News from The Gardens

Hello! We’re Becca and Cooper. We just got married last year at Mohican Gardens. We want to share some of our day so you can see what makes this place so very magical for a wedding.

We knew from the beginning that we wanted to use every space available at Mohican Gardens. They have SO MUCH and it’s all included with the wedding package, so…why not?

Becca got ready in the upstairs of the Century Barn because she really loved the look of the historic post and beam construction. It makes the perfect backdrop for photos, as you can see. Once she was ready, the space was converted into a setting for cocktail hour after the ceremony.

Cooper and the groomsmen spent time in the Conservatory before the ceremony. It was the perfect place for them to get final touches and hang out. Here’s Cooper getting his boutonniere.

The ceremony took place at the pergola overlooking a beautiful lake covered in waterlilies. Late afternoon lighting is best. Plan your ceremony after 4:30 so you aren’t sitting in the sun during the middle of the day! Ours was perfect!

Once the ceremony finished (yay! We’re married!), we gathered with our wedding party and family to take pictures while our guests headed to the barn for cocktails and hors d’oeuvres. Shout out to our great bartenders (Bowman Beverage), caterer (Cabin Catering & Events), and DJ (Entertaining Ed’s)!

With over 25 acres of rolling farmland and forest, there are lots of places for photos. Make sure your photographer gets there early so they can scope out which spaces are best for the vision you have. We love the outdoors, so that’s the focus of most of our pictures. Whether your style is rustic, elegant, or casual, there are so many options it will make your head spin!

Once we finished with our pictures, everyone headed to the Conservatory for the rest of the evening. We opted for a “family-style” meal, but you can do a buffet as well. We upgraded to champagne-colored tablecloths that are an additional fee, but we loved the look and felt it was worth it. They went so well with the place settings from All Events Rental and the gorgeous centerpieces created by Compattibles Flowers.

Dinner was fantastic—thanks, Char! Our wedding cake (from the Suisse Shop Bakery) was absolutely stunning. We also offered pastries from Pistacia Vera in Columbus. I don’t think there was a single crumb left at the end of the evening. Yum!

We hope you enjoyed sharing a bit about our experience at Mohican Gardens. If you choose to host with them, your day will be as perfect as ours!

We get calls this time of year asking if we have certain varieties of plants. This is especially true with heirloom tomatoes and peppers. Yesterday we had a customer ask about San Marzano paste tomatoes and our response was “Hey, it’s early enough in the season…why not?” We got online and checked with one of our suppliers and the seeds will be here by Thursday so we can have plants ready in time for Memorial Day. THAT’S the kind of service you have come to love and enjoy at Mohican Gardens & Conservatory. Personal. Friendly. Customized. The type of attention to detail that you won’t find at the big box garden centers and huge greenhouse complexes. Don’t take it the wrong way—we’re not saying they shouldn’t be in the plant business. We’re saying plants are a way of life for us at The Gardens. We love plants. We love talking to our customers. And we love doing whatever it takes to earn your trust and keep you coming back year after year. Need a specific variety? Let us know soon. We’d be happy to source the seed and get them started for you. And if we can’t find it, we will happily refer you to one of the other fantastic greenhouses in the area. Yes, we do regularly refer customers to other places that can help out with things we might not be able to stock—like mulch or apple trees. In keeping with the “dropping names” theme of this post, here is a list of some of the tomatoes and peppers we are growing for this season:

TOMATOES: Abe Lincoln, Amish Paste, Beefsteak, Best Boy, Better Boy, Big Boy, Brandywine Yellow, Bushel Buster, Celebrity, Early Boy, Early Girl, German Johnson, Grape Red Plum, Hillbilly, Jubilee Yellow, Larry’s Favorite, Marglobe, Marianna’s Peace, Mortgage Lifter, Roma, San Marzano Paste, Sun Sugar Yellow Cherry, Super Sweet 100 Cherry, Tumbling Tom Cherry…

PEPPERS:  Black Pearl, California Wonder, Carolina Reaper, Dad’s Favorite Pimento, Early Jalapeno, Garden Salsa, Grand Bell Mix, Habanero Red, Hot Anaheim, Hot Hungarian Wax, King Arthur, Onyx Red, Poblano, Red Bell, Red Hot Cherry, Sedona, Serrano Chili, Sheepnose Pimento, Sweet Banana, Sweet Gypsy, Trinidad Scorpion, Yellow Bell…

The other day we had one of our regular customers come in to find a hanging basket and patio pot that she needed for an event next weekend. After selecting the patio pot, we went looking for a basket that would complement the pot. Once we pulled a few down and found the perfect shape, she commented that she wished the patio pot was fuller (we had expected it to be one that was ready for Memorial day, so the plants were fairly young). My response was “Shall we fix it together?” We can and will do this. Add a flower to an existing pot. Replant with a plant that has more blooms or buds. Or, as in this case, start from scratch and build a custom planter. When she heard that we could do this, her eyes brightened with excitement and we proceeded to select the perfect blend of flowers and fillers to create the ideal planter for her porch steps. It turned out beautifully, and she promised to come back in a couple of weeks to get the rest of her garden plants. And we’ll be ready to help her out when she returns.

While we are talking about service, we wanted to introduce you to a couple of the people who make it all happen at Mohican Gardens. In addition to our family, you will be greeted by one of our three seasonal employees: Judy Rafeld, Marissa Lamp (our intern from OSU-ATI in Wooster), and Phil Reeder.

Judy has been with Mohican Gardens since its earliest years when Lorie Ambrose started the business. She’s been a mainstay every season, helping manage the place when we are not available. She is a florist by trade and she is fantastic at helping people select the right plant for a specific problem area in your garden. If anyone knows the answer to a question, it’s this lady. And she’s one of the nicest people you will ever meet!

Marissa is a Greenhouse Management student at the Agricultural Technical Institute in Wooster. She has worked very hard this season learning how we do things at Mohican Gardens and especially enjoys getting out into the flower beds as the weather improves. It’s a perfect fit, since she hopes to work at a botanical garden in the future.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We’re still working on getting a photo of Phil, since he is only working one day a week. Phil has been with us for several years on a part-time basis since his retirement from the Mohican Lodge. A background in horticulture makes him a huge asset in the greenhouse!

We will continue to offer a wide variety of plants at the greenhouse and at Local Roots in Wooster. Let us know if you have any specific requests and we’ll do what we can to fill your needs. Until next time…happy gardening!

 

With apologies to our favorite board game, Clue, it’s time to get this gardening game started! Let’s take a quick look at some of the exciting changes in store for our friends when we open the doors for spring on April 1:

First off, you’ll notice a change to our look inside. We’ve added a “pergola” over our checkout counter as a way of offering more shade and protection from the condensation for our employees and sensitive electronics. This should be especially helpful for our newer customers who have often asked us “where do we pay?” Now, it will be quite obvious where to check out! This was a father/son project with lots of great input from Benjamin. Now that we’ve started with the construction, we just might be adding even more. Time will tell if we can keep the momentum going…

Another new feature this year is our Succulent Zone, just to the right of the checkout pergola. It will focus on these super-trendy hot weather performers. Take a look at the huge variety of shapes, colors, and habits of these beauties. We’ve even planted some pots for inspiration (or purchase!). Pick the ones you want and then take them to our potting “shed” to plant them up. As always, you can leave the mess with us. Oh, and we’ve also added “succulents by the strip” which includes smaller varieties that work well for party favors or place settings at weddings. They come 10 per strip for $30, which makes each plant only $3.00.

We’ve increased our number of hanging baskets this year in anticipation of a fantastic demand for our #1 seller. Variety is key, and we have many amazing combination baskets to choose from. Pricing remains the same as it has for the last three years—just $17.99 for a 10″ basket with up to NINE different plants!!! Got a shady yard? Take a look at our trailing coleus, begonias, ivies, or shade-tolerant combination baskets. Full sun? No problem! Most of our hanging baskets include varieties that LOVE the sun! And if you are looking for something a bit larger, we have a nice variety of deluxe wire/coco-lined hangers to choose from. You might also like our new half-cone hanging baskets that work well right up against the house. We will share pictures once they fill in a bit more.

This year, Keith and Mary went shopping for perennials and came up with some nice new additions. In 2019 we are offering three varieties of hardy garden mums that can be planted in your flower beds this spring for late-summer and fall color. The best part? You won’t have to replant them next year! They will come back over and over, unlike the big “fall mums” everyone gets in September. Don’t worry, we’ll still offer fall mums for those of you that just need a quick splash of autumn color!

Early spring vegetable starts will be available in April. We have a nice selection of broccoli, cauliflower, kale, cabbage, and brussels’ sprouts. We’ve also got kohlrabi and okra started.  We will also have onion sets and seed potatoes ready for those of you already tilling up your gardens. Even though this winter seemed to linger quite awhile, the number of you out looking for these early season favorites has amazed us. Pricing remains the same for our 6-packs at $2.39 each, or a full tray for $12.00.

We learned a few things last year. Number one is that you NEVER want to run out of tomato plants. To that end, we have MORE started this year than in the past. It will be a nice mix of heirloom and traditional tomatoes with some new varieties we’ve not tried before. Who knew there was such a fan-club over Better Boy and Best Boy???  These will be ready, along with the peppers, later in May. And, speaking of peppers—we’ve got a whole bunch of that Ambrose tradition of “Dad’s Favorite Pimento” plants this year. If you haven’t discovered this little sweet pepper, you are in for a treat. Small, flat and red, Dad’s Favorites are perfect for snacking on right out of the garden. Of course, our favorite way to enjoy them is to cut out the seeds and stem then stuff them with cheese and broil them. Yum!

Judy and Phil are back this year! We do have a new face greeting our customers through May. Her name is Marissa, and she is an intern from the Wooster campus of OSU-ATI where she is studying greenhouse management. She has been a fantastic addition to our team and works hard from the time she gets here until she leaves for the night. There is so much to learn at Mohican Gardens, but Marissa is up for the task! Ask her about her favorite plants…then, tell us since we’ve not been able to pry that information out of her yet. We think she likes them all!