On Saturday, May 20th, we hosted our annual Perennial & Garden Plant Sale at the St. Paul’s Episcopal Church on the Huntington Green in Shelton.  It’s a highlight of our year, when members donate cultivars from their own gardens for sale.  This year’s event once again featured some of our favorite features.

In the weeks leading up to the sale, a team of members had potted two hundred Orange Coneflower (Rudbeckia fulgida) starter plants specifically for the plant sale.

The Shelton Board of Alderman had designated the Orange Coneflower the City Flower in 2016. The Olde Ripton Garden Club encourages residents and businesses to grow this flower — it is a native plant that will grow readily in our area, and it is a perennial assuring that it will return to our gardens year after year.

 

Between 7:00 and 8:00 am on Saturday morning and donned in their signature green gardening aprons, members began setting up tables and tents, grouping plants by sun requirement and purpose.  The Orange Coneflowers were featured prominently outside the tents.

Customers had a wide variety of plants to choose from, including shade-loving varieties such as hostas, bleeding hearts, and pachysandra (Pachysandra terminalis), all-purpose workhorses like Gooseneck Loosestrife (Lysimachia clethroides), Sweet Woodruff (Galium odoratum), and astilbes, to sun worshipers from lilies to irises.  Members stayed close to the tents to provide advice and recommendations.

Besides the wide varieties of plants for sale, we featured other tables of interest for customers.  Guy’s Eco Garden of Shelton had a spread of beautiful vegetables, all organically grown and with substantial maturity to get gardens off to a healthy, vigorous start.

 

 

Joyce Fedorko featured local raw honey in delightful, corked-stopped glass bottles from The Hawley Farm in Shelton.  ORGC is dedicated to conservation and responsible gardening, and promoting local apiaries is an important way to support bee ecology efforts.  The honey has been a community favorite for years, and visitors immediately gathered around the table as the bottles were put out for display.

As always, we presented a wide variety of baked goods from ORGC members.  Treats ranged from muffins, breads, and cookies to apple chips and gluten-free biscotti.

We were thrilled to receive brightly colored banners from the students at Perry Hill School, and these were displayed on a cord under one of our tents.

The sale generated over $1600.00, which will benefit garden and scholarship activities in the community.  We look forward to seeing you at the sale next year!