In a garden, growth cannot be rushed

Editor's note: This is eighth part in the series "A Walk Through The Robert J. Moody Demonstration Garden," which is at 2200 W. 28th St.

---

Sorry I’m late. I actually came early so I could go into the Yuma County Cooperative Extension Office and it took longer than I thought it would because I was visiting with Vickie Steinfelt, director. She is so supportive of our efforts here in the garden.

At least you had a chance to visit while you were waiting for me; gardeners always have plenty to talk about.

Here in the Tropical Garden you also had a pleasant place to wait. These two tables and benches were put here at the time the building was being constructed.

Isn’t this garden lovely? Of all the areas in the garden, this was probably the hardest hit by the killing frost that we had last January. However, nearly everything came back when given enough time.

Some plants or trees had to be cut back drastically. They lost a lot of height in some cases as the new growth came out from the bottom; but the main thing is that the tree or plant survived. We did lose our three plumeria plants and that made us very sad. They had been doing so well and were beautiful and the flowers so fragrant in the summer.

The original leader of this garden was Donna Johnson and it was planned with a committee. The public planted this garden on March 1, 2003. Donna did a lot of hand watering at first - until the irrigation system was fine-tuned.

This shade structure was originally flat and made of shade cloth. Weather got the best of it a couple years ago. The sun had rotted the thread and then the wind (summer '05) proceeded to tear it apart.

Yuma County and Action Auto helped us replace it in a more appropriate style for a Tropical Garden. It was a new design for Action Auto. After it was installed, they had to do some adjusting. At one point, they had to take it all down and back to the shop.

We are pleased with the end result and also pleased with how it has held up with the wind. However, a problem did occur recently up near the center posts and we had to call them for repair work. Once again it had to be taken down and back to the shop. They were very quick to get it back in place. Isn’t it nice?

Jimmy Vance is currently the leader for the Tropical Garden but he has gone to work now at Yuma Nursery. We offered him plenty of work here at the garden but I guess he wanted a paycheck, too. Anyhow, he would like some help here. A garden leader is a caretaker who oversees and reports needs of the garden at the MGM Garden Club meeting the last Tuesday morning of each month. Could that person be you?

We love the Wedelia groundcover in this garden; however, it does want to take over the world. Notice the circles around the plants. They make it easier to run the weed-eater and not damage the trees. Myra and Gene Saylor came up with this solution and engineered the project. We love suggestions, especially when they come with the physical or financial means to accomplish it.

We also have a lot of hog potato in this area. We call it a weed but remember a weed is just a plant out of place. I recently learned that you could buy this plant in 1-gallon containers at the Boyce Thompson Botanical Garden near Superior, Ariz. Maybe we should be cultivating it instead of trying to get rid of it.

I've often said gardening teaches patience. Meaning, of course, that things grow slowly and for the most part cannot be rushed. It has been a hard lesson for me to learn in my own garden and as I've worked with the Moody Garden I've learned, too, that progress is often slow - usually due to lack of funds or volunteers. When I start thinking that way, I go on the Web site and look at the album of pictures - that reminds me just how much we’ve done here in the last four or five years.

This is it for this week! Let’s meet here at the tables again next Thursday and we’ll tour the Vegetable Garden, which is the area up there by the Cooper Barn. I’ll not be late next week! See you then!

---

Ellen Gardner, a Master Gardener who writes this column for the Federated Garden Clubs of Yuma, can be reached at 343-4020 or at gardner3028@netzero.com. For more information, click on the links below.