Club Minutes: Horticultural Society, 1987

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match for our Lydia Haviland, she chose to abandon her tepid efforts to recover the bird and Lydia quite rightfully adopted the bird into her more able, worthy, and knowledgeable care.

Questions: Nancy Chance asked how to prune wisteria. Advised to go about it in a major way and September is a good month for it. Mo Chance asked if there was any good corn around. Lydia Haviland allowed as how her first batch was smallish but nice. Other reports were discouraging due to the lamentable shortage of rainfall. Flora Goff offered mysterious seeds for identification. They were tagged as from a luffa sponge plant which does well in these parts. Bill Hartge inquired about deer sightings. A herd of 11 were sighted on Haviland Mill Road and Priscilla Allen spotted a spotted fawn near Amersely. Tom Farquhar is finding it difficult to get his spinach to germinate. Aduna Hanel displayed peat pots with 4 or 5 seeds on top of potting soil with damp paper towel over top of them. Mary Grady wants to transplant lilac bushes. Advised to go ahead. Lydia Haviland's porgilaca has stopped blooming. Suggested she leave it alone. Betty Hartge asked if anyone uses milky spoor any more. Yes, the Extension Service still recommends it highly. Once applied it will maintain itself as long as there are japanese beetles around to prolong the life of the spoor. Does anyone around here use zoysia grass for ground cover? No mention of it - consensus is that it's too ugly most of the year for local tastes. Nancy Pruess pruned back her peonies to the ground. It was advised to just take off flowerhead next time. Consolation was offered that peonies are rugged plants and might come back. More on peonies came from Tom Farquhar whose plants have languished this summer while he's seen others do fine. It was suggested that water may be the problem. John Hartge wondered whether this venerable society could be dragged kicking and screaming into the computer age. Much of the wisdom repeatedly imparted over the decades could be catalogued onto computer disks so that maybe the 7 dozen most often asked questions could become an integral part of our records. The response was mixed and John was encouraged to spearhead the effort as cautiously as possible. Buzz Hussman asked about groundhog control. With gentleness and delicacy, Priscilla Allen suggested smoke bombs, car exhaust, traps, gasoline, lye, guns, waterhose treatment, and voodoo. Beth Bullard mentioned squash borers; while on vacation the bugs back home killed all the Bullard's squash. Advised next

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time to soak the seeds in kerosene before planting - also plant 2 crops separated by a month.

The meeting was brought to a close. We thanked the Hanels for their hospitality and agreed to meet in October at Lakeview, the home of Mary Seiler.

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October 6, 1987

The Society's last meeting for the year took place at Lakeview, home of Mary Seiler. The house and grounds both reflected clean lines and elegant taste. The modern features of the residence were as comfortable and pleasing as those equally timeless homes in the community that were built over a century ago. Unfortunate to be absent were the Rogers, Priscilla Allen and Susan Canby. Pity as well there were no guests. The meal was tangibly more relaxed and leisurely than mid-season gatherings. Everyone seemed happy to enjoy the company of friends who would be largely unseen during the cold months ahead.

Mo Chance read the selected article entitled "Luffa: Garden Grown Scrubbers". Once the luffa sponge also called the rag gourd and sponge cucumber was a novelty item quite infrequently grown in the home garden. In recent years the plant and its fruits have become popular, chic, and of increasing usefulness. The luffa sponge's common utilization is as a bath sponge but it has gone as far as being used as an oil filter.

As a bath sponge its invigorating roughness stimulates blood flow and removes dead skin cells. The same properties make it useful in the kitchen sink as a pot scrubber. Properly cared for a luffa sponge can remain useful for years.

Luffas can be grown like cucumbers. They need 110-120 days to mature. Methods for cleaning and processing luffas vary from the very methodical to that of the neglect and conquer approach. Most basic is to let the fruit dry sufficiently, knock out the seeds, and peel the skin off. A civilizing touch is to run the cleaned luffas through the washer with a little soap and bleach. A couple vines are ample per household. Overproduction is easy but can satisfy one's gift-giving responsibilities for the entire year.

Mary Seiler volunteered an article from the August 23, 1987 New York Times entitled Farming Without Chemicals: Age-Old Technologies Becoming State of Art. It was a very encouraging account of the growing trend to reduce dependency on high cost and residually destructive chemical methods of controlling pests, eliminating weeds, and increasing yields. Relatively simple practices of crop rotation and companion planting promise to help the largescale farmer save money, reduce groundwater pollution, cut back on topsoil loss, and give greater harvests for the effort and expense. In these dark times of seemingly endless environmental abuse in the pursuit of agricultural overproduction, the article offered a ray of sunshine.

The minutes from October 4, 1887 were read. It was said that roses could be trimmed in the fall. Hard cider should be turned to vinegar and english sparrows were mentioned as possible enemies of the grape harvest. One member of the community saved his grape harvest wih 17,000 bags placed over the clusters. Elizabeth Thornton had copied the celebratory tract of the Society's 50th anniversary and distributed the copies with further requests to use the uneventful winter months to plan for next year's 125th anniversary.

Forethought advised us to lift tender bulbs and store them in a cool place. Plant perrenials. Bring house plants indoors. Citrus plants can't take temperatures below 50 degrees. The raspberry patch ought to be cleaned and

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cut. Fruit trees ought to be cleaned and pruned in late winter with dormant spray applied there after. A sticky ring either painted or wrapped around tree trunks will keep caterpillars from climbing up after their emergence in the spring. Cut the lawn, seed, and keep moist. Apply lime later. The compost pile should be arranged for winter - layer and sprinkle with lime.

Exhibits from Riverside included cosmos, love lies bleeding, zinnias, clematis (bridal veil), cinnamon basil, nasturtiums, and baselia malabar. From Lea House came cleome, globe amaranth, and white marigolds. Offerings from Clifton were New England Aster, marigolds, orange cosmos, butterfly bush, zinnias, lavender, and artemesia. The Cedars brought a fine long season beet, sweet potatoes, and a "Sheer Bliss" rose. From the Earps came zinnias, marigolds, garlic chives, a purple pepper, and a cubanelle pepper. Helen Farquar brought marigolds, asters, zinnias, and cleoni in a beautiful indian ceramic bowl. Sylvia Woodward brought her last rose of summer - which was a fine pink peace rose.

The bird report included Jim Bullard's sighting of 2 barred owls at Clifton. Nancy Pruess brought an advertisement for winter roosting boxes. The need for these boxes has developed because many natural shelters such as decrepit, old buildings and shattered, decaying trees are being eliminated under the pristine grind of suburbia's advance.

The Redundancy Committee reported great strides under the energies and guidance of John Hartge. A computer program had been worked out that enables the abstracter to digest the old minutes with considerable effect. Over 3 years of old minutes have already been worked on. The project of dissecting and organizing over a century's worth of horticultural knowledge, hearsay, contradictions, ignorance, witchcraft, and supposition is an awesome task. The first steps that have been taken are impressive indeed.

Questions; Aduna Hanel asked what to do about teeny, weeny slugs. Beer doesn't work because they're obviously underage - however, it was mentioned as a possible emollient for the frustrated gardener. A suggestion was to leave a board on the ground so the little darlings can seek shelter from danger. The gardener can then come by on occasion and stomp on it. John Hartge advises us to go on gypsy moth egg cluster hunts. Each cluster can contain 1,000 eggs and if left unchecked, the eventual damage to hardwoods is horrible to behold. Peter Conlon has 2 semi-dwarf apple trees. The fruit grew and fell off before maturing. Our bad year for rain is blamed. The same problem was mentioned regarding seckle pears. Sylvia Woodward inquired after the woolly bear consensus. The thickness of the center color band indicates the severity of the winter ahead. Since the one that was spotted was in her kitchen it was deduced that the winter in front of us included bad weather indeed. Ari Preuss mentioned that there have been no finches on his thistle seed feeder. It was assumed that they can be found where the real food is and will come to the feeder when natural sources become depleted. Elizabeth Thornton wanted to know if anyone has extra tansy. She needs some for dying fabrics. Some was located & offered.

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Nancy Chance has zinnia plants whose leaves developed brown spots then got brown all over. Condition was blamed on drought and a soaker hose was recommended. Further opinion suggested problem could be more complicated. Tom Farquhar wants to know what to do to his strawberry patch. On one side he was admonished for being too late. On another he was advised to make rows by thinning and not to apply mulch too heavily as it increases mouse damage. Beth Bullard wanted to know what are winter cherries. No serious answer was submitted.

The meeting and year was drawn to a close. The winter ahead seemed long and it was obvious that the Society would miss the warmth of both the weather and our monthly gathering. We thanked Mary Seiler for a lovely setting for our meeting and agreed to meet at Lydia Haviland's on April 5th.