Secrets of Successful Local Gardening

Join us as Marilyn Kusler from the Medicine Hat Horticultural Association shares insights into gardening, the history of local gardening communities, and tips for sustainable gardening practices in changing climates.


Chapters

00:00 Introduction
01:02 Historical Gardening in Medicine Hat
02:04 Getting Started in Gardening and Education Pathways
03:44 The Role of Gardening Associations Today
06:41 Differences Between Agriculture and Horticulture
07:53 Traditional vs. Modern Gardening Knowledge
10:20 The Ewart Duggan Garden and Heritage Plants
12:28 Climate Change and Its Effect on Gardening Zones
14:43 Adapting to Weather Extremes and Pest Cycles
17:24 Upcoming Fall Activities and Community Engagement
18:17 House Plants and Indoor Gardening Trends
19:36 City Parks, Urban Green Spaces, and Future Planning

We explore the rich history of gardening in Medicine Hat,  through an engaging conversation with Marilyn Kusler, the President of the Medicine Hat Horticultural Association.

For many Hatters, gardening has been a cherished tradition for decades. The area's favourable soil and climate have made it a haven for gardeners. Marilyn shares her personal story, emphasizing how her upbringing on a family farm influenced her love for gardening. Growing up, she assisted her mother in tending to both vegetables and flowers, which sparked a lifelong interest in horticulture.

With over 130 active members, the association bridges the gap between seasoned gardeners and newcomers, facilitating knowledge sharing through meetings and guest speakers. These gatherings offer invaluable insights into various gardening topics, from pest management to ethical interactions with local wildlife.

A common challenge for gardening associations is attracting younger members. Marilyn highlights the need for outreach to younger generations, who often juggle busy schedules filled with family and activities. The association strives to create a welcoming environment where everyone, regardless of age or experience, can learn and share their gardening knowledge.

Marilyn reflects on the evolution of gardening practices over the years. While some traditional methods have faded, many gardeners still seek out old-fashioned tips and tricks. For instance, she shares a recent experiment with using baking soda around tomato plants, inspired by advice from a fellow gardener. Such anecdotes illustrate how gardening knowledge is passed down through generations, blending historical wisdom with modern practices.

Gardening is not just about growing plants; it's also a therapeutic activity that fosters a deep connection to the earth. Marilyn expresses how tending to her garden offers solace and satisfaction, especially as she ages. The act of nurturing plants provides a sense of achievement and peace, making gardening a valuable pursuit for mental well-being.

Our visit with Marilyn offers a glimpse into the vibrant gardening community in Medicine Hat. From its rich history to the challenges of modern gardening, her insights inspire both seasoned gardeners and newcomers to embrace this fulfilling hobby. Whether you're growing vegetables or flowers, gardening is a beautiful way to connect with nature and others. 

For more information about the Medicine Hat Horticultural Association and to join their efforts, check out their website. Happy gardening!


Resources

Medicine Hat Horticultural Association - https://medhathort.ca/
Olds College - Horticulture Program - https://www.oldscollege.ca
Heritage Plants and Seeds - https://www.heritage-plants.com/

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Transcript

0:00

Hey, this is Brian again, and I'd like to ask you to do a favor. We can't do this work without people like you. So if you can, please like, share, subscribe, tell your friends about bring back the porch. love my garden and, you know, even picking weeds is is fine. I don't I don't mind that it's I try not to let them get ahead of me because then it's a lot of work. But if you can keep up with them and it's nice to see that garden blooming and growing, whether it's vegetables or flowers. Yeah. This episode of bring back the porch. Brought to you by medicine at Monumental Crafting Quality Memorials of Distinction since 1970. I have here a scrapbook that belonged to my grandfather, John Alexander Park. He made my grandmother lived on Belfast Street and they were great gardeners. They had a lot between themselves in the corner where they grew all manner of plants back in the 1920s and 30s, etc. they were horticultural nuts. This scrapbook has all kinds of clippings about what to do about garden pests, how to look after your roses, and I look after your gladiolus, which was his prize. And I also have here a membership card for the Medicine Hat and District Court Cultural Society from 1955, which would have been, I believe, six years after it was set up. The reason I'm going into this historical diatribe is because we still have the medicine at Horticultural Association, and the president is with me to talk about gardening this morning. Marilyn Kusler welcome. Thank you very much. It has. Well. Medicine hat has a history of being a gardening community. Going back. Boy, probably since the first tents were set up because they found the soil here to be quite amiable and the climate quite amiable to growing things. Yes. So how did you get into this gardening and growing plants? Well, I was raised around the island, so. And on a family farm. So I grew up. My mother was a huge gardener, so of course grew all the vegetables and things like that. And she loved flowers too. So she always had lots of flowers. So as a kid. Of course, I wasn't that crazy about the harvesting vegetables. I can still remember sitting in shelling literally barrels full of peas and that. But but it seems to be an eight. You grow up and it just becomes part of your life. And yeah, I've been gardening well, probably since I moved away from home. Yeah, it does get. I don't know if it's in your blood originally or if it gets in your blood when you start. Yeah, I don't, I don't, I'm not sure, but I went from high school, I went to work for a few years and didn't know what I wanted to do. And then I was talking to a friend one day and she says, well, I don't know why you're not going to school back to school and take horticulture. So that's what I did. I went back to Old College and ended up getting my diploma in horticulture at that point, but I'd already been growing gardens and flowers. That was just part of me. Yeah. When you talk about the period when my grandfather and grandmother were into gardening, there was no internet. No. You might find a book maybe in the library, but magazines or a newspaper articles were a good way to share information. Today you've got the association, where you have all your like minded people who can come together and help each other with ideas. So tell me a little bit about the association. How big is it? How many members you have? Why it's still here? Well it's quite it's I would say it's quite big. It's fairly active. You know, we seem to keep gathering members. I'm sure we're well over 100, 130, 150 members right now. We are struggling a little bit in trying to become a little bit more social and pass through our ideas and our knowledge around between our members, because some members are saying, well, we come to the meetings and we do all this, but, you know, we'd like to spend more time talking to people with more experience. And so we're working on that. But we do. We have had a lot of speakers just about every not every month, but quite often we have a guest speaker. We've had speakers from talking on topics from earthworms, like Roxanna Dirksen, who runs track here, to we've had some of the professors from the college that are working on the biological sciences and rehabilitation technology. The one gal was really I found it exceptionally interesting. She was talking about she she's doing a doctorate on on fungi and how they break down, you know, toxic chemicals. Really. So that was fascinating. We've had a gal from snakes on the plane, Sherry Monk. Sherry monk has been a guest on the podcast. Yeah. It talks about her, our interactions with snakes, bees, just all kinds of things, and also different horticulturalists that have different businesses. So lots of information out there. And certainly we try to be as welcoming and as social as we can. Yeah. The key is you want to pass it on to the next generation so that it continues to grow. Pardon the pun. Yes. And that's the other thing. We all say we need more younger members. But I know what life is like when you're young, you're raising families and you're running nowadays way more than we did growing up to all kinds of sports and activities that are available. So. So yes, a gardening fits in there, but it's it's a hard one to probably to fit in, to come to meetings and things like that. It's probably let people know the difference between agriculture and horticulture because there is a big difference. Yeah, I would call agriculture more on a larger scale. If you're growing like fields of wheat, barley, alfalfa, canola, whatever it is. Whereas horticulture would be, well, I shouldn't say smaller because any kind of time you're growing intensive there intensive labor crops more. So a lot of times more hand labor. If you're growing vegetables or small fruits like strawberries or anything like that. I feel that that fits more into the horticulture. There's specialty things and a lot of times it does require specialty knowledge. Has the knowledge from, say, a hundred years ago been lost? I know some of the plants, the heritage plants have been preserved, but some of them maybe have sort of been phased out and replaced by newer hybrids and whatnot. Well, it's interesting because people like to hear about the, you know, the old tips. I, I tried one just the other day or last week, even last year, I met an elderly man in the community garden, and he was who was putting some powder on his strawberries. They're not sorbets, his tomatoes on the ground. And I said, well, what are you doing? And he said, well, I always put baking soda around the base of my, my tomatoes. I said, baking soda really? Like, that's, you know, sort of a tough thing on can be a tough thing on soil. He says, yeah, it works great. My tomatoes love it. Keeps the ants away. You got to try it. So and then I also saw a thing on, well on, on on my phone I guess on the net that also recommended baking soda for, for geraniums so that. Well okay I'm going to my geranium was looking kind of peaky so I thought I'm going to try it on my dream. The verdict is still out yet. I don't know, but it's not getting worse, so we'll go with that. Yeah. Now the Horticultural Association, you have a mission to spread the knowledge of growing things. You also, as you mentioned, you have meetings, but not over the summertime. I think you take a break so people can be out in the garden. Yes, yes. There's been debate about whether we should have our meetings July, August and take a break in January or February, but it's always as long as I know it's been traditionally to take the time off in the summer, I think. And now, especially because a lot of people are gone and on holidays we trying to get together. We do, of course, our big garden tour, but we're also trying to encourage members to open their gardens up to other members in our garden club. So we had three on the weekend that we we toured gardens. One was actually a public facility. It was masterpiece, the senior resident, and they're quite proud of the work they've been doing to beautify their landscape. So they they asked if our members would be interested in coming by to see it. So it was open to our members as well as two members opened their gardens. Gardening is also therapeutic, especially as you get up in age. It's it's a connection to the Earth. Oh, it definitely is. I would say, unless you do too much of it. Well, that's. Yeah. Anything, you know, all things in moderation. Yeah. I mean, I love my garden and, you know, even picking weeds is is fine. I don't I don't mind that it's I try not to let them get ahead of me because then it's a lot of work. But if you can keep up with them and it's nice to see that garden blooming and growing, whether it's vegetables or flowers. Yeah. You also have an annual plant sale. Yes, we do that. May I believe it happens. We usually always do at the weekend after the long weekend. So we don't conflict there. And in the garden centers kind of have their go. And it's mostly perennials. Yes. And it goes over well. People look for it always I think we. Yeah, yeah. I think one of the most famous gardens, at least that I am aware of, is the one that the Duggan home. Yes. That is a classical garden, as I understand it. Yes. I was just there this morning. It just weeded for an hour and a half and I had to try to stay clean. That was a challenge to come here. But yeah, I'm kind of the head gardener there. So yes, we've tried, we try to keep as many, mostly the plants there that are historical plants. That would have been either around at the time when, you know, the early years of the house. So yeah, the older roses like blocked cupboard and the hands are roses we've got. Yeah. Lots of older plants. Yeah. Yeah. They have hollyhocks there. Not so many. There used to be some for some reason they've kind of disappeared. And the other issue this morning was I got a shock because I had walked through the garden and I was walking back, a deer shot out of the bushes. Wow. Yeah. Right in front of me. And I went, oh my gosh. But they create a little bit of havoc and that they love to eat certain things. They decimate the hostas. We can't really grow sweet peas, which is an old favorite of mine. There's a few other things they like to munch on. They like lilies, like daylilies to eat the buds off. So yeah. But all in all, we have to sort of live together. We can't get rid of them. I guess to them a flower bed is like a salad bar. I think. So, yes. Or d'oeuvres or something. Yeah, yeah, we have lots of new varieties now. Do you have one that you really say? Boy, I'm glad that they've come up with this. Do you have a favorite one that you've started to grow over the last couple of years, perhaps, or an improvement on one that you had a as a favorite? I can't think of any offhand, but but there's there's so many out there. Yeah, I love The Veronicas or Speed Wells and they've done so much work in breeding with them. The traditional old Veronica was, you know, about two feet tall and a nice purple flowers that blooms a long time. It's a good one for our prairies because if you give it too much water, it gets floppy. But floppy, floppy or floppy? I thought I was going to say floppy. That's the term floppy. Floppy? Yeah, yeah. So, you know, it's a better looking plant if it's kept on the dry side. But they've also done so much breeding with it. So now there's well they have everything from low ground covers all the way up to up to that two feet and all the colors white, pink and purple. And, and I love Veronicas and there's been a lot of work done on them. So yeah, our climate has been changing. And I believe that as medicine had changed its zone. Yet are more plants now able to be grown here because of the change in climate? Are we still the same zone? Well, I think you can. I always say it's nice to push the boundaries, and it's always going to depend on your yard or your location. You know, some people say, oh yeah, I can grow that and the next person can't. But microclimates are a big thing. Yeah, definitely. You know, it's a bit warmer than it used to be I would say. But but on the other hand the fluctuations are more extreme. So in some ways it's very difficult. So you might get away with with growing zone five if you're really lucky and if it's just in the right place and, and some zone for plants. But if you're just want to stay tried and to stick to zone three plants for hardiness, cold hardiness. But like I say, with our our fluctuations and our lack of snow cover, it makes, I always say it's tough on plants here. It'd be easier to grow lots of things in Winnipeg or in Edmonton if you get the snow cover there, insulated for the winter. Here we get our snow and then it melts and then we're back up to, you know, plus ten, 15, seven, you know, incredibly warm. And so the like they say the plants are confused. They don't know whether they should grow or not grow. I've had peonies growing in February really. And you go, oh my gosh, I'm not happy to see the little pink nubs coming up. But then you know, they've managed to survive and that. But we've had also winters of incredible winter kill because of that. Yeah, yeah I remember when I used to do the gardening show on chat with Lee Smythe from Golden Acre Garden Center. She used to tell me that some plants have the ability to telescope, so if it's warm, they can go up. And if it's cold, oh, wait a minute. They come back down again. Yes. They're incredibly tough like this spring. I mean, I have I grow a lot of irises and we get snow in May in the first little irises are blooming by mid-May. And you think, oh, so it kind of wrecks. And actually I felt some this spring because it was cold and they were solid, like hard as rock. They were frozen hard as rock like, and they were fine. The next day the sun came out and they were fine. Yeah, the flowers were kind of destroyed, but the plant and I'm going. I couldn't take that. Yeah. No, it it's always a battle though. And the pests that we have to fight off as well. Yeah, a lot of I haven't seen too many grasshoppers over the last couple of years, but they're cyclical. Yes. They kind of run I think it's about a seven year cycle. But yes, they definitely are cyclical. More yeah not so many. And this year I think well you know how much rain we've had. It's really unusual. So to me that is really I mean the plants everything this year is kind of like they're on steroids. Everything. They love that natural rain. And to me that's certainly seem to sort of retard the bugs because the plants are healthy, it's easier to resist the insect and the problems. I get a lot of insect damage on my rose leaves. It's like a chafer kind of a slug kind of thing. And this year I've been watching them. I'm never very quick at treating, and they're not nearly as damaged to some years. Yeah, there's another change to that. I recall Lee talking about was the less harmful pesticides that don't affect birds and the rest of the food chain and also companion planting. Yeah, I've done that through the years. Years ago, I planted garlic next to all my roses. Does it help? I'm not sure, but it looks. The garlic looks neat when it goes up into the scapes and it gets that curled head anyway, so do things like that. And also, yeah, you can do sprays made out of garlic and, you know, crushed garlic and hot peppers and things. They don't have a little dish soap. They don't have a residual effect. So that's one of the disadvantages. But at least you know you're not killing off the bees or that's the key or helpful wasps or anything. You know lady the lady beetles. Yeah. Yeah. Because without the bees and the wasps and the butterflies to pollinate, we would not exist. Oh, exactly. Yes. So I'm always happy in the spring when I start seeing all the bees buzzing around and the flies are out. And. Yeah. So the association is sort of taking the summer break right now as we speak. You're getting ready for the garden tour, which when this airs will already have happened. When do you get going again? In the fall. September. Okay. Get going in September, our meetings the fourth Monday of the month of every month. So it won't be till the end of September. But yeah, we we look forward to getting together in the fall. And sometimes over the summer we try to organize some kind of a tour or group get together besides the garden tours, whatever we can figure out for members. Last year we did a trolley tour, whoever wanted to sign up for it and did a tour through the city. And yeah, so we'll see if we can arrange something this summer. So if somebody is listening or watching, they think, boy, that would be something I would like, but might be a little intimidated to be rubbing elbows with gardening experts. Oh, I hope not. I mean, the whole point is. Yeah, talk to people who know know something. If you don't know something like I say, we hoped that we're friendly and approachable and that. Don't be afraid for sure. I mean, this is the place to come. Yeah, yeah. Do you help with house plants, too? Yes. We've had. Oh my gosh. My mind is going. We had the girl from across the tracks. She has a shop she started her business in during Covid selling house plants. Okay. And she sells plants. Oh, yes. Botanicals? Yes. And North railway? Yes. The old Austin store. Yes. She's come and spoke to us and quite knowledgeable. And so I mean we. Yes. And there's members that do you know lots with with houseplants too. We have one of our members is an amazing, amazing orchid grower, fanatical orchid girl. That's hard. Oh, and our members have toured his place. And it's fascinating. Absolutely fascinating. Yes, he's totally immersed. He also grows crickets and frogs. So the crossover combo. I think the crickets defeat the pet stores. But. But his orchid collection is fascinating. Yeah, I think we should also give a shout out to the folks in the medicine at Parks Department for the work they do with all the flower beds around town, and growing them in their greenhouses and maintaining them over the years to make our city look that much better. Yes. I mean, I'm I'm happy that we have these flowering baskets downtown. Beautiful. Yeah, all of that. I don't know what to say about it. I'm glad to see that the parks are planting more trees, because definitely our our tree cover. I mean, they're suffering. You can see with all the heat and the droughts and the things we've had that we need more trees. We need a lot more trees planted because there's a lot of death, you know, in The Overstory and things like that. But yeah, the parks is undertaken to plant a lot more trees and that's that's a great project. And I know when it comes to budget and money, there's never enough. When I came to Medicine Hat, I worked. I worked for the parks department for a few years under Rick Doyle. And at that time there was so much money and he was ordering trees by the semi load and we were planting, or it was a bunch of us newly graduated horticulture students, and we were just every day you'd go in and cut a new shrub bit. And so we planted a lot of these shrub beds that are around the city in the parks. Well, if you're up on Crescent Heights or you're coming down Shelton Hill and you look across the valley, you see all those tree tops in. It always looks so nice. Wonderful. Yeah. And I recall an article in the Medicine that news when they started the water distribution system in Medicine Hat, encouraging people to plant trees because they referred to it then as a blister on the prairies. Well, we're in the short grass prairie region. And if you look out on the prairie, they're the only place there's trees or along the river or, you know, maybe in a gully of some little seedling managed to get established. So. Yes. And, you know, going forward that that could be a challenge if we start having water shortages. Yes. Yeah. Well, from a parched blister on the prairies to an oasis on the prairies, all thanks to people like yourself who look after your lawns and gardens and trees. Marilyn Kusler with the Medicine Hat Horticultural Association. Thanks for the visit. Oh. You're welcome.