September Newsletter

Guy’s Greetings

Pumpkins, gourds, and mums, oh my! All the makings for fall. Even though we lost a month of our summer to the rains, we now have a chance to enjoy some beautiful weather, the bounty of our gardens, and, hopefully, a few more days of Indian summer.
I am so looking forward to seeing each and every one of you at the Harvest Dinner on the new date, September 27th. It will be wonderful, as always, to close out the season on Great South Bay, breeze blowing, and the sinking sun glinting on the water. Guy

Mark the Date

Tuesday, September 22, 2009, 7:00 PM, the autumnal solstice, general meeting at the Hagerman Fire Department, off Montauk Highway on the corner of Dunton Avenue and Oakdale. Our speaker will be The Garden Lady, Lynn Thompson, on basic landscape design.

Many of us dream of a beautiful garden, but don’t know where to begin. We thumb through catalogs and read books, but are confused by the myriad of choices. We have questions galore. Should I move that shrub? How can I camouflage the chain link fence? Maybe I should put an island bed in the lawn, but where and how big should it be? Well, help is on the way. Lynn Thomson, “The Garden Lady”, will give a talk and slide presentation to show you some of the basic design principles such as shape, texture and focal points. You can make your garden an interesting personal space. Come and see how.

Sunday, September 27, 2009, 4:00 PM, our Harvest Dinner at the Patchogue Beach Club on Maiden Lane just west of South Ocean Avenue. Please bring a dish to share, your choice of appetizer, main course, or dessert. Wine and soda will be provided again by the club. If you are attending, please RSVP to Diane Voland by email, ddjr5418@aol.com, or phone, 758-7350. Please leave a message no later than September 25.

August Meeting in a Flash

We met at Guy’s garden and had a lovely time looking at the pond, flower and vegetable gardens, and the beautiful chickens.

Everyone was given a reminder that dues are to be paid by March 31, 2010. The Board has voted on a late fee of $5 after that date, which means a single membership would be $20 and a couple would be $25.

Arlene will make the arrangements for the Harvest Dinner; please contact her to help out with setup and decorating. Carla will get info on a guitarist to play.

Georgia and Arlene are asking for basket donations or something that can be used in a basket for the Think Spring Luncheon. They are also looking for gift certificates from local businesses. The committee will meet every Monday at 1:00 PM beginning in January. A preliminary meeting will be held in September or October. A quilt show is planned for the luncheon.

Mary Ann said we have four definite houses and are looking for two more for the Christmas House Tour on December 13, 1:00-5:00 PM.

Paula reported the Garden Tour Committee has seen eight gardens thus far as possible candidates for next year’s tour.

Carolyn gave a detailed presentation about club T-shirts. We can order tees, crew-neck sweatshirts, or zip hoodies in many different colors with our logo. Your name is optional. See Carolyn to order.


One wonderful offshoot of inflation's erosion of the weekly paycheck has been a remarkable revival of backyard vegetable gardens. Suburbanites are off calla lilies and into cauliflower, and even city pueblo inhabitants are buying pots and kits to grow their own sprouts. It reminds me of the delight my father took in every meal that featured vegetables from our own garden. We boys found them considerably less so, because their care was one of several jobs that earned us our inconsiderable allowances. His inspection of our efforts every Sunday made the day almost as dismal as did our required church attendance. It took us years to develop a fondness for vegetables.
~ Malcolm Forbes (1975)


Serious Dirt from Richard Waldman

Trees take on Toxins: BNL researches plants to fight pollutants
By Jennifer Smith jennifer.smith@newsday.com

Inside a greenhouse at Brookhaven National Laboratory, a potential remedy for pollution from Long Island's industrial and military past grows in orderly rows.
Slender hybrid poplars planted earlier this year by Lee Newman, an associate biochemist at the lab, now stand at eye level. Bred to grow fast and thirsty, they can suck up groundwater fouled with industrial solvents and then break the toxins down inside the plant tissue.

The approach is called phytoremediation: using plants to contain, remove or destroy toxins. It's been used to help clean sites tainted by dry-cleaning fluid, heavy metals and gasoline - all common pollutants across Long Island.

From trees to vegetables and even ferns, different plants are used to address different environmental pollutants. And they do it "naturally," Newman said, "without having to resort to excavation and incineration of the contaminated material."

In Suffolk, county officials are considering using plants to detoxify soil at Gabreski Airport in Westhampton Beach. Polychlorinated biphenyls, or PCBs, contaminated about an acre at the southeast corner of the property, where electrical transformers were buried decades earlier during the site's use by the military. Following manual removal of the worst "hot spots," Newman and a colleague have proposed sowing zucchini and pumpkin plants. Their roots can extract PCBs from soil and take them up into plant tissue.

"It's a green alternative," said Carrie Meek Gallagher, Suffolk commissioner for environment and energy. "I think it would be a great pilot project."

Still an emerging technology, phytoremediation has been used with some success over the past decade at dozens of military, agricultural and industrial sites across the country. In some cases, phytoremediation can be two to three times cheaper than traditional treatments. That’s part of the appeal for Suffolk County, which has allocated $361,000 to clean up PCB’s at Gabreski Airport. It is less invasive and helps control erosion and dust emission. So why isn’t the practice more widespread on Long Island?

Plants are not the answer for every hazardous waste headache, particularly when pollution is severe or poses an imminent risk to human health. Plants have to be able to access the pollution. The water table is 50 to 100 feet below the surface in parts of Long Island—far too deep for plant roots to reach, said Jim Harrington of the state Department of Environmental Conservation.

Still, the DEC has not ruled out phytoremediation as a tool for future cleanups across the state. “We’re still looking at it, and we will pick it when we have the right fit.”


Mark Jeffers Shares No-Dig Secrets for a Carefree Garden

Something magical happens when compost kisses your garden soil.
It energizes your soil with fertility-boosting nutrients. It fluffs up your soil, making it easier to work in. It vaccinates your soil against disease. It preserves life-giving moisture. And it actually invigorates the soil with thousands of beneficial life forms to enrich and protect your garden.
And that's just for starters!

• Imagine a no-work "comforter" composting system that works IN your garden! No more back-breaking wheelbarrowing…no more turning or mixing…no more wasted effort. Instead, you have compost exactly where you need it to be for the most powerful results.
• Imagine Grow Heaps you prepare in just minutes in the fall, and magically, some of the healthiest, most disease-resistant tomatoes, squash, watermelons, and more automatically leap from your garden bed the following spring.
• Imagine a hot-burning "banner batch" that yields black, fluffy, almost velvety compost that's perfect for potting soil or for your prized flower beds – in just a few weeks time.
Well, imagine no more. With the all new, full color step-by-step guide, you’ll discover astonishingly innovative techniques that take traditional composting methods to dramatic new levels that are easier to use and more practical to apply in your garden. For example...

• Turn that idle garbage heap in the back of your yard into a vibrant tool to create new growing space…solve garden problems…host beneficial insects…and invigorate soil all year!

• Trade in all the laborious work of old composting methods for much simpler ways that take little or no effort and guarantee garden-boosting results every time.
• Solve the puzzle of what you can and can't compost when you know about surprising compostable ingredients – and how they can make an amazingly powerful difference in your garden.

These simple composting secrets mean less digging…less mulching…less weeding…and less watering. You'll actually work less and enjoy your garden more! Amazing new uses for compost with step-by-step advice to help you fight weeds…attract beneficial insects…start up new plants…and more. See how simple it is to use compost to loosen up hard, clay soil…plant a bed on a sloping site…fill in erosion-washed ditches…and perk up tired flowers, trees, and shrubs.
Pleasant, Barbara. “The complete compost gardening guide: banner batches, grow heaps, comforter compost, and other amazing techniques for saving time and money, and producing the most flavorful, nutritious vegetables ever”, Barbara Pleasant & Deborah L. Martin. North Adams, MA: Storey Publishing, c2008. Available new and used from Amazon or by Suffolk County Library Interlibrary Loan.


Timely Tips for October

Now is the time to plant spring-flowering bulbs until the ground freezes.
Water evergreens well, especially the broadleaf ones, to prevent winter injury.
Plant bulbs for indoor forcing this month. Dig up and store tender bulbs.
Plant/transplant deciduous trees and shrubs; water and mulch well.
Plant garlic and shallots for harvest next August.
Trim dead, broken, diseased branches from trees and shrubs.
Cut back plants that have grown onto walks, drives, or patios.


When you get right down to it, as sooner of later you must, gardening is a long-drawn-out war of attrition against the elements, a tripartite agreement involving the animal, insect and bird worlds and the occasional sheer perversity of Nature.
~ Alan Melville