Repotting Workshop at Hillwood

Evergreen Garden Club

Minutes of Meeting at Hillwood Estate

February 18, 2025

Attending: Connie Anderson, Winkie Crigler, Jane Dana, Amy Dewey, Doris Dixon, Fossy Fenwick, Betsy Forster, Mary Jane Glass, Jeannette Harper, Diana Luke-Hopson, Sally Marshall, Dolly McKenna, Ann Reid, Donna Roberts, Pam Selden, Laurene Sherlock, Susie Taylor, Ellen Thrasher, Susan Vanderver, Rosa Wallach, Xenia Wilkinson. Also attending: Doris’s guest: Fran Usher.

President Winkie Crigler thanked Doris for arranging this opportunity to learn more about orchids from Andrew Bedenbaugh, Hillwood’s orchid and tropical plant specialist. And she thanked Rosa for her eye-popping spread of refreshments. At least one club member said she felt she was at a hunt breakfast.

Andrew Bedenbaugh introduced himself and described his passion for orchids, which developed when he was young. The orchid family is vast, rivaled only by asters in the number of species. There are orchids native to every climate except Antarctica. There are epiphytes, which gather nutrients and water from the atmosphere, and terrestrials, which grow in soil. He explained that he was mostly going to talk about the epiphytes, which are tropical, and their requirements for repotting. (Please note: Your reporter attempted to capture what Mr. Bedenbaugh said, but since the information came out with the force from a fire hose, there is a lot that I missed. What that man doesn’t know about orchids isn’t worth knowing at all!)

Orchids can be monopodial, with one stem, or sympodial, with several. The latter can be divided into new plants after flowering. There are also pseudobulbs, whose stems thicken from the rhizome to the first leaf. These have evolved because the weather conditions are variable over the year where they are native. The pseudobulb stores energy and moisture when it is scarce in the atmosphere. They can also grow without roots, as the pseudobulb stores enough energy without.

Orchids do not bloom naturally for 10 to 15 years, so the ones we commonly see available in stores have been tissue-cultured and are clones. If you are orchid shopping, don’t buy an orchid whose bloom emerges from the middle of the plant. The flower should emerge from the plant’s base. An orchid needs micro-rhizomes to germinate. The aerial roots are like leaves, and even if they look dead, they are not. The outer covering has just changed color. Phalanopsis can tolerate more sun, which encourages branching, but too much sun will cause sunburn. Always sterilize your secateurs to prevent the spread of disease when working with orchids; use Formula 409, Drano, alcohol, or the gas flame from your stove.

When he started repotting, things got pretty intense. He removed the bottom two leaves of his orchid (victim). Always leave at least four leaves on the plant. He yanked the plant out of its pot and removed every bit of medium around the roots. Then he jammed the roots into a clean pot, not bigger than the last, and then forced handful after handful of sphagnum into the pot with the roots. For orchids growing indoors, he suggests we use light-colored sphagnum moss as a medium; orchids in sphagnum moss require less water. Other potting mediums are “pro mix” or New Zealand fir bark.

Fertilizing was enlightening; (I have been doing it all wrong.) You should not use MiracleGro or any other fertilizer with urea. Jack’s is good. Mr. Bedenbaugh uses three different types of fertilizer, 20-20-20, 15-5-20, and 20-10-20 at half to one quarter strength, one each week in rotation, with no fertilizer every fourth week. If you use clay pots, replace them every two years, as they collect fertilizer salts. You can use baking soda to disinfect any cuts you have made on these (poor) plants while you have been repotting. Water well after repotting.

Mr. Bedenbaugh closed by urging us to join an orchid society. And when ordering from small, independent growers to be patient. Many of them are one-person operations.

Winkie opened the business meeting by thanking Andrew Bedenbaugh for a fascinating presentation, Doris for arranging today’s clinic, and Rosa, for her delicious food.

There were corrections to the minutes of the January meeting: Diana Luka-Hopson and Catherine Farrell were omitted as attendees for this meeting, and Winkie inadvertently cut some information from the Membership report while editing. The minutes were approved with these corrections.

Treasurer’s report (Susie Taylor) All membership dues have been submitted and deposited. Additional income came from two generous, anonymous gifts totaling $1,500. We currently have $11,318.45 in the bank.

We are slightly above budget for monthly program and speaker fees due to the unexpected participation fees charged by Hillwood for the February orchid repotting clinic. This increase will resolve once members reimburse the Club for advancing these fees ahead of the clinic. Our bank account will then increase to $12,068.45. This includes our $250 donation to Hillwood for hosting the February orchid repotting clinic.

The Garden Club is on track to meet its approved budget.

Membership We have one candidate for membership – Christy Thorley, proposed by Doris Dixon. There is at least one more candidacy being prepared. The absolute deadline for candidates is February 28. Xenia will present Christy and any others next month, and we will vote in April.

Nominating Chair Sally Marshall, Fossy Fenwick, and Pam Selden have been hard at work for the past month, putting together our slate of officers for next year. If they call you and ask you to fill a role, please say, “YES.” Serving as an officer of Evergreen is just not that hard, and it is a wonderful way to get to know members and to form lasting friendships.

Philanthropy Committee Mary Jane Glass, Jane Dana, and Ellen Thrasher have volunteered to be on the Philanthropy Committee to make recommendations to the group to be voted on in April or May. Winkie mentioned that our 75thanniversary is coming up in four years, so we might consider setting aside funds in the intervening years to make a significant gift that year.

Tregaron work day Just a quick reminder that we generally have a Tregaron work day in the spring.  Colet Mitchell will be working with Tregaron to set a date and a rain date, so expect an email announcing those dates in the near future.

NCAGC Announcements of interest (And reminder that all Evergreen members are invited to participate in District I events):

·      Friday, March 21, District I meeting at the National Arboretum. After a brief business meeting and induction of new officers, Christopher von Koln, the Curator of the Friendship Garden, will give a presentation on the garden. Weather permitting, a tour of the garden will follow. For those of you not familiar with the Friendship Garden (that would include Winkie!), the Friendship Garden surrounds Arbor House at the Arboretum’s R Street entrance. Once a caretaker’s residence, Arbor House is now home to the Friends of the National Arboretum and the National Bonsai Foundation. The garden captures the spirit of a wild meadow, with wide swaths of grasses, perennials, and ferns. Designed to be low maintenance and environmentally friendly, the Friendship Garden celebrates a naturalistic garden aesthetic. The front portion of the Friendship Garden opened in 1987. Support from the National Garden Clubs, Inc. allowed for the development of the rear garden in 1991 by Wolfgang Oehme and James van Sweden. The pair pioneered the New American Garden movement, characterized by expansive and dynamic waves of colorful perennials and ornamental grasses. In 2019, landscape architect Claudia West led a complete plant-community-based redesign of the front garden, which builds upon the foundations that Oehme and van Sweden laid nearly thirty years before.

·      Saturday June 21, in lieu of a Presidents' brunch or tea, District I will host club presidents and members for a docent-guided tour of the gardens of Hillwood Estate.

Our next meeting is Tuesday, March 18, 2025, at 10:00 am. Dolly McKenna has graciously agreed to host, and it will be a lecture and slide show on pruning by Elizabeth Doyle of the Yankee Clippers. Jane DeCell and Catherine Farrell will provide hospitality.

The meeting was adjourned at 12:45.

Respectfully submitted,

Mary Jane Glass

*Artwork below by Ann Reid, EGC member