Madawaska Valley Gardening Club offers an exciting range of unique gardens for you to explore during this summer’s Annual Garden Tour on Sunday July 7th between 10 am and 4 pm. Tickets cost $5 and come with details about each garden along with a self-guided tour map. You can buy your ticket from Gift It Gray in Barry’s Bay, CO Country Stores in Combermere, and from Grandma’s Pantry in Killaloe. Above: image of tour map features painting by Madawaska Valley artist Joyce Burkholder (Submitted)
The Current had a sneak preview of the garden descriptions so we could give you a hint of what you’ll see. All four gardens are located in the Combermere / Palmer Rapids area, and three of them are situated on the shores of waterbodies in the Madawaska Valley watershed.
Of the gardens next to water, one has been developed over the past 50 years from a cottagers’ plot to a full time residents’ garden packed with perennials. As the trees have grown over the years, increased shade has provided excellent conditions for many varieties of hosta.
Another water’s edge property features some 16 separate gardens to explore with perennials including daylilies, Asiatic lilies, iris, peonies and much more. The gardeners have included many colourful annuals and have also tucked in some gnomes for your enjoyment.
By contrast, another lakeside garden on the tour is just four years old. There are raised beds and mounds for vegetables, and paths to both a shady area and a birch wood. The gardeners doubtless use the excellent output of some chickens to enhance the productivity of this garden.
If you garden on your own with a limited budget, then the fourth garden on this year’s tour will give you lots of inspiration. It’s a sustainable food and flower garden cultivated organically by just one person using only a couple of tools. The planting scheme was developed by adding companion plants and using permaculture methods to the native and established plants that spontaneously appeared in the grounds of an old rectory.
About the Madawaska Valley Gardening Club
MVGC members recently contributed vegetable transplants and provided growing advice to clients of MV Food Bank. Earlier this month Club members enjoyed a delicious Strawberry Social (a popular Club event held every June). MV residents and visitors can appreciate the beauty of the Club’s Adopt-A-Beds which are dotted around public areas of the municipality. Tending these beds is a fun, co-operative activity that members willingly volunteer for each season. Club members have all this plus monthly meetings packed with gardening lore for a fee of just $15 a year. For more information, visit Facebook/Madawaska-Valley-Gardening-Club
