Educating Gardeners Like You Since 1958
Our Mission: To educate and inspire members of our community to become more complete gardeners.
Speaker Series
-
Everything I Learned From a Tomato with Sky Kurlbaum
Tuesday, May 14, 2024
7:00 p.m. - 8:00 p.m.Gardeners Connect Free Speaker Series
Free, Open to the Public, No Reservations Required
Merriam Community Center
Kessler/Loomis Rooms
6040 Slater
Merriam, KS 66202 -
Growing Trees as Mother Nature Intended with Matt Evans
Tuesday, November 12, 2024
7:00 p.m. - 8:00 p.m.Gardeners Connect Free Speaker Series
Free, Open to the Public, No Reservations Required
Merriam Community Center
Kessler/Loomis Rooms
6040 Slater
Merriam, KS 66202
Member Garden Visits
-
Tree Peonies in the Garden with Talis Bergmanis
Saturday, April 27, 2024
10:00 a.m. & 11:00 a.m.Gardeners Connect Member Garden Visits
Free, Open to Gardeners Connect Members Only, Reservations Required
A 1-1/3 acre garden in Fairway, Kansas, that consisted of nearly all grass (had two yews and one rose bush) got turned into place with hundreds of plantings over 20 years including a large collection of tree peonies.
-
Iris, Angels and More with Janet Weiblen
Saturday, May 18, 2024
11:00 a.m. & 1:00 p.m.Gardeners Connect Member Garden Visits
Free, Open to Gardeners Connect Members Only, Reservations Required
With luck, the irises will cooperate and be in full flower for Janet Wieblen’s Merriam, KS, Member Garden Visit. She opened her garden to Gardeners Connect members last year. Those who attended found a delightful, well-manicured small garden that abuts a wooded area. In addition to her irises, she has a wonderful shade garden with a variety of heucheras, pulmonarias, aruncus and hardy geraniums. There are small angel sculptures keeping watch over the quilt of colorful leaves and textures. Her sunny areas have more hardy geraniums, yarrows, and a wonderful specimen of threadleaf false cypress, Chamaecyparis pisifera.
-
Cottage-Style Garden with Marla Galetti
Saturday, June 8, 2024
10:00 a.m.Gardeners Connect Member Garden Visits
Free, Open to Gardeners Connect Members Only, Reservations Required
Marla's cottage style garden is set on two acres, near Parkville. It has been an ongoing work in progress for the last 35 years. There is a large array of seasonal blooming bushes, annuals, perennials, vegetables and tropical plants. Some of the more unusual perennials are Crambe cordifolia, Thalictrum, Veronicastrum, Cassia (popcorn plant) and Acanthus (bear breeches). There are many vantage points to sit and enjoy the garden as well as a swimming pool, fish pond and a greenhouse that makes it possible to winter over tropical plants and to grow a wide variety of of plants from seed to fill the garden. See you in the garden.
-
Carnivorous Plants, Lilies, and a Crevice Garden with Brian Chadwick-Robinson and Chuck Robinson
Tuesday, June 25, 2024
6:30 p.m.Gardeners Connect Member Garden Visits
Free, Open to Gardeners Connect Members Only, Reservations Required
The executive director of Gardeners Connect the Gardeners Connect newsletter editor again are inviting members to their garden to see if anyone notices changes from 2023. A flagstone fairy seems to have visited and left 2 or 3 tons of flagstones since last summer, and so visitors may rate the new walkway around Chuck’s front bed, which he has referred to as his “Boomerang Bed” because of its shape. However, he is considering calling it “Liliphilia” because of the lilies there. In addition to the Gardeners Connect newsletter, he also edits the North American Lily Society Quarterly Bulletin. Also, there have been physical upgrades to Brian’s carnivorous plant collection, and they are seeing if the name “Carnivory” is a good fit for this part of their combined gardens. Also, inspired by Kansas City Garden Symposium speaker Joseph Tychonievich, there is a new crevice garden installed. It replaces a planting of Echinacea paradoxa and pallida, which tended to lean and trip people on a rock walkway. Those beloved plants have been planted elsewhere. Come see these and other changes to the garden.
-
Garden with Art in Old Briarcliff with Phyllis Carlyle
Thursday, June 27, 2024
6:30 p.m.Gardeners Connect Member Garden Visits
Free, Open to Gardeners Connect Members Only, Reservations Required
This garden has not been open before to member visits. Your main takeaways from touring Phyllis Carlyle’s garden in Old Briarcliff will be seeing many native plants, a casual gardening style, and that this woman likes yard art! In 2015, she moved to her 1943 cottage-style home with a spacious but somewhat empty yard. Since the neighborhood was developed in the 1930s, ’40s and ’50s, it is full of mature trees and better than average soil. With a goal to have a lower maintenance landscape than her previous home, she has added many shrubs, trees and perennials to her yard, at least half of them natives. She keeps creating new mulched planting areas wherever grass doesn’t grow and mostly uses purchased and self-created yard art for pops of color instead of annuals.
-
The Wildlife Garden Estate with Lenora Larson
Saturday, June 29, 2024
10:00 a.m.Gardeners Connect Member Garden Visits
Free, Open to Gardeners Connect Members Only, Reservations Required
This 2 acre garden is certified as a butterfly and wildlife habitat, Monarch Waystation, and Pollinator Garden. The garden illustrates that the goals of beauty and wildlife habitat are not mutually exclusive. The garden exemplifies the English Estate landscape style with flowing curves and masses of plant material to create a painterly effect using ornamental and native plants. Bring a picnic lunch if you wish, to eat in the garden. Lenora will be in the garden to answer questions.
Member Garden Visits
Open your garden to other Gardeners Connect Members. You pick the date, time and number of attendees your garden can accommodate. Email info@gardenersconnect.org for more details in opening your garden.
All Member Garden Visits are rain or shine. Any cancellations or changes will be emailed to attendees and updated on the website.
Please check here for the latest information regarding any Member Garden Visits.
Diversity & Inclusion
Gardeners Connect is a diverse, equitable, and inclusive organization and community, which is open to and welcomes everyone regardless of age, disability, gender, ethnicity, race, religion, sex, sexual orientation or identity, or country of origin. We are committed to acceptance, non-discrimination, and equal opportunity for all and believe diversity in our members and participants greatly benefits our organization and community. We are committed to making everyone feel welcome, accepted, respected, and appreciated.
A welcoming and diverse garden is a great garden.
Discover the Benefits of Membership.
Our members make it possible.
We believe that every great gardener should have the opportunity to keep learning no matter their skill level. We strive to offer those opportunities in everything we do from our excellent speakers to our newsletter filled with pertinent garden information and articles cultivated especially for the Midwestern gardener.
Gardeners Connect newsletter published every other month and delivered to your mailbox.
Access to Member Garden Visits to private gardens.
Access to our online speaker series.
Travel with Gardeners Connect on guided tours both here in Kansas City and beyond.
Be a part of members only workshops.
Gardeners Connect is a 501 (c) (3) nonprofit organization incorporated in 1958 to promote and encourage among citizens of the metropolitan Kansas City area and beyond an interest in horticulture and related garden activities, to carry on an educational program pertaining thereto, and to provide a place or places where such activities may be conducted in order to attain a more attractive and beautiful community.
