Garden Club of Woodbridge Celebrates Success at Flower Show, Hosts Talk on Organic Farming

On February 6, the Garden Club of Woodbridge hosted Stephanie Berluti, who is owner of South Haven Farm in Orange. South Haven Farm is a diverse vegetable farm specializing in salad greens, roots and seasonal favorites. Stephanie's presentation discussed growing organic vegetables and providing organic produce to the local community.

Numerous garden club members won awards at the CT Federated Flower and Garden Show event, "Bursting into Spring," in February. Winners are: Barbara Bosco, honorable mention, "Baseball Craze" petite angular design Cindy Marien, first place, "Hula Hoop Antics" petite design Mary Ann Tyma, third place, "Double Dutch," petite design Nancy La Bianca, (first time entrant) second place, "Rhythm of the Day," multi-rhythmic design Leslie Martino (also Branford Garden Club member), second place, "Daydreaming," reflective design. Leslie also won the division ll horticulture Mary Lou Smith Award of Merit for her entry of the jumping cholla cactus. She took home the horticulture Elfin award for her silver dollar cactus. Several of Leslie's photography entries won ribbons.

Kevin Wasilewski, head of the plant department at Van Wilgen's Garden Center in Guilford and current president of the Connecticut Dahlia Society, discussed spring maintenance of hydrangeas (remove leaves at the base of the plant in order to eliminate excess moisture, remove dead cane, cut off cane crossing others) and roses (use Rose Tone fertilizer, remove dead wood, assess for diseases, remove crossed branches, every three to four years cut bush to ground).

Members partook in the raffle of two beautiful flower containers, one holding mini-daffodils and yellow jolly jump-up flowers. Kevin also supplied several plants for the raffle.