​Make an eye-catching garden more enjoyable by including fragrant plants.  Incorporating aromatic flowers into the landscape adds an unforgettable dimension.  Fragrant plants tend to bring up pleasant memories, and scented flowers also attract pollinators, such as bees and butterflies.
Fragrance is produced by plants when their essential oils evaporate and the molecules enter the air.  The most fragrant flowers are white and pastel.

​Create your own fragrant garden with these tips:

1.  Avoid using pesticides and chemical fertilizers.  They detract from the pleasant odors and can kill or harm beneficial creatures like birds and butterflies.
2. Use drip irrigation.  Overhead watering interferes with the release of nectar in aromatic plants, which will cause them not to smell.  Drip keeps the water at the root zone and off the plants.  If you can’t install drip irrigation, try to water at the roots.
3. Plant aromatic plants in high traffic areas.  You want the plants close enough so you can smell them.  Good locations include entryways, passageways, and enclosed areas where the odors can linger, such as patios, courtyards, and atriums.  Spots near windows that you open are also good.
4. Locate low-growing fragrant plants near nose level.  Place short aromatic plants where they can easily be appreciated, rather than on the ground.  Good locations include elevated containers located on tabletops and hanging baskets.
5. Consider time of day.  Some plants only smell at certain times of the day.  Weather can also make a difference.  Hot days tend to stir up the volatile oils in plants more than cool days, which means you’ll have a more fragrant garden when the weather is warm.
6. Balance and layer.  Avoid putting too many different types of fragrant plants into your landscape.  The results of doing this can be overpowering and even unpleasant.  Some plants, like night-blooming jasmine (Cestrum nocturnum), are so strong that you only need one in your yard.  Other flowers, like alyssum, require that you plant several in order to notice the scent.

​The specific plants in our fragrant garden are:
Bordering the walkway is Sweet Alyssum (Rosie O’Day).  Starting to cascade up and over on our arbor are both Moonflower and Sweet Pea.  In the main part of the garden are Bee Balm,  Carnation, Chocolate Flower, Heliotrope, Hyssop, Lupine, Marigold, Nicotiana, and Penstemon.   

​Submitted by Roseann Meixelsperger, Master Gardener Volunteer

The Herb Garden

Come on out and visit the gardens. Reach down and brush the plants in the herb garden. What can you smell?
Do you smell pizza? Do you smell pickles?

We have dill, basil, garlic chives, onion chives and more planted in the herb garden.

Come join us at the Annual Twilight Garden Tour.
We will have recipes to share using herbs and different herb infused water to sample.
And other fun and simple ways to include herbs in your day.

Annual Twilight Tour in the Teaching and Display Garden
Tuesday, August 13, 4:00 to Twilight
Features guest speakers, demonstrations, displays, vegetable tastings

​The North Country Master Gardener Volunteer Association invites everyone to our annual Twilight Garden Tour on Tuesday August 13 starting at 4:00 p.m. and closing around 7:30 p.m.  The event will be in the Spooner Agriculture Research Station Teaching and Display Gardens at 780 Orchard Lane, Spooner.  The gardens are located 1 ½ miles east of Spooner on Highway 70 or ½ mile west of the Highway 70/53 interchange.  All ages are invited to attend and there will be handicap parking near the gardens.

2019 is the year of the Dahlia!
Picking a favorite dahlia is like going through a button box. As well as coming in a rainbow of colors, dahlia flowers can range in size from petite 2-inch lollipop-style pompoms to giant 15-inch “dinner plate” blooms. Most varieties grow 4 to 5 feet tall.  
They are considered a tender perennial in cold regions North America. They are only winter hardy in planting zones 8 to 11. Gardeners in zones 2 to 7 can simply plant dahlia tubers in the spring and either treat them as annuals or dig them up and store for winter.

​Do you know the difference between a ground cover and a cover crop?  Do you have bare ground that it weed prone? 
 
Consider getting covered!  Bare soil is a magnet for weeds and the new trend is to cover with living plants.  Mulch has been the cover of choice in both the vegetable garden and perennial beds for years but there are many other options.  When referring to covers that use actual plants you will see terms such as green manure (for vegetable and annual areas) or green mulch (ground covers for perennials beds).  
 
In the Teaching and Display Garden we have examples of many different mulches and the use of living plants. 
 

Helpful links:
Gardening around bees
www.networx.com/article/how-not-to-get-stung-by-bees
Safe Chemical Use
https://www.wikihow.com/Apply-Herbicides-Safely
Ergonomic gardening tools
http://www.wyomingextension.org/agpubs/pubs/B1238.pdf
Poisonous plants in Wisconsin
https://www.wiscontext.org/5-poisonous-plants-avoid-wisconsin
Washing Off Urushiol Allergen
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4oyoDRHpQK0

Article submitted by Pamela Davies MGV

The Spooner Agriculture Research Station Teaching and Display Garden will host visitors for a relaxing program in the garden on Tuesday, July 16 starting at 6:00 pm.  This garden session will focus on reusing found objects, recycle, and re-imagining our gardens.  UW-Extension Master Gardener Volunteers will be on hand to share tips on small scale gardening including square foot and straw bale gardens.  A tour of the gardens will highlight All America Selections annuals within this theme as well as demonstrate the gardening techniques being used in the garden. ​

This year’s theme  “Re-use, recycle, and re-imagine” comes from the All America Selections .  The displays have been created with this theme in mind.  The Teaching and Display Garden is one of eight in Wisconsin that display vegetable and flower varieties who have been awarded this designation as an outstanding cultivar.