-Baxter County Master Gardeners-
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Ozark Green Thumb
BCMG Monthly e-Newsletter
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join us at our monthly meeting

3/21/2018

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The Baxter County Master Gardeners are a fun group of folks who enjoy sharing their love of gardening with any visitor.

At our meetings we have speakers, refreshments, & fun.

Come join us!




Next Meeting Date:

April 12th from 1:00 - 3:00 pm

Meeting Place:
The First Presbyterian Church
1106 Spring Street
Mountain Home, AR


April  Speaker: Chris Stuhlinger, University Forester, Arkansas Trees

Master Gardeners Monthly Radio Program:
Mountain Talk Radio April 19th on 97.1   7:15 a.m. - 8:am.

Master Gardener Host this month are Tommy Hagan and Ceil Gasiecki

Directions:
From Mountain Home
Take US Hwy. 62B East through Mountain Home until you come to Cardinal Street. Cardinal Street is the intersection just past Harp's Grocery.  Turn right onto Cardinal Street and travel South until you come to the first stop sign which should be Spring Street. Turn left onto Spring Street and go down the hill past the bridge and the First Presbyterian Church will be on your right hand side. 

From Gassville:
Take Hwy. 62/412 towards Mountain Home. Once you get to Mountain Home continue on into Mountain Home on US 62B. This will take you through town till you get to Harp's Grocery and you come to Cardinal Street. Cardinal Street is the intersection just past Harp's Grocery.  Turn right onto Cardinal Street and travel South until you come to the first stop sign which should be Spring Street. Turn left onto Spring Street and go down the hill past the bridge and the First Presbyterian Church will be on your right hand side.

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coNEflower, meadowbrite

3/21/2018

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All of our garden flowers originated as wildflowers. Most were developed by breeding and selection during the gardening explosion that occurred in Europe between 1820 and 1870.

​Not surprisingly, in the current gold rush mania that gardening has become in the last decade, plant breeders have again gone back to the wild to look for new garden plants. In the last decade, breeders have reinvented one of these – the coneflower – to produce stunning new perennials with totally new colors.
Save one, all of the six or so recognized species of coneflowers (Echinacea) are found in the Ozarks. Most are prairie plants or glade dwellers in the open woodlands. The purple coneflower (E. purpurea) has long been grown in gardens with the other species mostly left alone in the wild, at least until recently.

Beginning in 1997, Dr. Jim Ault of the Chicago Botanic Garden, began hybridizing coneflowers. He crossed the familiar purple coneflower with E. paradoxa, the yellow coneflower found in limey soils of the southern Great Plains. The several hundred seedlings produced from this first-hand cross were uniformly purplish pink.

These initial hybrid seedlings - the F-1 hybrids in breeding parlance - were crossed amongst themselves and seed saved. This second generation (the F-2 generation) flowered for the first time in 2001. These seedlings segregated into a rainbow of colors ranging from pink to yellow and all shades in between. Many showed a distinctive orange color. From this population, 50 distinctive new color forms were selected.

One of the best of these was Orange Meadowbrite, a 30- to 36-inch tall coneflower released in 2004. It’s like the typical purple coneflower in growth habit except for the unusual shade of its three inch wide flowers.

Orange Meadobrite flowers from late May through early summer, producing blooms that are a unique shade of orange. Some call the color tangerine, which is close but still not exactly right. The color changes shades under different lighting conditions and as the blooms age. Because it has undertones of other colors besides orange, it blends well with other perennials. Uncharacteristically, Orange Meadowbrite flowers have a distinctive spicy orange fragrance.

Orange Meadowbrite is a hybrid between the familiar purple coneflower and the yellow coneflower. It’s one of the many new hybrid coneflowers making their way into our gardens.Ault has produced upwards of 20,000 coneflower seedlings during the last decade and continues to release new introductions.

Mango Meadowbrite (a branch sport of Orange Meadowbrite) was introduced in 2005. Ault’s 2006 release is Pixie Meadowbrite, an 18-inch tall, long flowering pink with E. tennesseensis parentage. He describes Pixie Meadowbrite as having “an incredibly long bloom time and small perky flowers”.

Future releases from the Chicago program will include clones with plants having various shades of red, apricot and white. These new clones are mass produced in tissue culture and have become hot items amongst gardeners wanting the newest plant introductions.

Other than requiring at least four hours of sunlight and good drainage, coneflowers are easy to grow. They do best in a rich soil and have good drought tolerance once established. Trimming off the blooms can encourage a later flush of flowers. But, because finches love to pick the seeds from the mature cones in the fall, many gardeners prefer not cutting the plants back after flowering.

By: Gerald Klingaman, retired 
Extension Horticulturist - Ornamentals
Extension News - July 28, 2006






​
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foxglove

3/21/2018

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The line between myth and reality is often unmarked, especially as we look backwards through the mist of time. Foxglove, that rocket of a flower that launches itself from a pad of large basal leaves in April and May, illustrates how we still carry with us vestiges of this fuzzy borderland into our modern age.

Foxglove (Digitalis purpurea) is a biennial or short-lived perennial belonging to the snapdragon family, a native of western Europe. In its first year of life, foxglove seedlings produce a rosette of green, fleshy, simple leaves, which are unremarkable in appearance.
But, in the spring, this rosette begins to shoot skyward with leaves shrinking in size as they near the flowering scape. Older plants may produce several blooming scapes, but young plants are usually unbranched.
The 3-inch long, tubular purple flowers begin opening at the base of the scape, while the blooms above it are progressively smaller as they await their day of opening. The inside of the tubular flower is lighter colored and marked with irregular batches of dark brown. Hybridizers have given us an array of flower colors in this increasingly popular plant with white, pink, apricot and bicolor selections now available.
The name foxglove is from the old English name "foxes glofa." It comes from an old myth that foxes must have used the flowers to magically sheath their paws as they stealthily made their nocturnal raids into the poultry yards of rural folk. The association is natural for the foxgloves grew on the wooded hillside slopes that foxes chose for their dens.
The name foxglove is from the old English name "foxes glofa." It comes from an old myth that foxes must have used the flowers to magically sheath their paws as they stealthily made their nocturnal raids into the poultry yards of rural folk. The association is natural for the foxgloves grew on the wooded hillside slopes that foxes chose for their dens.
In 1542, Leonhard Fuchs, after whom fuchsia is named, gave the plant it's current Latin moniker - Digitalis - for the finger (ie. digit) shaped flowers. The species epitaph purpurea was adapted by Linnaeus two centuries later.
Like most plants in the European flora, foxglove was used as part of the herbal medicine chest before the development of the modern pharmacopeia. But its use was relegated to that of a general cleaning agent, to purge the body of whatever ailed it.
It was not until 1775 that an English physician named William Withering, acting on a account supplied by an herbal healer, reported that a tea made from it was useful in curing dropsy, the fluid accumulation often associated with heart-related problems. Since that time, the drug digitalin has become one of the old, generic drugs doctors and HMO's consider the first line of defense against heart-related ailments.
Foxglove is a mainstay of the spring garden where it can reseed freely if it finds the site to its liking. It has naturalized in the wild in Pacific Northwest and in a few areas of New England, but in the South it's propensity to procreate is much reduced. It grows in full sun or medium shade and usually persists for three or four years if it finds the site to its liking. It does best in a moderately fertile, well-drained soil that receives some water during the summer.
Foxgloves are easy to grow from seed, and gardeners wanting to add them to their garden for next spring will find this easy and rewarding. Seeds can be planted outside in containers in May or June. Seed germination is easy and seedlings can usually be transplanted to a growing on container after three or four weeks.
​The first-year plants should be planted in their final location in the garden during September so that they can establish themselves before cold weather arrives.
By: Gerald Klingaman, retired 
Extension Horticulturist - Ornamentals
Extension News - May 17, 2002
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APRIL GARDEN CALENDAR

3/20/2018

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In this week’s article I want to mention things gardeners need to be considering for April. The following is a garden checklist:  

  • Last average frost is about mid-April for Baxter County. You can get away with planting frost sensitive plants earlier if you are prepared to do some frost protecting when a frost is predicted.
  • Early treatment can prevent damage by cabbage worms on cole crops such as cabbage, broccoli, and cauliflower.  Cabbage looper, diamondback moth caterpillar, and the imported cabbage worm can cause serious damage pretty quick.  Check weekly for eggs and larvae under the leaves.  Use Bacillus thuringiensis (BT) spray as soon as they are first noticed. Also, this group of vegetables are heavy feeders of nitrogen and can use a side dressing of nitrogen 3 to 4 weeks after planting.
  • Onions are rapid growers and heavy feeders. To grow monster size onions, fertilize weekly with a water-soluble fertilizer and mix at half rate.
  • Plant warm season vegetables from mid month on. Don’t be in a hurry, or you may have to replant.
  • Hold back on planting okra, peppers, southern peas and sweet potatoes  until late this month or the first of May. Warm soil temperatures are critical for these warm season vegetables.
  • Spray hybrid tea roses with a fungicide to prevent black spot. Spray according to label directions.
  • Hold off on fertilizing your bermuda or zoysiagrass lawn until it has fully greened up. This is usually early to mid May.
  • Prune and fertilize spring blooming trees and shrubs immediately after bloom. Remember to remove the old canes of forsythia, quince, weigela, spirea and other cane producing plants.
  • Summer bulbs such as cannas, caladiums, dahlias, gladioli and tuberoses can be set out in mid-April. Plant gladioli several times at two-week intervals for blooms throughout the summer.
  • After Easter lilies fade, plant the bulbs in a sunny part of your perennial garden. Foliage may die back but will green up this fall and take off next spring. Don’t expect blooms until late spring to early summer. Easter lilies are pretty reliable perennials if planted in a well-drained spot.
  • To keep annuals blooming at their best, make regular applications of water soluble fertilizer.
  • Continue to divide summer and fall blooming perennials.
  •  As flowering bulbs fade, allow 6-8 weeks of green growing time for bulbs to replenish their nutrients. Crocus and daffodils do not have their flower heads removed, but it is beneficial with hyacinths and tulips. Fertilize with complete fertilizer. You can transplant and divide spring flowering bulbs after foliage begins to die down.
  • Use bird netting to keep birds away from strawberries. Watch for slugs.
  • Encourage production of runners on newly planted strawberries by removing all flowers the first season. Also fertilize strawberry beds in late August or early September to encourage good bloom set.
  • Watch for spider mites and bagworms on plants.
  • To attract butterflies to your garden try planting some host plants that will nourish the young caterpillars after they hatch. Plants to try to include, butterfly weed, parsley, dill, fennel, rue, passionflower, and tulip tree.
  • Plant seeds of annual vines such as hyacinth vine, moon vine and cypress vine from mid to late this month.
  • Mulching is your best method to prevent weeds, plus it maintains soil temperature and moisture.
  • Aphids can occur in large numbers in the spring. Aphids dine on the sap of an endless number of garden plants. Their feeding weakens plants and in some cases a total destruction of plants. They are a very prolific insect bearing live young. Fortunately, they are easily controlled by a spraying of bifenthrin, malathion or insecticidal soap but beware, reinfestation can occur in days.
  • This is the time of year when honey bee hives swarm. If you see a swarm and are needing someone to collect and move them, call me. I have a list of people who will come and get them at no charge.
  • Reminder – Baxter County 4-H Rabies Vaccination Clinic is Friday, April 13 from 2:00-5:00 p.m. and Saturday, April 14 from 8:00 a.m. – noon at all Mtn. Home veterinary clinics.  

For more information on any of the above points, contact the University of Arkansas Division of Agriculture Cooperative Extension Service at 425-2335.    

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Four onion Gratin

3/15/2018

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​Leeks, shallots, onions and
garlic c0mbine to make a 
rich, delicious side dish.
8 servings

  • 1/4 cup (1/2 stick) butter
  • 6 leeks (white and pale green parts only) sliced
  • 2 large onions, cut into eighths
  • 8 shallots, halved
  • 2 garlic cloves, minced
  • 1 1/2 10 ounce bags frozen baby onions, thawed and drained
  • 2 cups whipping cream
For topping:
    2 tablespoons dry breadcrumbs
​    2 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley
Melt butter in heavy large skillet over medium heat.  Add leeks, large onions,
shallots and garlic and saute untill all are tender, about 20 min. Add baby onions
and cook 10 minutes longer, stirring occasionally.
Mix in 2 cups whipping cream. Boil until cream is thickened to sauce consistency,
about 10 minutes. Transfer vegetable cream mixture to a 6 cup shallow baking 
dish.
(This can be prepared one day ahead. Cover and refrigerate. Return mixture to
room temperature before continuing)
Preheat oven to 425F. Sprinkle breadcrumbs over onion mixture. Bake untill
breadcrumbs are golden brown and onion mixture bubbles, about twenty
minutes.
​Sprinkle with parsley before serving.
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raspberry tiramisu

3/13/2018

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This is an easy desert to prepare
that looks elegant. It is delicious 
​with coffee
Serves four

  • 12 ounces frozen raspberries
  • 1/4 cup sugar
  • 2 ounces (about a 2 inch slice) pound cake
  • 1/4 cup mascarpone
  • 1/4 teaspoon vanilla
  • 1/2 cup heavy cream, lightly whipped
  • 1/2 pint strawberries
Puree frozen raspberries with half the sugar. Slice the cake
and cut in i/2 inch cubes. Divide bake between 4 wine or
martini glasses. Top with equal amounts puree.
Gently blend mascapone with remaining sugar and vanilla. 
Fold in the whipped cream and put a scoop of this mixture
in each glass.
Top with fresh raspberries and serve immediately or chill for
​up to four hours.
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  • About Master Gardeners
    • National Mission Statement
    • UAEX - Univ of AR Extension Service >
      • Baxter County Extension Office
      • The UA Cooperative Extension Service
      • UAEX Master Gardener Program
    • Baxter County Gov't >
      • County Extension Council
      • County Extension Service
    • Our Structure, Rules & Guidelines >
      • 2022 Org Chart
      • Bylaws
      • Standing Rules
      • Duties, Projects & Events
      • New Member Orientation
      • Continuing Education & Training
      • Member Status
      • Apply Online
      • Frequently Asked Questions
  • Events & Outreach
    • Calendar of Events
    • Join Us At Our Meeting
    • Radio Program
    • Monthly Newsletter
    • Spring Seminar
    • Annual Plant Sale
    • Farmers Market
    • Fair Horticulture Room
    • Public Education Booths
    • Hatchery Outdoor Adventure
    • Scholarship
  • Garden Projects
    • Fairgrounds Garden
    • Bull Shoals
    • Clysta Willett
    • Cooper Park
    • Fish Hatchery
    • Extension Office
    • Memorial Gardens
    • Library Pollinator Garden
  • Gardening Tips
    • Bringing Nature into your Garden >
      • Native Plant Finder (research by Doug Tallamy, PhD)
      • Creating a Landscape With Native Plants
      • Native Drought-Tolerant Plants
      • Well-Behaved Natives
      • Native Alternatives to Invasive Plants
    • Invasive Plants >
      • Invasive Plants to Avoid
      • Invasive Non-Natives
    • Seminar Horticulture Table
    • DIY Projects
  • Members Only
    • Enter Your Hours
    • Buddy Message Blog
    • MG Roster
    • MG Meeting Minutes
    • Treasurer Reports - 2019 >
      • Treasurer Reports - 2018
      • Treasurer Reports - 2017
      • Treasurer Reports - 2016
      • Treasurer Reports 2015
      • Treasurer Reports 2014
    • Forms
    • How-To >
      • Webmaster Duties
      • Website Editing Guide
      • Website Updating Duties
    • Practice Pages >
      • RoseMatta
      • Rose's Roster
      • Annual Plant Sale
      • JanelleStookey
      • MikeKuenzli
      • JanHalligan
      • PennyWells
      • Clysta Willett
      • SusanChamberlain
      • Memorial Gardens
      • Kathleen -Fairgrounds Garden
      • Practice - Cooper Park
      • Judy - Extension Office