Idea Garden Blooms Exotic At Farm And Home Center ANDY ANDREWS Lancaster Fanning Staff LANCASTER (Lancaster Co.) Here, you’ll find Exotic Love, Painted Tongue, Cupid’s Dart; and Canterbury Bells. Sound like the titles of romance novels? Well, they aren’t They’re exotic plants. And the only romance is the love Master Gar deners have for selecting and planting some beloved exotics chosen from seed catalogs and carefully grown for the 1996 Idea Garden on display at the Lancaster Lienhard, right, shows Elkner the root of a plant called 4 O'clock, or Mirabills, that grows to about two feet high, similar to a dalia, that has to be dug up each year and stored. Althea Mailing plants Painted Tongue (Salplglossls). Harry Collins crouches down to prepare the bed for the Idea Garden. Farm and Home Center. Early on Wednesday morning nearly a dozen Lancaster County Master Gardeners were busy removing plugs of some dainty, flowering annuals and turning over * the moist earth to allow the garden 5 to come back to life. “This year the Master Garden-» ers selected a lot of nonconven-- tional type plants, many of which I suspect most homeowners have never seen,” said Tim Elkner, county horticultural agent. Hans Lienhard, chairperson of Early on Wednesday morning nearly a dozen Lancaster County Master Gardeners were busy removing plugs of some dainty flowering annuals and turning over the moist earth to allow the garden to come back to life. All photos by Andy Andrews the Idea Garden Committee, was reviewing a “map” prepared on newsprint that detailed the location of plants such as Cupid’s Dart (a vine plant, Catananche, containing a red flower). Lienhard also showed Elkner the root of a plant called 4 O’clock, orMirabilis, that grows to about two feet high, simi lar to a dahlia. “There is a lot of material here that the Master Gardeners have grown in their gardens that will work in this area,” said Elkner, including California poppy (botanical name Eshscholzia). So how did they come by these gems? The Master Gardeners obtained seeds (at a cost of about $52) from several catalogs and contracted with a Strasburg nursery to grow them in flats. The nursery finished the plants—hop ing to see how well they do at the Farm and Home Center. Elkner said the cooler spring is leaving growth for plants lagging behind schedule about 10 days. For those who want to see the gar dens in full bloom, with both the cool season and early warm season plants at their peak, come by the Farm and Home Center after the Lancaster Farming special Dairy Issue on June 1. (Turn to Page A 29) Hans Llenhard, chairperson of the Idea Garden Commit tee, left, reviews a map prepared on newsprint that details the location of plants such as Cupid’s Dart (a vine plant con taining a red flower, with the botanist’s name of Cata nanche). At right is Tim Elkner, county horticultural agent. portion of the plot to plant coleus. v , V*4 * *
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