Troy garden features eclectic offerings

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How to go

What: Gardens Tour

Who: Miami County Master Gardeners

When: 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday, June 18

Where: Gardens in Troy, Piqua and the Casstown area

Tickets: $10 presale, $15 day of tour

Tickets available: OSU Extension Office, Miami County Courthouse; Coldwater Café, Tipp City; Patterson’s Flowers, West Milton; Lisa’s Perennial Flowers, Covington; Genell’s Flowers, Piqua; or any master gardener

More info: Call 937-440-3945

Mary Groves thinks she may have gotten her love of gardening from her father.

Although he was more of a vegetable gardener than one to fuss with flowers, “it fascinated me,” Groves said. “I swear he could take a weed and turn it into a rose.”

Groves will show off gardening talents displayed at her Swailes Road home near Troy during the Miami County Master Gardeners’ Gardens on Tour event June 18.

She’s built a series of gardens ranging from a small vegetable garden, to beds with hostas, to fairy gardens and a prayer/relaxation garden over the past 15 years.

Groves received her master gardener certificate through the Ohio State University Extension program last year.

“I start as early in the spring as it will allow because it is thick with weeds,” she said of garden areas in the yard surrounding the home. “Once I get into it, I love it.”

The fruits of her labors were on display on a recent June morning with a Humpty Dumpty figure perched on a wall near a fountain and roses in bloom. Nearby, a red children’s wagon had been converted into a fairy garden while tea cups, various statues and figurines and accessories such as tea kettles and watering cans were re-used as decorations or flower containers.

She doesn’t have a favorite flower. “I just think God makes them all beautiful,” she said.

Groves said she’s had to be flexible over the years as the wooded lot she and husband, Perry, bought saw some of the aging trees die. “What had been an all shade garden is evolving into something else,” she said.

She described her garden as “eclectic,” adding, “Unfortunately, there is no rhyme or reason to it.”

This is Groves’ first time on the master gardeners’ tour; something she admitted made her a bit nervous. “You look at everyone else’s (gardens) and they are gorgeous,” she said, adding she enjoys learning from the others.

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