Show #14/8401. The Grand Ideas Garden

Summary of Show

The Grand Ideas Garden
A garden can be many things, a place to relax, a place to experiment, and certainly a place to find inspiration. This garden is designed to do all three. In Grand Rapids, Michigan, THE GRAND IDEAS GARDEN is exactly what its' name suggests, an idea garden filled with creative plant combinations, smart gardening information, and ideas you can take home and use in your own landscape. With meandering pathways, trellis structures, a beautiful cascading waterfall, and planting ideas for both sun and shade, there’s something to discover around every corner.
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Pollinator Garden
Rebecca has a lot to show us, let's start in the POLLINATOR GARDEN. Sometimes when we think about pollinators and building a pollinator garden we think in terms of these giant swaths on hillsides filled with flowers, but really, what a gardener can do in a very small space can have a big impact. And one of the things they try to do here at the the Grand Ideas Garden is to mini size what you can do to help pollinators. Just imagine if everybody on your block was doing a mini sized pollinator garden. In this pollinator garden they have eight little patches that are approximately six to eight feet apart, and they're filled with a mix of spring blooming bulbs, like big allium, and then annuals, perennials, vines and herbs, all for beautiful butterflies.
For More Information Click Here

Native Plants
Rebecca, as gardeners, we talk about NATIVE PLANTS often, and their role in the ecosystem and their importance in the garden. In the context of this garden and also this community, why are native plants so important? Rebecca would like to back up a minute and say people used to come to her all the time and say, Rebecca where are the native plants? In the horticulture world there are native plants commingled all through this garden. But horticulturists never really did a very good job of calling them out. So, as native plants really started getting more popular and people are having native plant conferences and all that kind of stuff, interest has been rising. Yet, honestly, there are many native plants that aren't really adaptable to, let's say, an urban situation, even in the backyard. One of the things they really try to do is find native plants that one really could substitute and are equally as beautiful as any landscape plant you could find.
For More Information Click Here

Native Plants That Rebecca Really Likes
While we're here in the native garden let's talk about a handful of the NATIVE PLANTS THAT REBECCA REALLY LIKES and thinks are particularly well adapted for this community. Rebecca already mentioned Spagelia or Indian Pink. She thinks they're super well behaved. Another plant is called Jeffersonia or Twin Leaf. Twin Leaf, in her opinion, doesn't have a real big flower, but the entire year, it looks great. It's beautiful. It has two lobed leaves, that’s why it's called twin leaf. Deer don't eat it. They can't put hostas out here because they have a deer herd that's 2nd to none. Thus they have plants that they don't have to spray with deer repellent.
For More Information Click Here

Native Cultivars
One of the things Rebecca also wants to address is their philosophy on NATIVE CULTIVARS. They also have native hybrids out here and have selections and cultivars of plants. A good example is the beautiful little Heuchera, it's a rock star. An amazing plant that has what some would call native blood or native origin. It's tough as nails. Deer don't eat it. It's a show horse, a really great landscape plant.
For More Information Click Here

Native Plants That Do Well In The - Sun
Eric notes we talked about some NATIVE PLANTS THAT DO REALLY WELL IN THE shade, but Rebecca also has an excellent collection of native plants that thrive in the SUN. Rebecca please talk to us about some of your favorites. In this garden they have some native shrubs and also native cultivars, and they're in the garden side by side, so one can compare and contrast. The native Buttonbush loves wet sites, but also does pretty well in upland landscapes. But the newer one called Sugar Shack has some really cool attributes. Let’s think back to the prairie. Rebecca and Eric have both walked prairies, the plants can be 12 feet tall. Thus when in the prairie it's hard to see the depth and to really appreciate the qualities of each plant.
For More Information Click Here

Native Grasses
Rebecca also would like to point out a couple of grasses. They have lots of beautiful NATIVE GRASSES in Michigan. Prairie Dropseed is one they use as a turf substitute. The Prairie Dropseed grows up and has sort of a ponytail swirl, so you put it in clumps. It actually looks really great through the winter, too, it dries that way. They also have Little Bluestem and Big Bluestem. They're very interesting, some of these would be cultivars, while others are just straight species. Another great plant is the petunia, the Wild Petunia.
For More Information Click Here

Master Gardeners - Turf
The volunteers really are a hugely important part of this garden. This space is one that they just decided they didn't want turf, they wanted something different. And this is an amazing space. One of the really important components of this garden is their extension master gardener volunteer base. Michigan like many states, Georgia being one of them, that has extension MASTER GARDENER basic training. When someone wants to volunteer in this garden they must have completed that program and then they also become a smart gardening apprentice, which is something they offer through the summer. Thus they get a lot of hands involved. On top of that they have small groups of volunteers that literally adopt areas of the garden and they pretty much manage it from start to finish. In this case, one of the volunteers had been dealing with some TURF issues and last fall she approached Rebecca and said I really don't want turf in this area.
For More Information Click Here

Deer
One of most asked questions GardenSMART receives from viewers is, what do I do about the DEER? I just planted this beautiful garden and they come in and eat it like a salad bar. Rebecca says sometimes it's unavoidable. If they're hungry enough, they're probably going to try to browse on your plants. But there are certain things that we can do as gardeners to possibly reduce the impact of deer browsing. What are some of Rebecca's tips? Thinking about inspiration - one of the volunteers suggested they put in a no-deer garden. Rebecca thought that was a good idea and they started researching plants that deer traditionally don’t eat and provide groups or examples of those plants.
For More Information Click Here

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Show #14/8401. The Grand Ideas Garden

Transcript of Show

In this episode GardenSMART is in Grand Rapids, Michigan visiting a beautiful garden that is packed with great garden ideas one can take home. It is called The Grand Ideas Garden and every pathway, planting combination, and garden space is designed to inspire smarter gardening.

A garden can be many things, a place to relax, a place to experiment, and certainly a place to find inspiration. This garden is designed to do all three. In Grand Rapids, Michigan, THE GRAND IDEAS GARDEN is exactly what its' name suggests, an idea garden filled with creative plant combinations, smart gardening information, and ideas you can take home and use in your own landscape. With meandering pathways, trellis structures, a beautiful cascading waterfall, and planting ideas for both sun and shade, there’s something to discover around every corner.

And there's no one better to show us around than Rebecca Finneran, a Michigan State University extension senior horticulture educator, now retired, who has been designing and cultivating this remarkable garden since 2003. The Grand Ideas Garden is part of Michigan State University Extension Service, and an incredible resource for gardeners. Eric is ready to begin exploring to determine what ideas we can bring home to our own garden. Eric welcomes Rebecca, thank you so much for joining GardenSMART. This, in many ways, is the little garden that could. It's a garden that you put so much of your heart into, and it has such a heart warming and wonderful story. Rebecca in turn welcomes Eric and explains - this garden really is a culmination of a group of people, with a bunch of ideas, some amazing volunteers, and the amazing green industry in West Michigan. This site originally was just an open lot with a few mature trees but they were interested in creating something beautiful right on the corner. Looking back, Rebecca thinks most never dreamed it would look like this. In 2003, the Extension Service moved into this building, which had been the Kent District Library Warehouse, it was renovated for MSU extension so they would have classrooms and that sort of thing. But she had this idea that they could establish what they called an idea garden. So they went to the county and got permission, but one of the caveats was that the garden idea was okay, as long as it didn't cost anything. Rebecca felt that was fine because they have a really strong green industry here and great volunteers. So they started very small, but had a great design and a great plan. People bought into it, and during the last 20 years or more, it has grown bit by bit, and piece by piece, including a big waterfall. The purpose of the garden was and is to provide people in the community the opportunity to come and look at what you can do in your own garden. So today it's a collection of wonderful vignettes that are connected with paths. Pretty much everything that’s planted here is something that could be implemented at home. Eric thinks it's wonderful. When he visits botanic gardens, public gardens and arboretums he’s bowled over, because we both love plants and who wouldn't, but it's at a scale that an individual probably couldn't achieve. Rebecca agrees, that was one consideration in designing this garden. The three containers on the plaza are indicative of their thinking. One can go to the garden center today and buy the plants in this garden. They try to rotate plants frequently. Plants in the commercial trade really do become obsolete. Some of them are still really good plants but new plants come along. If a guest comes here and really likes that coral bell Heuchera, but can't find it anywhere, then what's the point? Their goal is education, they want people to learn about plants, how to plant things, how to be smart gardeners. One of MSU's key flagship programs is smart gardening, how to put plants into a vignette, something very simple at home, large or small. Eric agrees, big is not always better.

Rebecca has a lot to show us, let's start in the POLLINATOR GARDEN. Sometimes when we think about pollinators and building a pollinator garden we think in terms of these giant swaths on hillsides filled with flowers, but really, what a gardener can do in a very small space can have a big impact. And one of the things they try to do here at the the Grand Ideas Garden is to mini size what you can do to help pollinators. Just imagine if everybody on your block was doing a mini sized pollinator garden. In this pollinator garden they have eight little patches that are approximately six to eight feet apart, and they're filled with a mix of spring blooming bulbs, like big allium, and then annuals, perennials, vines and herbs, all for beautiful butterflies. Each year, the patch changes a little bit. What they try to do is provide ideas, if somebody sees an idea they like or a color scheme or the architectural structure of leaves, whatever, they can look at the little recipe card and then can recreate it at home. So, they are constantly turning plants over and putting in new plants. Sometimes perennials eat other plants, because they get so big, thus sometimes they have to keep changing plants out. Accordingly, you'll see new annuals in here every year. And they try really hard to encourage pollinators from the very first blooms of spring right until November, when they’re tearing everything down. So, in this garden many of the visitors not only learn about combinations of plants, plants that are great for pollinators but also learn a lot about which plants attract which types of pollinators. Plant selection is key here, because when you're trying to build a pollinator garden, your pollinators are not my pollinators. That is because they're so regional. So what they have tried to do here is to get people to learn by example, to realize plants have a certain flower color, flower shape, time of bloom. Then there’s always the gardener's desire to manicure their garden. In the fall, this garden looks pretty crazy, because they tend to not groom it. For instance, coleus, one of their favorite plants, bolts. As soon as it gets hot, they start going to flower, and when Rebecca was growing up, and all through horticulture, one would pinch them back to encourage growth but not blooms. Well, guess what? Pollinators love those flowers. And that's a very cool thing. So in this garden they're not pinching the coleus. On the other hand with the Salvia they do some trimming in the early spring to encourage reblooming. They try to extend the season so there’s nectar and pollen being offered to these bees all season long. Mason bees and the early season bees, the little guys, come out very early, then the really late carpenter bees and other native bumble bees and others can make their home here. And they are happy as a clam. When you're in the garden in, let's say, August, on a beautiful day, it's just buzzing with life, and it's magical. It really is magical.

Eric asks, one of the things that many of our viewers are curious about is understanding the plants that are native to their area. He really loves the fact that Rebecca also has a native plant garden here. Everywhere in the world one could travel even 50 miles down the road and all of a sudden the plants change subtly. If one goes a long way, they're very, very, very different. It's wonderful to be able to go see what is native right here in my community. Let's go take a look at that garden.

Rebecca, as gardeners, we talk about NATIVE PLANTS often, and their role in the ecosystem and their importance in the garden. In the context of this garden and also this community, why are native plants so important? Rebecca would like to back up a minute and say people used to come to her all the time and say, Rebecca where are the native plants? In the horticulture world there are native plants commingled all through this garden. But horticulturists never really did a very good job of calling them out. So, as native plants really started getting more popular and people are having native plant conferences and all that kind of stuff, interest has been rising. Yet, honestly, there are many native plants that aren't really adaptable to, let's say, an urban situation, even in the backyard. One of the things they really try to do is find native plants that one really could substitute and are equally as beautiful as any landscape plant you could find. So they're looking for plants that have some structure, a certain form or height, leaf texture, leaf color, a plant that's tidy. You know what I mean by that? Not one that grows up and lays down and gets all messy and rangy. That's one of the things that they try to do here is to provide examples of plants that just can be adapted and brought into a landscape and they'll perform for you. A great example is this plant that's blooming right now, it is called Spagelia. It's got a large native range and called Indian Pink. They have Indian Pinks in the full shade area and also in their sunny native area. It's a very clean plant, not usually riddled with mildew or insect damage or whatever. Rebecca thinks it's an excellent landscape plant. Eric feels Rebecca has brought up a good point. There are a lot of strong opinions among native plant enthusiasts. But when we look at a broader population of homeowners who like to buy plants, they want their plants to be aesthetically beautiful, plus oftentimes they need to be tight, compact just to work in the garden. And that's why a lot of the new selections are cultivars in the space of native plants. It’s important to find plants that fit into those spaces, yet also maintain the integrity of the native flora.

While we're here in the native garden let's talk about a handful of the NATIVE PLANTS THAT REBECCA REALLY LIKES and thinks are particularly well adapted for this community. Rebecca already mentioned Spagelia or Indian Pink. She thinks they're super well behaved. Another plant is called Jeffersonia or Twin Leaf. Twin Leaf, in her opinion, doesn't have a real big flower, but the entire year, it looks great. It's beautiful. It has two lobed leaves, that’s why it's called twin leaf. Deer don't eat it. They can't put hostas out here because they have a deer herd that's 2nd to none. Thus they have plants that they don't have to spray with deer repellent. And, they have great texture, compared with other plants they have kind of a blue-ish cast. If one matches it up with other things, like red baneberry or in this case Mayapple, that's kind of taken over the world, it's just a great combination. And that's just 3 plants right there, it's a nice little clump. That's what they're looking for out here, plants that people can insert into the landscape and it can be something special. In another area is a plant called Spikenard. It's an Aralia. In the ornamental world, we use Sun King Aurelia, which is not native. This is the native species, Spikenard. If you look at it, it's very architectural, it almost takes the place of a big shrub, like a viburnum. In early fall, late summer, it has a whole cluster of fruits on it that are garnet colored and when the sun hits them from the back, they glow. It's remarkable. And, a plant that thrives in full sun or full shade. It’s another native plant that's adapted to a lot of different conditions and can demonstrate the effects of structural elements in a landscape. Another nice feature is, in the fall just cut it down, do your landscape cleanup, and away you go. Eric thinks another reason these public display gardens are so important is it's an opportunity for people who are new to gardening and may not know what's perfect for their community, these kind of displays really, really help people move their garden to the next level.

One of the things Rebecca also wants to address is their philosophy on NATIVE CULTIVARS. They also have native hybrids out here and have selections and cultivars of plants. A good example is the beautiful little Heuchera, it's a rock star. An amazing plant that has what some would call native blood or native origin. It's tough as nails. Deer don't eat it. It's a show horse, a really great landscape plant. They try to keep everything in here that has native origins regardless of if it's a naturally occurring hybrid like Camass Sacajawea or like a new color of hydrangea that's found in the in the mountains down in the south. Eric thinks it's very cool, a wonderful, wonderful collection. And as he said, he thinks it's a really, really great service for your community.

Eric notes we talked about some NATIVE PLANTS THAT DO REALLY WELL IN THE shade, but Rebecca also has an excellent collection of native plants that thrive in the SUN. Rebecca please talk to us about some of your favorites. In this garden they have some native shrubs and also native cultivars, and they're in the garden side by side, so one can compare and contrast. The native Buttonbush loves wet sites, but also does pretty well in upland landscapes. But the newer one called Sugar Shack has some really cool attributes. Let’s think back to the prairie. Rebecca and Eric have both walked prairies, the plants can be 12 feet tall. Thus when in the prairie it's hard to see the depth and to really appreciate the qualities of each plant. But here, they're looking for plants that have a shape, or texture, something that really is more landscape friendly. Something smaller, tighter, blooms longer, full sun, can take rough conditions, that kind of thing. They’re always looking for different kinds of plants. Rebecca is a farm girl, thus has a hard time appreciating goldenrod in the garden. But when looking at all of the different species of goldenrod, she could name several that are really excellent candidates for the landscape. One of them is called Showy Goldenrod. When it's blooming, it's a tight clump, it doesn't flop over. It's just a really nice landscape plant and, of course, the bees love it, and other insects love it too. So this becomes quite a beautiful garden for beneficial insects, as well as many different kinds of pollinators.

Rebecca also would like to point out a couple of grasses. They have lots of beautiful NATIVE GRASSES in Michigan. Prairie Dropseed is one they use as a turf substitute. The Prairie Dropseed grows up and has sort of a ponytail swirl, so you put it in clumps. It actually looks really great through the winter, too, it dries that way. They also have Little Bluestem and Big Bluestem. They're very interesting, some of these would be cultivars, while others are just straight species. Another great plant is the petunia, the Wild Petunia. Rebecca loves it. One could look at it and say, that looks like spirea, or that looks like some shrub in the landscape. This one has great blue flowers and it blooms for a long period of time. It is a great companion to many of the other plants they have in here. And it's such a showy garden, designed to be a display garden, but for many people walking through it wouldn't necessarily occur to them that these are exclusively natives. Eric thinks Rebecca and her team have done a great job of really showing how impactful natives can be from a color standpoint. They have fun Galardias, and Rudbeckias and Asclepias, all with so much color, and so much diversity.

The volunteers really are a hugely important part of this garden. This space is one that they just decided they didn't want turf, they wanted something different. And this is an amazing space. One of the really important components of this garden is their extension master gardener volunteer base. Michigan like many states, Georgia being one of them, that has extension MASTER GARDENER basic training. When someone wants to volunteer in this garden they must have completed that program and then they also become a smart gardening apprentice, which is something they offer through the summer. Thus they get a lot of hands involved. On top of that they have small groups of volunteers that literally adopt areas of the garden and they pretty much manage it from start to finish. In this case, one of the volunteers had been dealing with some TURF issues and last fall she approached Rebecca and said I really don't want turf in this area. Okay, we'll make that happen. So no more turf, and this year, they installed this beautiful and amazing garden as a team. One of their philosophies with everything they do is, and you've heard it many times, many hands make light work. So, they celebrate that. If the students are properly trained what they can accomplish is limitless. Eric notes that is certainly true looking at this garden.

One of most asked questions GardenSMART receives from viewers is, what do I do about the DEER? I just planted this beautiful garden and they come in and eat it like a salad bar. Rebecca says sometimes it's unavoidable. If they're hungry enough, they're probably going to try to browse on your plants. But there are certain things that we can do as gardeners to possibly reduce the impact of deer browsing. What are some of Rebecca's tips? Thinking about inspiration - one of the volunteers suggested they put in a no-deer garden. Rebecca thought that was a good idea and they started researching plants that deer traditionally don’t eat and provide groups or examples of those plants. For instance, plants like Ladies Mantles, have fuzzy leaves. Deer don't like that fuzz. Things that have sharp edges, like ornamental grasses, like nafray, some of those aren’t popular with deer, fragrant plants like onions, anything allium, any onion family, they'll leave alone, generally speaking, things like Sage or Nepeta (catmint) that have that real sagey scent aren’t popular deer food. Even Boxwood tend to be pretty deer resistant, they must have kind of an off smell to them. It could be taste, it could be smell or it's just not palatable. And some plants could be actually toxic to them. But when deer are really hungry, though, they're gonna eat anything you put out. So, they have had both successes and failures here.Their goal is really just to show examples of characteristics that deer tend to stay away from. But sometimes that can be an annual shift as well. In the past they might have left the baptisia alone, Rebecca has never seen them eat baptisia, but, you know, they might have left that alone for three years and all of a sudden, they seem to have acquired a taste for it. Then you have to say, well, is that going be on the buffet, or was that just an odd man out that liked that plant? So you kind of have to evaluate the situation, wait and see, and if it becomes deer food, eliminate it from the garden.

Erick concludes, in this episode we discovered how the Grand Ideas Garden has turned gardening inspiration into practical ideas we can use at home. There's so much we can learn as gardeners from seeing the efforts of people like Rebecca and her amazing team of volunteers. We’ve learned about great plant combinations, natives, even how to, hopefully, prevent deer in our garden. Rebecca, thank you so much for spending the day with us. It’s been an enjoyable experience. Rebecca in turn thanks Eric and the GardenSMART audience for visiting. She’s always happy to show this garden to new folks.

LINKS:

Plant List

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