Category: Newsletters and Member Articles

With the holidays rapidly approaching, it is a great time to give the gift of a blooming plant that can be used to decorate the home. Here are some tips to keep your plant healthy, happy and ready to bloom. Christmas cactus and Amaryllis are plants native to Central and South America while Poinsettia comes from Mexico. Since these are all tropical plants, they share a lot of basic “do’s and don’ts.” Do keep plants in windows with bright, indirect lighting. Do provide room temperatures between 65-70°. If you’re comfortable, so is the plant. Cool temperatures will help it keep the blossoms longer. Do water when the top 1” of soil feels dry to the touch, but don’t let your plant sit in standing water. Do fertilize with a balanced, all-purpose liquid fertilizer only after your plant has finished blooming. Don’t place your plant near cold drafts or excessive heat….

The full pdf copy of this edition is available here. PRESIDENT’S MESSAGE – by John Atkinson. It’s a wonderful world! The year 2007 is almost over and what a good year it has been. It is time to express many thanks to Glenn Parsons and the officers and leaders that have guided us (like Moses) through the drought. What opportunities and challenges will the New Year hold? Only time will tell. Are you ready to renew your interest and vigor for the New Year? My goal is that the Gwinnett County Master Gardener Association will be the best in Georgia. I’m not sure what that means, but I am convinced that we have the skills and ability to continue the course we have been on since 1994. What new challenges do you want to step up to in the  coming year? Glenn Parsons said something at a recent meeting that…

You don’t have to travel to the steppes of Russia to find this wild edible plant. “Cossack asparagus” is another name for the common cattail, sometimes called bulrush. There are probably very few people who don’t know what a cattail is or what it looks like. When mature, the cattail is easily recognized by its brown “hot dog on a stick” appearance. Technically, male and female cattail blossoms are flowers, but extremely small. When they open, the tiny female flowers are greenish but before long they turn into the familiar brown cylinder. Male flowers don’t hang around very long. They grow on a yellow spike that juts out of the top of the brown cylinder, and when their pollen is ripe, it drops on the female flowers below. Then the male flowers fall off, leaving the familiar hot dog-on-a-stick. There are even fewer people who know that the common cattail…