Alpine Garden Club of BC 26 SPRING 2008
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Alpine Garden Club of British Columbia Vol.51 No. 2 Bulletin SPRING 2008 Web Address: www.agc-bc.ca President: Linda Verbeek 1st V.P. Philip MacDougall 2nd V.P. Dave Sellars Secretary: Allison Carson Treasurer: Amanda Offers Past President: Doug Smith Membership: Ian Gillam Seed Exchange: Ian and Phyllis Plenderleith Program: Philip MacDougall Annual Show: Diana Hume, Karen Thirkell Pot Show: Dana Cromie Plant Sale: Mark Demers Librarian: Pam Frost Open Gardens: Ann Dies Refreshments: Dorothy Yarema Publicity: Joan Bunn Webmaster: Chris Klapwijk Bulletin Editor: Sue Evanetz Bulletin Publishing: Moya Drummond Copy Editor: Ian Gillam Committee Members Mark Demers, Ann Dies, Diana Hume, Stuart Scholefield Karen Thirkell, Chris Klapwijk Honorary Life Members Margaret Charlton, Grace Conboy, Francisca Darts, Pam Frost, Daphne Guernsey, Bodil Leamy, Jim MacPhail, Geoff Williams, Bob Woodward Meetings are held the second Wednesday of each month except July & August, in the Floral Hall, VanDusen Botanical Garden. Doors and Library open at 7:00pm and Meetings start at 7:30pm with the educational talk. Don’t forget to bring a prize for the raffle which goes a long way to paying for the hall rental. Cover: Recently I fell heir to a number of back issues of the Bulletin dating from 1992 collected by past Honorary Life Member Frank Dorsey. What a wealth of articles and drawings; not to mention a sort of condensed history of our Club. The cover drawings are all by members, sadly some of whom are no longer with us. However, it is our intention to have a gallery of our members’ drawings on our website as a permanent record and I am starting this month to share with you some of these treasures. This month we have Silene hookeri drawn by Gerald Straley who was Director of the UBC Botanical Garden before his untimely death on December 11, 1997. ~ Moya Drummond Alpine Garden Club of BC 26 SPRING 2008 TABLE OF CONTENTS PROGRAM: 27 AGCBC-NARGS AFFILIATION PROPOSAL 28 NOTE FROM THE EDITOR: 28 THE WAY FORWARD: 29 THE BULLETIN AND ITS DISTRIBUTION ~ by Ian Gillam, Vancouver, BC DESFONTAINIA SPINOSA 30 ~ by Charlie Sale, Woodlands, BC ALPINE TROUGHS AT WISLEY 32 ~ by Paul Cumbleton & Meg Morgan ALL THINGS ORIENTALIS 37 ~ by Patrick Healey, Belmont, Manitoba THE SISKIYOUS MADE A FIRST AND LASTING IMPRESSION 39 ~ by Brent Hine, Curator, Lohbrunner Alpine Garden at UBC PROGRAM: April 9th Harry Jans - Iran in focus Website: www.jansalpines.com . A rock gardener for more than 25 years, specializing in rare and unusual alpines. Founding member of the Dutch Rock Garden Society and president of the Society for 6 years. Member of four AGS Expeditions, Frequent lecturer at International Conferences and Study Weekends in Holland, Germany, England, Scotland, USA and Canada. He has written several articles for international journals on the subjects of rock gardening and alpine plants. April 12th – 13th The Annual Alpine Garden Club of BC Spring Show will be held in the Floral Hall at VanDusen Garden, 37th and Oak Street, Vancouver. Hours of opening are Saturday, 12 noon to 4 pm and Sunday, 10am to 4 pm. Plants may be entered for the Show between 6 and 9 pm on Friday the 11th. The BC Primula Group will hold a sale on the walkway from 10am on the 12th. May 3rd Spring Sale: 1pm to 4pm at St. David’s United Church, 1525 Taylor Way, West Vancouver. May 14th Linda Jennings: Collections Manager of the UBC Herbarium: A History of Women in Botany on the West Coast. June 11th Possible tour of UBC E.H. Lohbrunner Alpine Garden led by Brent Hine, Curator of Collections. Sept 10th Brent Hine – Dry Land Odyssey (to be confirmed) Oct 8th Linda Veerbeek: Alpines along the West Coast Alpine Garden Club of BC 27 SPRING 2008 The 2009 NARGS speakers tour features Joseph Halda. He will be speaking to our group Sunday March 15th, 2009. Please note this is not our regular date and the venue may change. We may also hold our regular meeting on Wednesday March 11th, 2009. AGCBC-NARGS AFFILIATION PROPOSAL ~ by Linda Verbeek Several times in the past decades it was proposed that the AGCBC should become a chapter of the North American Rock Garden Society (NARGS). The proposal has always been voted down at the annual general meeting, but it was raised again in the last couple of years, and this time we decided to involve the whole membership, not just those who can and do come to the monthly meetings. So in the last (Winter 2008) issue of the Bulletin, we presented two articles outlining the arguments pro and contra. We hope that many of you will consider the proposal and send us your comments (to the Editor, Sue Evanetz). We will publish the arguments (excerpted if we get too many similar views) in the next bulletin, together with a ballot. Unfortunately, the ballot has to be non-binding; our Constitution specifies that these kinds of decisions have to be made by the members present at the Annual General Meeting, but we promise that we will take your views into account. NOTE FROM THE EDITOR: In this issue we are delighted to include articles from Paul Cumbleton and Meg Morgan at the RHS Garden, Wisley, England; and from Patrick Healey who gardens on the Prairies in Manitoba, Canada. We are looking forward to hearing from a curator of the trough garden at the New York Botanical Garden, and we are extremely fortunate to have a wealth of people here in and around Vancouver who are prepared to share their love of plants and their extensive knowledge. Do YOU have a story to share? A favourite plant; a special experience with something; a funny story you heard somewhere? Do you know someone whose gardening skills you admire? Have you built a rock garden or planted a scree? We’d LOVE to hear from you. You can send in your garden-related items – long or short or somewhere in-between – as an email, on a CD or 3 ½ inch disc or on paper. Photos can be printed or slides. We will do our utmost to return material to you, but it’s best not to send precious originals if you can avoid it. ~ Sue Evanetz Alpine Garden Club of BC 28 SPRING 2008 THE WAY FORWARD: THE BULLETIN AND ITS DISTRIBUTION ~ by Ian Gillam, Vancouver, BC In the past couple of years our Editor, Sue Evanetz, and her associate Moya Drummond, responsible for layout, locating illustrations and getting the proofs to and from the printer, have taken the request to improve the Bulletin and acted. Articles have been commissioned from outside sources, several pages of colour illustrations inserted and items such as Pot Show results, of interest primarily to local members, have been banished to inserts directed locally. (Once mailed the Bulletin seems to fall into a black hole and there is little actual evidence anyone reads it.) The Bulletin and Seed List have in recent years been posted on the Club’s website, available to anyone interested. This brings the Club to the notice of growers anywhere in the world and encourages a trickle of new members. Valuable as this is it raises questions about anyone being able to read the latest Bulletin on the web free of charge while members pay to receive the paper version. Colour printing and the ever-increasing cost of postage make this an expensive project. We have visualized saving some costs by distributing the Bulletin electronically and have asked members if they are willing to receive it in this way. Currently around 20% have agreed to do so; 40% don’t wish to. The remainder have indicated no preference and possibly don’t read it. (But could some members value the paper copy enough to want to keep it for reference?) One solution to the economic situation is simply to increase the annual subscription. (It has remained at $25 over many years.) This is likely to be unpopular and lead to loss of some members. Another under serious consideration is to continue publishing hard copies of the Bulletin for those requesting it but only printing in black-and-white. Colour illustrations would be available in the electronic version. Current issues would be available electronically only to members, who might wish to print it out themselves. Back issues over a year old would be continue to be available free to all on the web. Whatever solution is attempted some changes are needed. If the Bulletin is to continue to publish material of interest the support of members is required. Surely with all that experience with the thousands of packets of seed distributed each member has gained some fresh insight into the problems of growing interesting plants. Your notes, questions and answers will be of value to other members. They need be no more than notes and can be shaped into publishable form by our talented editorial staff. Alpine Garden Club of BC 29 SPRING 2008 DESFONTAINIA SPINOSA ~ by Charlie Sale, Woodlands, BC At our February 2008 meeting the raffle was kind to me and I came home with a tight little Desfontainia spinosa grown from wild collected seed (DPCH #132). Our new baby looks like it could develop into something really special. Most of the literature advises planting this handsome holly-like shrub from Chile & Peru in part shade in a moist woodland setting. Here at Buckethill Margaret planted our first acquisition in 1990 in such a location. It did beautifully but never flowered! Then two things happened. When in New Zealand we saw many well-grown D.