cordifolia patch within the garden alongside the south side of M building and needed to be rid of dead foliage.

We then moved onto the next assignment, which was to tackle the woodland garden. First the crew trimmed the Miscanthus sinensis and made sure to leave the Saccharum ravennae Plume Grass and Arundo donax Giant Cane Grasses to leave a winter interest element within the garden.

We then trimmed down the dead material from the Black-Eyed Susan’s, Siberian Iris and sedums.

We removed the dead material and foliage from the Stachys byzantina lamb’s ear that was over creeping onto the walkway. There was a small 20 ft x 5 ft Cotoneaster shrub that was then trimmed, tidied up and had all garbage removed from within and surrounding areas.

Jeff had mentioned to remove a small tree that was growing next and basically within the fence (South side), that surrounded the woodland garden, later to be identified as buckthorn.

The backpack blower was used to remove the excess of leaves that were built up within the red current hedge that is on the north side of the woodland garden. Any weeds including; thistles, dandelions and even a large patch of mint was removed from the gardens.

Day 3

We still had a few jobs to finish up within the woodland garden and decided to begin with removing the Hostas and daylilies from the north side of the gate, into the woodland garden. There was a single variegated Miscanthus grass located within the conifer garden and needed to be removed.

While looking over the work that had been completed within the gardens, we noticed that the fence alongside the East side of the woodland garden was leaning over and onto a mature Spirea shrub, on the East side of the fence. We collected multiple T bars and pounded them into the ground adjacent to the fence, in order to stabilize the fence for the time being.  

We had to make a few corrections to our trimming jobs on the grasses, and simply domed them to a more aesthetic shape.

Nearing the end of the day, the crew began to clean up all areas with a blow-over with the backpack blower and cleared off all benches and pathways within the required areas. We then washed off all tools that were used for the weekend and cleaned the tool room floor as well as the tractor bay.

We then came back to the greenhouse and noticed the greenhouse crew had some compost to dispose of, so we then collected the compost and drove around the working areas and had one last look over the jobs that had been completed over the weekend.

Greenhouse Weekend Duty Blog

Chris, Justin and Rob

Our weekend started on a Friday morning with Jeff informing us of some important information. We then started our day with many Poinsettia sales and deliveries around the campus. We ended up going to the wrong place so we had to make our way over which took some time but we made it. Everyone seemed very excited when we made the deliveries. Many people liked the different cultivars that we have grown and are very happy with the end product.

Next we were instructed to lower one of the lights to prepare some of our plants that we would like to force into flower for Congress Trade Show, which will be held in early January. As a class we will be building a pollinator garden to show our skills that we have acquired over the past year and a half. We are all very excited for this opportunity. Before lunch we also re-potted some of our succulents for sale, also we re-arranged our poinsettias as they were going out the door fairly quickly ensuring that the table looked full. We also took some cuttings from our stock baskets which will hopefully root and thrive. We then alternated our lunch breaks as someone needed to stay for possible plant sales. After lunch potted up some prickly pears before taking our last break. We then had a few guests who were prospective students; we showed them around our greenhouse and answered any questions they had. This concluded our first day of greenhouse duty.

Our second day of greenhouse duty started on an overcast Saturday morning. We arrived and started our work by opening the blackout curtains and checking over the crop. We then went into the school and looked after some of our interior plants. We arrived back at the greenhouse to open for plant sales at 9 am. We got back to it taking cuttings from many of the stock baskets, although some we felt were not big enough to take from. This took most of the afternoon along with doing many sales. Justin spot watered the grasses, perennials and the cuttings on the first table. We had a small rush of people who came and bought many different plants. After closing down the cash register for the day we all took a trip to the compost area to dispose of some unwanted soil and plant material. After arriving back at the greenhouse we gave a quick cleaning to the work area as well as greenhouse before calling it a day. See you tomorrow!!

Our third and final day of greenhouse is here and for the most part we think everything has gone well and we are happy with our work. Plus everything is still alive so that’s good. We began by walking the crop and checking our sticky traps, we noticed that sadly a casualty had happened at some point and a Parasitic Wasp had been captured which is not what we wanted, the wasp was one of our beneficial insects that we use in the greenhouse. After checking the crop we opened the till and prepared an order of Poinsettias for tomorrow morning. Since we had sold 2 of our Poinsettia arrangements we also started the day by making replacements.

 After this we started removal of the blackout curtains as this crucial time for the Poinsettias was over. Chris jumped on the backpack blower and blew the front of the greenhouse as well as sides removing all debris from parking lots and leaves from grass area. After this we took break. After break we had our first customer of the day, which quote said “I did a U-turn in the street skkkrrrttt” (tires screeching) because she saw our sign we had placed on Fanshawe Boulevard. We are convinced that our little “Poinsettia” sign helped convince this woman to turn around and come into the greenhouse. 

After discussing different things we could keep doing to keep us busy, we decided to make two more poinsettia sale signs, Justin and Chris went down to the compost pile to find some things to make up supports for the signs. We came back with large grass stalks hoping that they would be sufficient enough to hold our signs in place. We used grass to tie together stalks and made a good sign for poinsettia sales! 

We hoped by doing this we could bring in more customers by widening the advertising zone. We then alternated lunch breaks and started the cleaning process for the greenhouse after lunch. We had a few more sales and walked the crop ensuring that everything was okay to be left for the night. After doing this we cashed out and closed down the sale portion of our weekend. We then continued cleaning and took back some more compost and finished our reports. Throughout the weekend we notice that the ‘Ice Punch’ cultivar was a popular choice amongst the customers and they really thought that the ‘Gold Rush’ cultivar was really unique. This concluded our weekend duty and we are all happy with the end result.

November 24-26 Greenhouse Weekend Blog

Friday​ ​November​ ​24

This weekend, the Poinsettia Sale is in full swing, with many beautiful cultivars flying out the door as quickly as we can package them up! Friday morning we arrived to get set up for our weekend, and receive detailed instructions for our tasks from Jeff. The greenhouse had received poinsettia orders for the Office of the President of Fanshawe, as well as K building. Our first mission was to gather and package these orders. After we all helped skillfully wrap them in festive and protective paper sleeves, Josh and Will very carefully delivered them via the rolling cart.

 After making sure all of the checklist items were completed for the morning and distributing advertising flyers for the Poinsettia Sale, the next item on the agenda was to re-pot the succulent arrangements that were in plain black plastic pots, into much nicer, patterned ceramic pots. It was a fun opportunity to be creative.

Friday afternoon was very busy for sales, and we spent a lot of time wrapping up customers’ plants and pulling poinsettias from the back of the benches to re-stock the fronts and keep them looking full for the public.

Saturday​ ​November​ ​25

On Saturday, after checking temperatures, opening the blackout curtains, and getting set up for the day, we (very carefully) took cuttings of the large Opuntia cactus to callous over before they are propagated, perhaps next weekend. We also began checking the stock plant inventory, counting all hanging baskets, 4” pots, and cuttings against the numbers recorded on the computer. This is an important task that ensures there are enough cuttings of each stock plant, and lets us at the greenhouse keep track of how many of each specific variety of plant we have currently.

When we were about halfway through, we had a rush of customers in to buy poinsettias and some succulent arrangements! After everyone left happily with their new plants, we took a much deserved morning break before returning to complete updating the stock plant inventory. In the afternoon, Will and Josh took over interiorscape duties while Taylor took EC and pH readings of each poinsettia cultivar in the greenhouse, and recorded them for our weekend report. The weekend hort maintenance crew was helpful removing compost for us throughout the day!

Sunday,​ ​November​ ​26

On the last day of our weekend greenhouse duty, we spent some time in the morning cleaning the greenhouse floor thoroughly, as well as again pulling all poinsettias to the fronts of the benches for our customers’ viewing enjoyment. Then, we checked the insect traps we had set out earlier in the weekend for pest monitoring purposes, and interpreted the results for our class’s IPM discussion board. We also took the opportunity to spend some time with the microscope, examining some tiny bugs.

After continuing our cleaning into the potting room, hallway, and tractor bay, we helped the final customers of the weekend find the perfect poinsettias, and watched them walk merrily off into the sunset with their new festive botanical friends.

Weekend Maintenance Blog - September 29 - October  1, 2017

Nicole M. and Rebecca J.

This weekend at Fanshawe College was extremely rainy, soggy but warm which made it hard to believe that we were already beginning to prepare the campuses gardens for winter. This weekend gave us the opportunity to learn how to create winter interest in a garden using existing plants, such as ornamental grasses and perennials. We also gained experience by using power tools such as power shears, which we had a lot of fun using!

 Friday we had a shorter day due to CLT testing that took place in the morning. Which was an exciting experience for all of us entering the world of horticulture.  We began our shift by walking the gardens. We were given the gardens in front of Fanshawe's registrar's office and M building. We discussed what needed to be done in these gardens to have them ready for winter and made a plan on what we could achieve over the weekend and what we would prioritize. From there we had little time left so we started by cutting back perennials and weeding in front of the registrar's office. As we came to the end of the day we disposed of our compost and we did our first tool clean up, ensuring everything was cleaned and put away accordingly.

Saturday was a big day. This is where a huge chunk of our work took place. We prepared the garden outside of the registrar's office and D building by tying back all grasses into tepee’s which made it really easy to collect all of the debris once they were cut down. While cutting the grasses down we made sure to make sure they had more of a “mound” formation as this creates winter interest. We also cut back the masses of Salvia in front of F building as well as weeding. We hand groomed the Bergenia as we decided that it gave the garden some interest as far as colour and texture.

Sunday we were in for some severe weather.  It was very windy and we had torrential downpours and even hail at one point during the day, but we had a lot to do still so once the weather calmed down we got back to it. We finished off doing some weeding, cutting and raking up the debris in front of F and M building. At the end of the day we cleaned up our tools and took our last tool inventory. By the end of this weekend we both learned time management is a big factor in our industry and it is key to make it a priority.

Weekend Duty                                                                    Jensen M.                     October 15, 2017                                                                Tawny R.

Friday October 13

  After a long day of CLT examinations we arrived at the greenhouse at around 2pm to start an afternoon's worth of work. We met Jeff in the greenhouse and he explained all the weekend duty protocols and his expectations of the weekend. Tawny and I than met with Sue and went over the POS system and everything that goes along with the sales production at the greenhouse. She than took us around the greenhouse and showed us what was expected of us over the next couple of days. Jeff then showed me how to calculate the fertilizer amount that goes into the all-purpose fertilizer tank. I than refilled the tank while Tawny was learning how to use the ECE and pH reader. Without hesitation we then started into transplanting succulents in cute little ceramic bowl arrangements.

By the time we got those finished it was time to close up the POS system and count up our float for the next day. We cleaned up the mess we had made and finished our day off by closing the shade curtains.

Saturday October 14

We arrive at 7:50am to start our second day of work. When we first got settled in we opened the blackout curtains and walked the crop to make sure all of the poinsettias were happy 

After all that was complete we noticed the power was not working for anything in the potting room. Before we got a hold of Jeff to fix the problem the power was out for 3 hours. So we just started transplanting cuttings from propagation chamber into 4” pots and placed them on the heating mats. Just before lunch i removed a dead squirrel in the tractor bay. After lunch we removed hanging baskets from the yellow drip line as Sue requested. We than took the rest of the hanging baskets and cut back all stock baskets nice and neat.

Throughout the afternoon we also accomplished 96 coleus ‘GoldSpot’ cuttings and placed them on the heat mat as well.

We called Rebecca and Nicole on the radio to come dispose of all the compost we created throughout the day. We then closed the blackout curtains and headed home for the night.

Sunday October 15

On Sunday we opened the greenhouse and had the Blackout curtains opened by quarter after eight. We spent an hour filling out our log books and setting the camera up for the day. We watered the ornamental grass at the east end of the greenhouse. We than walked the crop and decided the poinsettias could use a little water so we watered through drip lines for 3 minutes. For the remainder of the morning we put some plastic pots away and filled out the ECE and pH readings for the poinsettias. After lunch we thoroughly cleaned the greenhouse (figure4) and helped Kathy bring in the plant donations. We closed the curtains for the last time and we left the greenhouse.   

Weekend of October 6^th-8^th, 2017

By: Chris M. & Stephanie T.

Friday 6^th

We arrived at the greenhouse bright and early ready to receive all the information and advice from Jeff Rowley, the greenhouse technician. Our day started by running through the rules and the safety guidelines. Next, Chris opened the blackout curtains to allow the poinsettia crop day time light. Well that was being done, Steph walked all the benches and spot watered what needed to be watered, and fixed a couple of the dripline. She then ran the lines to water all the hanging baskets. Then we opened up the plant sale around 11:30. The greenhouse sales went well, but the squash we grew out a Cuddy Mac (AM) Gardens sold out before lunchtime. After the fresh nutrient-rich lunch break, we helped plant up some Alocasias that were dug up out of the woodland garden. The plants were to be moved into the interior-scape around the college. Chris helped move some of into the T building while Steph washed some pots. We then started to tidy up the around the greenhouse when our last costumer got to the greenhouse just before we started to close the till for the day. We then closed the blackout curtains so we could put the crop to bed.

The Poinsettia crop requires what’s called a photoperiod where there must be 12 hours of complete darkness. Since the greenhouse is located in a city environment, we use black tarps to block out any sort of light pollution created by the college and street lights. If these conditions are not met, the crop will not produce the colourful bracts that it is known for.  The 12 hour photoperiod must be uninterrupted, or the blackout process must be restarted, and this may affect when the crop is ready for sale. This would likely prove to be an issue because most crops, like the Poinsettia, are sold at certain times of the year. If the crop is not ready for a particular time, the greenhouse would lose sales, and there would be significant profit loss.

Saturday 7^th

                We began Saturday by opening up the blackout curtains in the greenhouse, and completing the opening checklist. After doing a walk of the crop, we determined that everything was functioning normally. Following that, we both helped Josh transplant a diseased Ficus tree that was close to D building. We struggled to get both the tree and the pot outside. After getting security to remove the middle portion of the doorway, we troubleshot ways of moving the heavy pot outside, and into the RTV. This took a while, but we were eventually able to get the pot in the back of the RTV after emptying out most of the soil.

Sunday 8^th

                We started the day the same as the previous by opening the blackout curtains and checking the crop. From there we placed 4 yellow bug monitoring cards in various places throughout the greenhouse. After 4 hours, there were only 2 thrips, one fungus gnat, and a shore fly that were captured.  Steph helped Josh with an interior-scape transplant of a Ficus tree while Chris worked on the blog for a bit. After washing a few more pots, we worked as a team to figure out the E.C. and pH testing process. Chris completed most of the testing while we were preparing to get the greenhouse ready for closing. Since it’s a holiday on Monday, we ensured that all the crops in the greenhouse were prepared for a day of no maintenance.

    

  

Weekend Duty Blog

BY: Justin M. and Will S.

            Our weekend duty was from September 22^st to September 24^th. Our job was to clean up the Louise Weekes garden and install some fresh mulch.  We started at 7:50 am with Jeff providing instructions and a tour of the campus to show us where everything we needed was. This took up quite a bit of time our first day. While showing us the gardens we are required to clean up, Jeff had my partner and I tell him what we would do to clean it up and make it look nice. This was great because it is fairly easy to follow instructions, so if he just said, “Do this, this, this and this” we aren’t learning much, where if he leaves it up to us to decide it puts more pressure on us to make it how we would want it to look. The Louise Weekes gardens were quite covered in weeds and unwanted Eastern Redbud saplings. We spent the rest of the day weeding the gardens and emptying the greenhouse compost whenever needed.

            Day 2 is when the week end got a little more fun! At the beginning of day 2, we finished off the weeding which took maybe 2 hours or so. After all the weeding was done, we decided next we should tackle the pruning of shrubs/cutting of perennials. There was not many shrubs in the gardens that needed to be trimmed up. Weigela florida ‘Bristol Ruby’ was in dire need of a pruning. Since it looked like the weigela hadn’t been pruned in a while we sort of mixed the two pruning methods. First we cut out the super mature growth which will encourage new growth. This got rid of a lot of the long shoots sticking up. After that we tipped the remaining shoots, attempting to give it a good shape. There was also a shrub that had a lot of dead wood on it, which we removed. We also pruned out the reverting leaves on the Euonymus fortunei ‘Emerald Gaiety’ (wintercreeper) because if we were to leave them even more would revert and eventually the whole plant would be reverted back to straight species. There was a peony that we thought needed to be removed, but a google search told me that the peony was generating and storing away energy for next season. We should have removed it later in the season but Jeff said there was no one else going back to that garden until winter, so we removed it now to avoid an eyesore come winter. We also got all the edging done and some mulch in the gardens.

            Day 3 we spent most of the day on the tractors loading the mulch, and running wheelbarrows to the garden. This was really fun because we got to drive the tractors and gave us some experience with pulling trailers and backing them up. Once we finished spreading the mulch we blew all the mulch that we spilt back into the garden beds. With our edge on the garden all the mulch fell neatly against the side with very minimal amounts spilling over onto the sidewalk, which we blew back in. Overall weekend duty was a great experience and we learned a lot in time management and maintenance skills.

Fanshawe Grounds Weekend Blog

Sept. 15-17

Written By: Jennifer H. and Nicolai J. 

This is the first weekend duty shift this autumn and it happened to be sunny and warm all weekend; it still felt like summer. Out of the both of us, Nicolai had the most experience and was a tremendous help over the weekend.  Early Friday morning we arrived and were given the rundown on our weekend tasks and a quick walk through of the facilities. We were assigned an area by G building to start out with and then asked to continue through the Louise Weekes Garden. Most of the plants in this garden were donated by Louise Weekes, who was a passionate gardener herself, and when she passed away it was commemorated in her memory. 

Friday: So, first thing we decided was to clean up the garden bed by G building, before starting on the process of mulching. We picked up some garbage and thoroughly went through the bed digging out any weeds we could find. Half the bed wasn’t too bad, only a few weeds, but the other half was pretty weedy. Under all these weeds were some Astilbe (to the right of the Hydrangeas from the image - Figure 1) that were hiding out and were probably pretty grateful of the extra space they now had. We also deadheaded Hostas, pruned back some Holly bushes as they were getting pretty large, and cleared the few windows of the climbing Ivy. The last thing we wanted to do before mulching was to relocate some Hostas that were getting lost under the Holly bushes and to move some ‘mini’ Hostas to a more empty area. Then it was on to mulching. We made an edge around the bed, using a Dutch Hoe, extending the bed around the new cooling machine installed there recently to make it easier to mow later on. Nicolai went to pick up some mulch but unfortunately we ran out of time so the mulching was to be completed Saturday.   

                 

Saturday: Early Saturday morning, after getting all of our tools ready for the day, we got straight back to work. The first few hours were spent mulching yesterdays bed and we completed our first garden bed!

It was then time for us to move on to the Louise Weekes Garden. We started with the closest gardens near the doors and got to work with weeding and pruning the Ivory Silk Japanese Tree Lilac which was overhanging the walkway.

In the bed opposite of the Tree Lilac were some Ornamental Thistles that did not belong there and had migrated from a surrounding garden bed. We decided to keep them and moved them all to under the Tiger Eyes Sumac. We also edged and mulched both beds ending our second day.

Sunday: Our last duty shift for the weekend! We were headed back to the Louise Weekes garden to continue to clean up and mulch some more of the garden. Again we checked out our equipment and gathered our tools for the day before setting out. We chose the bed with the young Norway Spruce and the Bear’s Breeches. This bed had quite a bit of weeds to remove. Canadian Thistle and a type of grass, and also some more of the Ornamental Thistle which we consolidated into the middle of the bed (apparently this is where it was first planted). We removed the spent flowers of the Bear’s Breeches and some Daylilies before we started the edging. We edged and mulched the entire bed, taking care not to cover up some smaller Rose plants that had spread throughout one corner. We finished just after lunch and then it was time to clean up. We cleaned all our tools, the tool room, and made sure our work areas were also nice and tidy. Nicolai went to grab the Leaf Blower and finished up our work for the day cleaning up anything we might have missed. It was a beautiful weekend to be outside and I think we both enjoyed getting our hands dirty. Have a great week everyone!