Appreciating Nature's Little Critters

by Laura Walker

My calendar says it’s January; my personal barometer says it’s late October. New Years day was spent on my much-postponed task of putting down mulch to protect for the winter but honestly it was a satisfying experience. The soil was moist and soft. Weeding was almost a pleasure. I was careful not to disturb too many creatures seeking a cozy spot for hibernation because protecting insects protects our garden ecosystems. I haven’t always been a fan of insects but over the past years I’ve been properly educated and the influenced by my good friends, the Master Gardeners that know the value of these bugs. Now I relocate rather than kill. Yep, even that slimy garden slug.

Could it be that these little living things like us have feelings or personalities? They definitely have jobs and responsibilities. Consider the different roles bees or ants play in a community or colony. They can be mothers or leaders, nurses, producers of goods, foragers, defenders or even builders perhaps important scouts. And for the gardener, they provide such important service. They help enrich our soil, many pollinate our plants, and some are keen predators that provide us with natural biological control. They live in our gardens – flying, crawling, wiggling and slithering – working for the good of biodiversity. I've include a few photos I've taken within my garden.

I’m thrilled that our focus this month and throughout our newsletter revolves around spreading knowledge about the beauty, value and interest of these incredible garden partners. I hope it challenges your thinking about bugs.

And remember, when life gives you aphids,

make aphid-ade!

Couldn’t help myself. Embrace a little levity! ~ Laura

Orcas Island Garden Club

presents

Linda Gilkeson

Where Have All the Insects Gone?

at the Orcas Center

Special Guest Pop Up - Carol Wetzel of Little Farm on Olga Road

Carol Wetzel from The Little Farm on Olga Road will be bringing beautiful potted up Amaryllis to share with the garden club on January 15th. First come first serve. This is a generous gift provided by Carol to the garden club members at no charge. There will be a limited number available.

Holiday Tea and Terrarium Making Workshop Revisited

by Laura Walker

Our holiday tea and terrarium making workshop was a huge success! It was so wonderful to see so many smiling, happy and engaged folks. We were all creating something beautiful with our hands while learning a great deal of detailed information on building and caring for terrariums. If you need a refresher, check out the photo folder for more pictures and our instructor, Lynn’s overview slides with helpful information to create a mini indoor garden at home.

Vegetable Gardening in the PNW (January 22nd)

Vegetable Gardening in the PNW with Extension Master Gardener Jim Olson. There are six keys to successfully growing vegetables in our area of the Pacific Northwest, preparing your planting location, timing of seed starting, key items for caring of plants and how to recognize and treat problems on plants during their path to your plate at the peak of flavor. The focus is how to use the six steps to prevent problems, and where that doesn’t work, how to treat them. Register ($8 per person) today!

PNW Garden Savvy Series (January through March)

PNW Garden Savvy classes (formerly known as BDG Workshops) are held Saturdays from 9:30 to 10:30 am from January through October each year. They are held online via the Zoom platform. Registrants will receive Zoom instructions to access the online class via email prior to the presentation. The classes are recorded and recordings will be made available to all registrants. For more information, please click the buttons below.

Want to get started in the hobby of Birding?! The San Juan Island Library is hosting a lecture you just might want to attend!



Introduction to Birding on February 5th from 6-7:30

DIG IN Member Experience: Tool Sharpening & Pruning Hands-on Workshop (February 8th)

Come meet the Orcas Master Gardeners and learn alongside them. Join us for a DIG IN Member Experience on Saturday, February 8th at the Orcas Christian School at 12 pm beginning with a hands-on tool sharpening experience with a whetstone and oil. Next, learn how to make successful cuts on dwarf fruit trees with your newly refurbished shears – no ladders required! Pruning your fruit trees can improve their health and harvests PLUS tool care is more fun with friends. 

We are so grateful to have our expert and friend, Marguerite Greening lead us through this workshop which will help us learn how to get our fruit trees ready for the growing season through pruning. Look for an invite to RSVP soon.

DIG IN Member Experience:

North Short Preserve Walk and Great Backyard Bird Count (February 14th)

Join us on Friday, February 14th at 9 am for a walk through the North Shore Preserve with Orcas Island preserve steward, Peter Guillozet. He will share an overview of recent native plantings and restoration efforts while we simultaneously participate in a group bird count, Citizen Science activity. Our meeting place will be in the main parking area down by the wetlands and swallow roost.

January

by Helen Huber

It’s a new year and a time to reflect on all that’s come before. I was young a very long time ago. So long ago that the guidelines for child safety were either nonexistent or relaxed. My parents did not hover, expect to engage, or entertain us as part of our shared daily lives. Following are some examples of how my childhood was a tad different from modern kids’.

Playthings 

Here I am stylin’ in pink-striped jodhpurs over what looks to be an enormous diaper. Or my pear shape started way earlier than realized. Note the jaunty hat. And my Mother’s Winstons I so casually hold as if I’m about to pop one in my baby-toothed mouth and light up. Toddlers like to hold things and cigarettes were always nearby.

Play With What’s Around 

My sister and I had a few games, a box of crayons, a stash of Barbie dolls, and the world around us that we would use to make our own fun.

Experiencing the Magic of Zoolights

by Abby Deskins

Garden Club member and Tacoma resident, Abby, ventured to the iconic Zoolights at Point Defiance Zoo & Aquarium to celebrate the holiday season. Read on to learn about her adventures and findings!

Sowing the Seeds of Patience

by Suzette Lamb

You know how you’re not supposed to go to the grocery store hungry?

That’s how I feel looking through these seed catalogs. Every hue of every vegetable and flower calls me to order it. I can taste and smell them already. And I want to buy them all and eat them in the parking lot before I’m even home. Wait…those metaphors got mixed together…but you know what I mean. I’m hungry for the next growing season and everything sounds delicious!

Welcome to our nature studio where each month, the Orcas Island Garden Club will feature a different artist who has created diverse, beautiful artwork.

This month, we are featuring Virginia Sides!

Garden Art Pastels by Virginia Sides

Virginia moved to Orcas with her parents in 2007 to begin attending college at WSU. Here, she met and married her husband, Cameron Sides, who is an OI high school graduate. While she lived on Orcas, she assisted her mom, Garden Club member Perri Gibbons, with the social hour, the garden tour and painting whimsical garden-related art. She and Cameron now live in Bow with their three children, but she continues to support the club. For the 2024 tour, she painted an individualized watercolor gift for each of the tour property owners.

Click below to view some of the art Virginia made for the club. Her favorite paintings are of her children, but here’s one she made for Laura and her girls at the end of last year’s garden tour.

Also, check on the XL-ANT art in the Made You Smile section at the end of the newsletter!

Do you want to showcase your creative side? Is there someone in your life who has expressed great passion with art, nature, or gardening? We would love to showcase these talents in our newsletter!

Welcome to our series of garden travels. Each month we will feature a garden visit shared by our garden club members. Walk with them as they discover hidden gems and get inspired to visit these treasured places.

This month, we are visiting Karen's Wildflower Garden!

Creating a Wildflower Garden

by Karen Johnston (Interviewer: Cindy Burman-Woods)

Curious about growing a wildflower garden on Orcas? I contacted Karen Johnston whose garden is colorful, whimsical, and creative in design. It is a delightful garden, with many found objects that have been imaginatively transformed and flowers at every turn.

Karen lives out on the Olga side of the island, on a piece of land that extends out into the water. Over the last few years, she has been cultivating a wildflower garden that frames her view of Olga and beyond. Karen was kind enough to respond to a list of fourteen questions that I submitted to her, please continue to read on!

OIGC Grants and OPAL Recipient Update

Grant proposals that align with our mission are accepted starting January 1, 2025 until

March 1, 2025. Learn more about the grant process for the 2025 year by reading below! See what grant recipient, OPAL Community Land Trust has been working on with their funding...

Identify and Control Tent Caterpillars

by Madrona Murphy

Most of us only think about tent caterpillars when we see them swarming in our trees in spring; but I want to encourage you to think about them in the winter: specifically, when you are pruning fruit trees. Your best opportunity to reduce or prevent damage to fruit trees is before the caterpillars hatch.

Greenhouse Propagation

by Lilian Bergsma

Are you thinking about adding a greenhouse to your garden? Greenhouses can be beautiful and useful structures for a gardener. It serves as a shield between nature and what you are growing and extends the growing seasons. This is the first in a new monthly series where we'll feature a different club members’ greenhouse. They'll share what they've learned and experienced along with how they utilize it. Lilian give us a glimpse into how she utilizes her greenhouse throughout the year.

"Gardening adds years to your life and life to your years."

Author unknown

Prophylactic: A Preventative Measure.

by Carol Wetzel

The word comes from the Greek for "an advance guard," an apt term for a measure taken to fend off a disease or another unwanted consequence. 

Other than an occasional application of Neem and Horticulture Oil, I rarely sprayed for disease and pests in 2024. I simply focused on compost tea soil drenching’s to build a strong base for my plants. 2024 was not a big year for aphids, and I saw lots of lady bugs out and about. However, there was disease and issues with blister mites on our grapes. During winter, those buggers crawl into the grape’s main trunk and wait for spring to get back at it. This year, we want to take a proactive approach by using preventative measures to get ahead of disease and pests. 

Join us in person at our monthly meetings for a chance to win a door prize.

Pictured right: Presenter, Lynn Johnson, and President, Laura Walker, congratulate Jan Jacobson, December's Door Prize Raffle Winner! Lynn will make a special terrarium for her!

Nature in Your Neighborhood

Author Marni Fylling

Congratulations to Nancy Reas for winning the raffle!

Thank you to Darvill’s Bookstore for the generous donation of the book, "Nature in Your Neighborhood" by Marni Fylling!

Monthly Member-Only raffle winners are chosen at random from a list of current Garden Club members. To see if you are an active member, contact Karen Hiller.

What We Sow: On the Personal, Ecological, and Cultural Significance of Seeds

Author Jennifer Jewell

"For Christmas, I received a copy of WHAT WE SOW - On the Personal, Ecological, and Cultural Significance of Seeds by Jennifer Jewell, and I recommend it highly." Ken Wood

You can find this book at Darvill's Bookstore online or in-person!

Meet your Newsletter Contributor

by Cindy Burman-Woods

The OIGC newsletter was developed during the Covid pandemic to continue educating and connecting members. In-person meetings were cancelled, and several members volunteered to edit and write articles for the newsletter. To recognize the efforts of the newsletter team we are highlighting one member each month. Each member took the time to answer questions about themselves and their interests.

This month, we are highlighting newsletter team member Helen Huber!

Hibernating Insects

by Kate Yturri

In light of their importance Linda Gilkeson will speak to us this month about the reasons for the catastrophic loss of insects in our environment. We will also be writing an article about insects and other invertebrates as a new series in every newsletter!

In this newsletter we are giving you permission to procrastinate for the sake of insects. If you are still thinking about cleaning up your garden, remember most arthropods including pollinators need many of the plant materials we throw away.

Growing and Pruning Hydrangeas

by Anne Garfield

Growing Hydrangeas is easy. They don’t need a lot of attention. Hydrangeas don’t require pruning to remain healthy and vigorous. The main reason for pruning them is for aesthetics. How we want them to look in our yards.

Calling All Garden Sleuths

As our gardens settle into rest with the arrival of winter weather, our Garden Tour planning committee is continuing to work to create a great garden tour for 2025. Each year, with the help of our Garden Club members, we search for lovely gardens to feature on our garden tour.  

We need your help to find some great gardens for our 2025 Garden Tour!

Program Chair, Lene, says we should all tune into the Linda Gilkeson’s insect presentation…

It will be XL-ANT!

Artwork by Virginia Sides

2024-2025 Membership to date: 169