Master Gardeners enjoy years of success, growth

WASILLA — Snowfire Gardens owners Doug and Florene Carney didn’t set out to be master gardeners.

But they do have a long history of caring for plants.

Doug and Florene — who celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary in 2013 — each came to Alaska from their respective home states of Ohio and Arizona as young teenagers. They both come from gardening families, but Doug’s initial view of the nature of his work was perhaps a little less glamorous than Florene’s.

“I (am) from a family of 11, so I was pulling weeds when I was 6,” Doug said.

Doug and Florene married at St. Michael Catholic Church in 1963, maintaining an average-sized garden as they raised children in the Mat-Su Valley. Doug taught language arts and physical education at Palmer High School for 28 years, and Florene worked as the administrative assistant to the superintendent of schools for many years as well.

But retirement wasn’t in the cards.

With his extensive experience in carpentry — handed down from his father — he began a second career building houses with Alaska Petroleum Contractors, which he did for about seven years.

“I retired, and about three weeks later (APC) called me up and said, ‘we understand you can read blueprints and you’re a good carpenter and we need a foreman for a job out at Hooper Bay,’” Doug said.

Meanwhile, Florene had a bit more success at being retired and put all her efforts into gardening.

“The first thing I did was take the (Cooperative Extension Service’s) master gardener’s class,” she said. “I had had my name on the (waiting) list for quite a while.”

The Carneys had also been looking to sell their three-story house and build on a new property, but it sold much faster than they had expected. All of a sudden, the “retired” couple was very busy.

“We ended up building a house and doing everything in the same year,” Florene said.

A new level

It was 1998 when Doug and Florene moved into their new, one-story home (they didn’t want to worry about stairs as they grew older, Doug said). At the time, the yard was all forest, Florene said, and the idea was to have “a very small rock garden,” and possibly a bed of vegetables. She had been inspired by little blue flowers (a type of Campanula) growing out of the rock faces along the Seward Highway, and wanted a little piece of that for her own.

“Everything in the garden turned out bigger” than originally planned, Florene said.

And all for the better. Florene had helped Alaska field guide writer Verna Pratt and Coyote Garden owner Les Brake start the Alaska Rock Garden Society in 1997, and in 2002 the local group hosted the North American Rock Garden Society for its annual meeting at the Carneys’ home.

From there, Snowfire Gardens began to take off.

“It was meant to be,” Doug said. “Everything would just kinda fall into place.”

Over the next few years, with the Alaska Rock Garden Society, Florene hosted “garden teas” to help support the Wasilla Public Library, gave talks and participated in seed swaps around the world.

“It just became a passion,” she said.

Doug, as well as Florene, became increasingly enticed by the creative process and the challenge of growing new things.

“I’ve always been one to push the envelope,” he said.

And with their new location, cultivating plants and crops Doug never thought could grow in Alaska suddenly seemed much more possible.

“I wanted to grow azaleas … a couple fruit trees, maybe a cherry tree, but there was no way I could do it out at the old place,” he said. “Fifteen miles difference between here and there and the climate was 10 to 15 degrees warmer.”

Soon Doug was not only growing azaleas, cherry, apple and plum trees, but grafting same family-plants together and creating unique strains that could best survive the Wasilla climate.

Down to business

As more and more people found out about Snowfire — tour buses scheduled stops there, a television crew working on a botanical garden show for PBS spent eight hours filming there in the early 2000s — Doug and Florene realized they were running a business. They hosted a wedding for an employee of the Alaska Botanical Garden at their home, and soon brides-to-be began asking about prices and amenities.

The Carneys were willing, and as requests increased, they obtained a business license and purchased the necessary insurance to host the hundreds of guests filling their garden. Snowfire is now featured in local and national bridal magazines and websites.

“It doesn’t put money in our pocket (directly), but the money that comes from the business goes into the garden, so, leaves money in our pocket,” Florene said.

Though an “accidental” business, hosting weddings is “very fun,” she said.

“I love people and … we have had some beautiful weddings here,” she said.

Though Doug is sometimes less enthusiastic about huge crowds of people visiting their home at the end of the unpaved cul-de-sac, he still says everything about their home and garden “was meant to be.”

For more information, visit snowfiregardens.net.

Contact Caitlin Skvorc at 352-2266 or caitlin.skvorc@frontiersman.com.