May Program Night
May 17 2018. Minutes by Petra Kruis-Daly
At 7:06pm Debbie began the evening with a welcome to everyone, especially the new members
1. Reminder to all guests to sign in as you enter for safety reasons, as well as to win potential prizes
2. Check out the back bulletin board to see new business and other information.
3. Deb Z thanked Mary Fretz, Donna Cavers, Dorothy Minor and Agnes Wolters for the snacks for this evening. Hellen Edl, Sharon Sykes, Letha Burden, Pat Henderson and Kim Dickie are scheduled for June’s Program.
4. The Lions Home Garden and Craft show. Thank you to all who came to visit our booth, it was a great success with the volume of visitors and the mini demos from Lester F, Kim D and Marlene L. Thanks also to all the people who helped ‘man’ the booth. Those friendly faces were great ambassadors for our organization.
5. Plant sale report by Petra, despite the rain, we had a great turnout of donated plants and friendly volunteers. We ended up making $1851 including the leftover plants sold tonight.
6. Planting Day is May 26. Everyone is welcome to come 8am to help plant flowers to make our town look great. Come to the bridge parking lot and you will be guided to a flower bed to help plant. All annuals are donated by Konkles Greenhouses.
7. Junior Gardeners program has 25 signed up. Our second year partnering with Haldimand 4H. As part of the program the children help on planting day and clean up day, as well as planting and maintaining their own home garden under the direction of Margaret Bottrell.
8. The Members Only Free Garden Tour is on June 16 10am to 3pm. Please make sure you pick up a map/list. Feel free to come and check out all the great gardens. Rain or Shine. This is self guided so feel free to wander and admire. Feel free to bring a friend, they just need to purchase a membership at one of the gardens and they can enjoy. Website will also have details.
9. Plant and Bake Sale for Haldimand Hort Saturday May 19 Rain or Shine. St Paul’s Church, Caledonia.
10. 7th Annual Blooms and Bubbly Garden Tour, June 23. Proceeds- Senior Support Service. 905 774 3005
11. Our condolences to the family’s of two DHS members : Geoff Johnson and Dorothy Egger.
12. Weeders this year are to make sure they received an email from Deb Z with instructions. Weeders are encouraged not to break up the soil, just pull the weeds as this reduces the amount of weeds self seeding. Please remove the weeds from beds and not leave them on the sidewalks. This year we are going to leave any Milkweed that should sprout up, to help the rebound of Monarch Butterflies.
13. There are 17 beds that require weeding this year, many have annuals but some have a variety of perennials.The large flower pots throughout downtown will increase to 32 this year. The BIA provides the summer inserts, DHS decorates for Winter/Christmas to keep the town beautiful. Several community groups have volunteered to help our club weed some of our beds. The local Scouts/Cubs are taking care of one bed, and another by Community Living. The flower bed under the anchor has been redone. Two Tonne of potato stone has been added over new garden cloth, the weeds will no longer have a chance. Thanks to Ed Zylstra from Dunnville Silo for volunteering his time and resources and taking care of this project.
14. Break announced, everyone was encouraged to get a snack and drink, and purchase ways and means tickets before our speaker begins.
15. Deb Z introduced Carla Carlson from Niagara Nature Tours. She had been intrigued with nature her whole life, and had completed degrees in this area. Her topic tonight was on identifying weeds…. Good and bad.
16. Deb Z thanked Carla for her very informative talk. We will all go home trying different plants in our meals, have a new outlook on things that grow around us that we didn’t plant, and have a healthier respect for all plants and how they interact with animals, birds, bees, insects and ourselves.
17. Debbie began the annual ‘Rose Draw’ assisted by Nelly. The following members have won a beautiful rose bush: Don Davies, Anna Lam, Bob Baily, Clara Draalstra, Rose Allen, Virginia Harris, Bev Mclean, Wyn Overend, Stanley Carnes, Gloria Hunter. One rose was donated back by Don Davies and auctioned off to Ellen Guenther for $21
18. Debbie closed the meeting tonight reminding everyone that Carla is still available for questions about talk and if you give her your email your name will be entered in a free draw.
19. Meeting was adjourned at 8:35pm . Ways and Means followed.
