Volunteers Plant Annual Flower Trial Gardens

By Logan Martinez
The cool dirt is scooped up with gloved hands in anticipation to place the first perennial into the clean, moist ground. Volunteers smile as the early morning sun warms their faces, bringing the knowledge that the day will be filled with community, fragrance, barbecue and accomplishment.

Every year extensive planning and deliberation begins the process of planting the Annual Flower Trial Garden, located on Remington Street.

The garden is not just for looks, but was also created to provide education, research and outreach to students, community members and industry professionals. The garden is filled with over 1,200 varieties of diverse perennials and annuals, provided by vegetation and seed companies from all over the world.

Colorado State University horticulture professor Jim Klett, Ph.D., supervisor of the gardens, explains how tips and seeds begin arriving from companies in early January to be planted in the garden. The companies are interested seeing how their varieties perform in a Colorado climate.

“I think we have a reputation in Colorado that it is a wonderful climate, a lot of sunshine, low humidity, and we are kind of a regional school here for the Rocky Mountain high plains area,” Klett says.

This year, Klett explains how vegetation companies are interested in seeing how more varieties of their plants grow in a potted environment, requiring the addition of containers to the garden.

 “I think [vegetation companies] are seeing a lot of interests in lifestyles of people who have containers and smaller lots or condos, things like that,” Klett says. “So they want to see how their plants perform in containers, versus in the ground.”

In late March, Colorado State University Cooperative Extension officers advertise the opportunity to volunteer in potting, transferring and planting the garden for participants in the Master Gardening Program. CSU Extension Horticulture Agent in Larimer County, Alison O’Connor, says over the past few years volunteers from the master gardening program have become an important component of putting the garden together.

“Helping build the garden is one of the best things that master gardeners do with the university and it is a way for us to be involved and see research first hand,” O’Connor says. “A way for the volunteers to understand the whole process of how a plant is first introduced, how it is trialed, what it goes through and then how it is then introduced into the market. It is a great way for them to stay in contact, plus it is a lot of fun and it is beautiful.”

The Master Gardening Program gives residents the opportunity to learn extensive gardening and horticulture knowledge in a set of classes through a 10-week period from January through early April, amounting to a total of 60 hours.

The program requires in return that master gardeners give 12 hours of their time in volunteer work through several opportunities. As tradition of a day of planting with a big barbecue lunch continues, helping plant the trial garden has become a popular outlet for those volunteer hours. “Because it is such a popular activity we try to involve as many volunteers as we can,” O’Connor says. “But the purpose of being a really good volunteer is that you expand what you do and make connections in other parts of the community.”

In return for the 12 hours of volunteer work, master gardeners receive 60 hours of classes on horticulture. O’Connor explains how master gardeners learn every interest they have in horticulture, including learning the basics of diagnostics, lawn care, identifying insects, how to plant trees properly, pruning, growing vegetables and how to work with people through volunteer opportunities to share what they learn. “I joke and say that it is basically a four year horticulture degree crammed into 60 hours,” O’Connor says. “But they learn the gamete of everything horticulture.”

Therese Mahannah, owner of Garden Dreams and first year master gardener, enjoys the program for more than just the educational aspect. “It is a different and fun way to meet people with the same interests and help people out.”

After the garden is planted, it becomes a popular attraction for residents and tourists alike. “The Fort Collins Visitors Bureau say that it is also one of the very top tourist spots, because people coming to Fort Collins see that color and like to see color of that number,” Klett says. “It brings professional green industry people, it brings a lot of advanced homeowners that garden and also brings just curious people that like a very colorful, very nice spot in Fort Collins that is a green space that they can just relax in.”

The Annual Flower Trial Garden is a part of is the Fort Collins in Bloom tour as well. The Gardens on Spring Creek created this self-guided tour brochure as an effort to provide knowledge of all the free gardens throughout town for both visitors and residents alike. “I think people just enjoy plants and like to see plants that grow well here,” says Laura Atwood, the marketing and advertising manager of the Gardens on Spring Creek.

In return for planting flowers in the garden vegetation companies receive unbiased evaluations at the end of the summer describing how each variety faired. “Because we have close to over a hundred to 150 people evaluate on evaluation day and there are all different levels that come up with these evaluation scores,” Klett explains. “So they get a pretty good wide-based, unbiased evaluation of how their plant performs here in Colorado.”

Through this evaluation Klett and other evaluators determine the best of show flowers in each category, available at independent garden centers around Fort Collins the following spring season; However, the Annual Trial Flower Garden is still always open to the public.

“Anytime people are around gardens or around plants it creates a relaxing oasis in the middle of town, a place to go to get away from the stress of the day in a public place,” Atwood says.