Mill Creek Towne Garden Club Open House
Date: Tuesday, September 24, 2019
Time: 7:30pm – 8:30pm
Location: Mill Creek Parish United Methodist
Fellowship Hall
7101 Horizon Terrace
Derwood, MD 20855
Cost: FREE, Donations gratefully appreciated!
Join us for a meeting and get to know the members of the Mill Creek Towne Garden Club. You will find out more about the club and what we do. We’ll be discussing our community projects including restoration of the entrance walls, clean up of Mill Creek, and the Butterfly Bandwagon! Refreshments will be provided.
NOTE: If Montgomery County Schools are closed due to inclement weather, the Garden Club meeting will be cancelled.
It’s Harvest time and also a good time to take stock on what worked well for you this season and what didn’t. Here are some garden tips, educational opportunities, and events for August. Events include Wings of Fancy at Brookside Gardens South Conservatory, Montgomery County Agricultural Fair, Pollinating Pairs, Food Matters: Montgomery County Breweries – Policy, Profit, and Pints, Mill Creek Clean Up, Pop-Up Movie Night: Agricultural History Farm Park, Mill Creek Towne Entrance Repair Project, and more!
Planning:
The heat of summer is here. Time to start doing chores during early morning or evening. Take a break during the hottest part of the day.
Take garden photos and make notes in your garden journal.
Check your local garden club for end-of-summer bargains.
Start shopping for spring bulbs.
Start collecting plant seeds for next year and for trading.
Preserve gourds and dry flowers for display in the fall.
Attend a county fair and enter some of your garden bounty.
Support our local farmers! Visit a local farmers’ market near you. Download Montgomery County’s Office of Agriculture 2019 Farmers Market Flyer to find a farmer’s market near you.
Flowers and Groundcovers:
Cut petunia stems back by 2/3rds and fertilize.
Start seeds of pansies, calendula, flowering cabbage, kale, and other fall annuals.
Divide Hostas and daylilies.
Don’t fertilize plants that slow down in the heat, but keep them watered.
Divide and cut back Bearded Iris and Peonies.
Pinch back mums so they grow bushier and won’t flower until autumn.
As the days get cooler, plant hardy mums.
Check for black spot on your roses – remove and discard any affected leaves in the trash, never back in your garden or in your compost – apply a fungicide with Neem oil every two weeks during the growing season.
Inspect for Powdery mildew. If seen, prune back perennials to create needed circulation.
Check on your container plants daily and keep them well-watered.
Bring Christmas cactus and poinsettias indoors if you took them out for the summer in preparation for holiday blooming. Fertilize them and put them where they’ll get 10 hours of bright light per day.
Remove old leaves, damaged stems.
Pinch out growing tips of leggy cuttings and plants that are overwintering.
Clean the leaves of your indoor houseplants to prevent dust and film build-up.
Reduce fertilizing of your indoor plants (except cyclamen).
Remove old leaves, damaged stems.
Maintain moisture in pots wintering indoors, but do not over water!
Keep all houseplants out of drafts and away from heat vents.
Remove old leaves, damaged stems.
Pests to watch for: aphids, spider mites, mealybug, scale, whitefly
Clean your hummingbird feeders and add new sugar-water every three days.
Switch your deer deterrent spray.
Check your plants at night with a flashlight for any night-feeding insects like slugs.
If you find slug damage, set out beer traps or Sluggo pellets.
Hand-pick Japanese beetles or shake them off over a bucket of dishwasher.
Caulk and seal your outside walls to prevent insect entry into your house.
Be vigilant for mosquito breeding spots – any standing water from a bottle cap to blocked gutters- and clean them out immediately. Ask your neighbors to do the same. Put Mosquito Dunks in any areas that accumulate water.
Source: University of Maryland’s Home and Garden Information Center (HGIC) and the Washington Gardener.
Mill Creek Clean Up
Members of Mill Creek Towne Garden Club met with Henry Coppola of Montgomery County Department of Parks about Mill Creek, a tributary of Rock Creek. The banks of the creek have eroded with the heavy rains of the last few years. Trees are falling, roots are exposed, salt and chemical run off from roads impact water quality, and the banks will erode closer to the homes. Plus we saw all the junk in the creek, even a basketball. We learned about ways to counter the impact, but it will take cooperation from the people on the ground in the neighborhoods and leaders who understand what it will take to maintain the parklands we have, like this tucked away tributary. We are trying to arrange a volunteer clean up event in October with Henry’s help.
Please Support the Mill Creek Towne Garden Club’s
Mill Creek Towne Entrance Walls Repairs Project
Hello Mill Creek Towne Neighbors,
Your help is greatly needed with a community problem. The original entrance walls that identify our community as Mill Creek Towne are in a state of deterioration. One entrance wall, consisting of a center wall and two side walls, is located at Roslyn Avenue and Redland Road and is on Montgomery County property. The other entrance wall, consisting of two side walls, is located at Miller Fall Road and Muncaster Mill Road and is on Maryland State property. Both the county and the state have been approached and have declined to provide the much needed repairs and maintenance, stating that this is the responsibility of the community.
These entrance walls are more than fifty years old and, for all of that time, The Mill Creek Towne Garden Club (MCTGC) has been the caretakers of the entrances. We provide annual care with plantings either by doing regular maintenance work ourselves or engaging the assistance of professional workers.
We need your help to repair the Mill Creek Towne Entrance walls! See details in this link below on how you can help.
Save the dates for these upcoming events! Events include Wings of Fancy at Brookside Gardens South Conservatory, Montgomery County Agricultural Fair, Pollinating Pairs, Food Matters: Montgomery County Breweries – Policy, Profit, and Pints, Mill Creek Clean Up, Pop-Up Movie Night: Agricultural History Farm Park, Mill Creek Towne Entrance Repair Project, and more!
Montgomery County MD Food and Beverage Guide
The third edition of the MoCo Made Food & Beverage Guide is available!
The Guide features more than 60 local producers and farmers offering local-made products. Find the online version here:
Plant Clinics are held at several sites in the county on a weekly basis and at special events such as garden festivals and the county fair. Regularly scheduled Plant Clinics are located at public libraries and farmers’ markets throughout the county as well as at the Audubon Naturalist Society in Chevy Chase. There are also clinics three days per week at Brookside Gardens. The busiest season is April through September, but some clinics are open year-round. Bring your plant samples and questions to one of these locations in Montgomery County, MD (see link below to find a location near you):
CSAs can take many forms, but essentially they are community supported farms in which members contribute to farming projects, usually by way of membership fees, in exchange for fresh, local produce. The concept came to the United States from Europe in the 1980s. They are a great way to take advantage of fresh, locally grown fruit, vegetables, herbs, and more while supporting nearby farms. Each one is different, some offer pickup locations in urban areas, some offer only farm-based pickups.
There are multiple CSAs located around the County offering a wide variety of products. CSAs begin taking sign-ups for spring and summer seasons in the early part of the year, and they tend to fill up FAST! Know of another CSA not on our list? Let us know! Montgomery Countryside Alliance also maintains a list: http://www.mocoalliance.org/community-supported-agriculture.html
2019 Dates: April 27 to October 26 on Saturdays
By popular request: Early Hours in 2019 9 am until 1 pm
Support Our Local Farmers: Visit the Derwood Farmers Market!
A community farmers’ market featuring fresh local farm fruits, veggies, meats, baked goodies, arts, live music and more. Meet sustainable local farmers and from-scratch makers of edibles!
Located at the parking lot in the front yard of Derwood Alliance Church 16501 Redland Road, Rockville, MD 20855
August 9 – 17, 2019
501 Perry Pkwy
Gaithersburg, Maryland
18400 Muncaster Road
Derwood, MD 20855
Enjoy a free movie and an evening under the stars at Agricultural History Farm Park.
Saturday, September 7 | 12 – 4 pm
Meadowside Nature Center
5100 Meadowside Lane, Rockville, MD 20855
The Pawpaw Festival is a fun-filled and educational event celebrating one of America’s largest native tree fruits, the Pawpaw (Asimina triloba). This event highlights the rich history of the Pawpaw through crafts, music, live animals, and tastings!
• Crafts, Games & Facepainting
• Pawpaw Tastings
• Live Music
• Pawpaw trees and fruit for sale (while supplies last)
• Live Animals
ADMISSION
$5/person. Ages 2 & up. All participants must pay. No registration required.
