Willow Garden Club tour blooms for 27th season

WILLOW — Tour five gardens and share a special lunch in the garden of legacy club members — and Alaska legends — Dorothea Taylor and George Murphy during Willow Garden Club’s 27th annual garden tour from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m., July 28.

Featured in this year’s tour are the gardens of Karen and Bob Mattson, Gerald Freely, Sarah Richardson and Pat Eckhoff, Tina and Herb Schwager and Les Brake’s Coyote Garden.

Tour organizer Marsha Van Abel said it was mid-May before many Willow gardeners knew whether their perennials had survived beneath the almost 200 inches of snow that accumulated there this past winter.

“It was hard to get our gardeners to commit,” she said. “Fortunately, an early snow cover really protected the plants and many early perennials were trying to bloom as we brushed the snow away.”

Van Abel said this year’s tour includes everything from an elderly gentleman who has gardened vegetables in Willow for years; an artist’s cottage garden; a couple who operate a bed and breakfast complete with a lighthouse on the edge of Jean Lake; and two retired nurses from Florida who found their corner of heaven in Willow and created an inviting woodland garden over the past 10 years.

Each year the garden club works to present a full spectrum of gardens, Van Abel said. People often finish the tour with new ideas for their own gardens, she said.

If the exotic plants and manicured paths of Les Brake’s Coyote Garden seem impossible, people may find the container-based gardens of Tina and Herb Schwager’s Schwager Haus Lodge more doable.

Willow Garden Club 2012 featured gardens:

Schwager Haus Lodge

The Schwagers began building their bed and breakfast on the shores of Jean Lake in 1995. It didn’t begin that way, however. They had intended to build quiet place to retire. But as friends came to visit over the years, and an assortment of buildings grew up among the trees, a bed and breakfast just seemed logical, Tina Schwager said.

And with each new building, dock, deck or bathhouse comes a new flowerbed or two, Tina said.

“I love, love flowers,” she said.

Many of her flowerbeds are created using colorful containers of plants that punctuate the wooded landscape with bright explosions of summer color. Only the begonias are wintered over, she said. The rest they leave for moose to eat.

Among the container plants sprouts vegetation common to the region, such as lupine, columbine and wild roses. Lupine are her favorite and remind of her Texas blue bonnets, she said.

“It brings back memories of home,” Tina said.

Herb said they were gardeners when they lived in Arizona, too. And gardening Willow-style has taken some getting used to. Here, gardeners face a short growing season, cold and wet weather and acidic soil, he said. In Arizona, the soil is more alkaline, and drought and heat are ever-present foes.

Karen and Bruce Mattson

Karen and Bruce Mattson’s home, gallery and garden are located on a hill above Nancy Lake.

Much love and care have gone into their garden, home and gallery over the years. Pleasant walkways lead through wildflower meadows and a special water feature is lined with beautiful small annuals.

Family is special to the Mattsons, and some of the plants they cherish most are an heirloom rose, bishop’s weed and a cedar tree brought back many years ago from her grandmother’s home in Michigan. Lucky visitors will see the eagles’ nest (with two babies) high in a tree on the left side of the driveway as they walk up the hill to enter the garden.

Gerald Freely

Gerald Freely has lived and gardened in Willow for many decades. Over the years, Willow gardeners have sought Freely’s advice when they wanted to learn about productive compost techniques. Raised vegetable beds, a very functional and full greenhouse and currant bushes are just some of the things he tends year after year. He loves having company, is proud to show guests his plants and share recipes for homemade wine.

Sarah Richardson and Pat Eckhoff

For the past eight years, Sarah Richardson and Pat Eckhoff have cleared brush, trees and weeds to create a charming combination of lawn, flowers and woodland native plants.

Delphiniums, poppies, peonies and other perennials can be found in the front garden. Ferns, daisies and other wild plants reside on a hill in the middle of the green lawn in back. A small greenhouse sits in one corner of the yard next to a vegetable garden. Altogether, this is a restful woodland garden that brings joy to anyone lucky enough to visit.

Dorothea Taylor and George Murphy

Dorothea Taylor and George Murphy will open their garden on Long Lake to host the tour lunch stop this year. Visitors are fortunate to be able to visit with them again and walk amongst ferns, iris, rhododendrons, mock orange and other perennials planted many years ago.

Les Brake Coyote Garden

Willow’s Les Brake and his Coyote Garden will offer tours from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., July 28 as part of the Willow Garden Club tour, and additionally from noon to 5 p.m., July 29. Coyote Garden has been featured in numerous magazines, books and on television. Suggested donation is $7 and proceeds go to the support the Georgeson Botanical Garden at the University of Alaska Fairbanks and Willow Garden Club. For more information, call 495-6525.

What: 27th annual Willow Garden Club tour

When: From 10 a.m. to 3 p.m., July 28. Meet at 9:45 a.m. to get directions to each garden

Where: Willow Community Center, Mile 69.8, Parks Highway.

Cost: Free

For more information: Contact Marsha Van Abel at 495-2080, Cindy Forsyth at 495-6034 or email willowgardenclub@hotmail.com.