After two months of searching, the Midland Garden Club has selected its garden of the year.
“I was very surprised,” Susan Ash tells MidlandToday about learning she and her son Damian had received the special honour. “We haven’t been here that long, but we’ve been working really hard at it.”
Ash and Damian, who she credits with “doing all the digging,” moved to Midland last July after finding a house on Bayview Avenue that checked all the boxes of what they had been looking for as they planned to move from Hamilton.
She says their Hamilton home also featured impressive gardens while their Mississauga home featured a full front-yard garden complete with a pond.
“I don’t like grass,’ Ash says, noting her garden also features a number of little ornaments, including rabbits. “And with a garden, I get butterflies and do a lot to attract the birds as well.”
Speaking on behalf of the club’s board of directors, member Jenni McKeown says the selection process occurred earlier this summer.
“During July or August, a volunteer team from the Midland Garden Club drives around Midland looking for well-tended, attractive front gardens of any style or size, not professionally landscaped,” McKeown explains.
“There are so many beautiful gardens in Midland that it’s difficult to choose just one. The winner is notified and presented with a plaque and a year’s membership in the club. The runners up receive a congratulatory card and door hanger.”
McKeown says it’s not necessary for potential garden winners to be members of the club.
“No, they don’t have to be a member,” she says. “We don’t even know the homeowners. We drop off a letter advising them that they’ve been selected and ask them to call. In the letter, we also ask if they mind having their photo on Facebook and MidlandToday.”
Formerly called the Midland Horticultural Society, the Midland Garden Club has been in existence since 1897.
“We had been giving this award for many years and revamped the process in 2019,” says McKeown, who notes new members are always welcome.
“As a member of the Ontario Horticultural Society, the club encourages people to get their hands in the dirt and this is one way to recognize those who do.”
