● Demo Garden: Ann Cinquina – Come and open the gates to our beautiful Demo Garden. Peruse the vegetables that are producing lovely squash, bush bean, tomatoes and the lovely herbs. On the other side check out the flowers that are in bloom as well as our lovely path that has been recently refurbished. Sit awhile and enjoy a cool drink and listen to the birds and notice the bees pollinating the flowers and veggies. We are now going to cap all the concrete blocks with pavers which will make it convenient to sit and pick the vegetables (and maybe a weed or two.)
● Extension Office Landscaping: Doug Groff – This garden was designed to attract pollinators, and consists mainly of native shrubs and perennial flowers. Non-native species have been added over the years to add year-round color and interest. New mulch and several more pollinators have been added to the garden with an expansion of the garden to begin in the fall.
● Forsythe Nat’l Wildlife Refuge: Bev Albertson – Our main objectives and activities include removing invasive species, introducing native species, and educating the many visitors of the importance of providing native habitat to support wildlife. The Refuge is a vital part of the annual bird migration route along the Eastern seaboard. Our gardens are currently being used as nesting grounds for native birds and turtles, as well as numerous butterfly species.
● Seashore Gardens Living Center: Patty Dorr-Lewin – Rutgers Master Gardeners offer horticultural outreach activities for residents as a way to help them improve memory, cognitive abilities, and language skills. Work done outside to remedy the water problem included riverbeds with water-tolerant plants. This project was the recipient of a Garden of Distinction Award by the Pennsylvania Horticulture Society in 2016.
● Mays Landing Library: Harry Young – RMG’s started renovation of the library’s courtyard garden. Pairs of mg’s took responsibility for designing sections of the garden. The result is a lush garden of pollinator friendly native plants and shrubs that has received accolades from library staff, patrons, and local publications. A boat built by students of St. Vincent de Paul School is a focal point of the garden. Building on the success of the garden, mg’s expanded the project scope by renovating the garden area by the library entrance and beds and commemorative planting areas along the Farragut Ave. side of the library. The garden was recently reviewed by the Pa. Horticultural Society. It is a certified Monarch Watch site.
● Egg Harbor Twp. Library: Harry Young - Rutgers Master Gardeners began renovation of the library’s tiered garden beds in March 2016, to create an appealing and educational garden at the library’s entrance. The beds had long been neglected. The site was remodeled with many existing shrubs restored and retained. Within the tiered beds were created separate areas for herb and pollinator gardens to attract birds, bees and butterflies. Plants and shrubs native to South Jersey and the eastern U.S. were chosen for their ability to attract and benefit pollinators. A separate “salt-tolerant” garden was created to showcase plantings that will survive coastal seashore conditions. The MG team is also expanding beautification efforts by dividing and moving plants to other previously neglected areas of the site. The gardens are a certified MonarchWatch location.
● Citizen Science Project (DEP): Marjorie Brooks – Atlantic City Project - The site is at historic Gardner’s Basin, just north of North Rhode Island Ave and Parkside Ave in Atlantic City. The goal is habitat enhancement/creation, shoreline stabilization, tidal flood mitigation, public outreach and education. Areas are to be filled and planted to create low and high marshes. Upland of this, a vegetated embankment will be planted to provide pollinator habitat and flood mitigation. There will also be a mowed and managed area of cool season grasses. This project is designed to make the bayside of the City of Atlantic City more resilient by providing protection/resiliency for the historic Gardners Basin ten-acre commercial center and park.
Rutgers Master Gardener Association of New Jersey presents awards at their annual conference to Master Gardeners in each county that are selected by their coordinator as recipients of the ‘Award of Excellence.’ Atlantic County’s program recipients for 2017 are:
Len Walk
Leonard Walk has been a Master Gardener since 2013 and since has enthusiastically devoted his time to many of our projects. He is often the first to respond when help is needed. In addition to the projects he normally works on, Len took on an enormous task of propagating plants for both the Earth Day Festival at ACUA and our Annual Plant Sale. With the change this year from purchasing plants at local farm markets to plants propagated by Master Gardeners at the plant sale, Len opened up his greenhouse and his home for several months to accommodate most of the plants. He did an outstanding job raising and caring for a large majority of the plants. He then transported most of the plants to our plant sale site, picking up plants from our office and Master Gardener homes around the county. He also monitored plants at the Extension Office throughout March, April and May for other projects. After all of that, he has continued to work tireless hours in the vegetable section of our Demo Garden, the Mays Landing Library Garden, Galloway Butterfly Garden, helped get the ground ready and plant a pumpkin patch for our newest school garden in Pomona, and several other projects. He has truly been a dedicated and invaluable member of our group.
Mary McDermott
Mary McDermott has been a Master Gardener since our very first class in 2005. This year she energetically took on the task of organizing the revival of our Annual Plant Sale. Mary kept the preparations and the sale impeccably organized. Throughout the process she created information sheets with tips and timelines for preparing plants for Master Gardeners contributing to the sale, kept a detailed inventory of what was being grown by each contributor, created a pricing structure and posters, and Suggested Talking Points for Master Gardeners at the sale. She helped bring an educational element for our Master Gardeners to the sale that was impressive and that transferred into them educating the public as they shared their growing experiences. Even with an unexpected rain delay on Mother’s Day Weekend, she kept the holding room organized and volunteers on task. Her persistence and attention to detail created one of the most successful and educational plant sales to date.
August 2017
Accomplished MG’s
August 2017
Sue Scarlett – Class of 2009
Congratulations to Sue Scarlett, who was certified as our first Vegetable Garden Educator. Sue presents a talk to the community at the ACUA every month during the growing season on various topics, has worked with the Hope VI Garden in Atlantic City and the Hammonton Community Garden in the past, and attended a training program geared at certifying Master Gardeners as Community Garden Educators at the end of 2016. She has been an invaluable member of our Speaker’s Bureau and is currently looking to train more Master Gardeners to follow in her footsteps.
2016 Pennsylvania Horticulture Society Garden Award winners:
The Pennsylvania Horticultural Society’s (PHS) celebrates the accomplishments of gardeners in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Delaware with the PHS Gardening and Greening Contest. The 2016 winners in the contest attended an awards reception where photographs of the gardens were showcased.
Congratulations again to the Atlantic County Rutgers Master Gardener winners: Nancy Fiedler, winner Gardens of Distinction - Medium Flower/Individual Garden category, Seashore Garden’s Living Center’s Sensory Trail, winner Gardens of Distinction - Public Spaces/Plantings category and Blue Ribbon winner (for a second year!) Gardners Basin/Atlantic City Aquarium, in the Public Spaces/Plantings category.
Mystery Squash Identified by Belinda Chester
As we all know, gardening can be full of happy little surprises and our Demonstration Garden has just been full of those this year. Our vegetable garden got a bit of late start this season. In a rush to fill it and several other projects with a wide variety of vegetables, I went on a hunt to several local garden centers and along the way, I picked up what I thought to be a flat of spaghetti squash to mix up the patch a little. What started out to be small seedlings quickly ventured through the beds and up the fence, producing amazing, greenish-white, egg-shaped squash that were the mystery of the garden. They clearly were not spaghetti squash so I set out to research and find out exactly what they were. Much to my surprise, there are two varieties of vegetable marrow squash that are strikingly similar. So which variety have we happened upon?
Many of our Master Gardeners took a squash or two home and gave them a try both grilled and baked. I’ve heard that the best way to cook them was to “pick them young, give them a little salt, pepper, a bit of oil, and throw them on the grill.” I tried them and they were a perfect grilling squash and just a little sweeter than a traditional zucchini. I was convinced I had found the answer. This must be the Grey Griller F1 Hybrid Squash that has become popular in recent years due to its firm texture that holds up well on the grill. But, in one of my strolls through the garden I found a squash that had grown to the size of a small toddler and my curiosity was peaked. I took it home, split it and cooked it as I would a spaghetti squash in the fall or winter. Just as I suspected, it was almost identical
August 2017
The Under-Appreciated Radish by RMG Vanessa Schnauffer [15]
Step aside kale! Food trendologists are predicting 2017 will be the year of the radish. It certainly has been a long time coming with the first written record of the radish from the ancient Greeks and Romans. Thought to have been originally cultivated in Asia, there are dozens of varieties today in a tantalizing assortment of shapes, colors and flavors.
Baum + Whiteman International Food and Restaurant Consultant’s release a list each year of the hottest food and beverage trends in restaurant and hotel dining. Mr. Whiteman told Food and Business News, “We’re seeing a rash of radishes because they are colorful, are shapely, make a lovely crunching sound in your brain, enliven the palate, enliven the plate, and do their magic without requiring a talented chef's handiwork.”
Americans consume an estimated 400 million pounds of radishes a year, mostly in salads. But that is likely to change as chefs have popularized the radish by creating specialized dishes; this is how a food trend begins and is then picked up by foodies. Recently a variety of radish dishes were featured on Bravo’s “Top Chef Charleston” and restaurants participating in Santa Monica Restaurant Week are featuring dishes such as creamy radish soup, roasted radish with pancetta and horseradish/chamomile crème fraiche and red curry and lime leaf braised black radish.
Radishes are an easy cool weather crop to grow whether indoors or out. Indoors within a week you will be harvesting sprouts and within a couple of weeks microgreens (select a variety intended for this purpose). These have the peppery taste of the mature bulb and have excellent nutrient content. Radishes are high in vitamin C and to a lesser extent fiber, folate, riboflavin, potassium and copper. In a mere 30 days a variety such as Perfecto reaches maturity making it ideal in a children’s garden. If you are growing radishes indoors a globe variety is recommended which allows planting in shallow plastic seedling trays. This beautiful and tasty veg, chock full of good nutrients is easily grown and can be eaten from the root to the stem!
● Galloway Library Butterfly Garden: Pollinators can be observed on native plants from the large windows in the children’s section of the Library. This garden also serves as a place for all to meet and discuss native plants. The garden has increased in size over the years, and now includes several short trails and a view of Patriot Lake. Master Gardeners have also replaced a fallen arbor this season with the help from the Atlantic County Public Works Department.
● Pomona School Garden: Master Gardeners are currently working with school administrators, teachers and students to create a butterfly garden, vegetable gardens, and a pumpkin arch that children can walk through. The pumpkin arch is completed and plants are beginning to flourish and climb the arch. Vertical gardens are being built throughout the summer and students will be planting lettuces upon their return in September.
● Master Gardener Mobile Helpline: A mobile helpline will be available at the Galloway Green Market from 9:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. on Sundays at the Galloway Twp. municipal building. Residents will be able to bring their gardening questions along with samples (plant and/or insect) to the Rutgers Master Gardener table and our volunteers will help by researching and providing an answer.
● Hammonton Community Garden: The Master Gardeners of the Rutgers Cooperative Extension has plot #5 in the Hammonton Community Garden. The plot features flowers, fruits and vegetables. Flowers include sunflowers and marigolds. A variety of vegetables have been planted including zucchini, yellow squash, cucumbers, tomatoes, peppers and corn. Fruits such as watermelon, cantaloupe and honeydew are also thriving among the flowers and vegetables. The flowers are blooming and vegetables and fruit are doing well and ready for harvesting. Items from the garden will be shared with fellow Master Gardeners.