For more than 12 years a dedicated group of community-minded gardening enthusiasts have met Wednesday mornings for a couple of hours of volunteer gardening and community camaraderie. The group convenes every spring to plan, plant, weed, and prune to beautify the gardens around Cairnsmore Place and Cowichan Hospice House for the benefit of the residents and staff within.
Early on, the group embraced organizing an annual plant sale to help pay for plants, soil and compost, tools, irrigation equipment, and general garden materials. Appealing to local gardeners for donations of surplus plants from some of the valley’s finest gardens, the group collects, repots, and labels hundreds of plants for a one-day sale that usually sells out within a couple of hours. Now in their 11th plant sale year, the group has raised more than $27,000 for the gardens.
This year’s plant sale will be a hybrid online and in-person event, with orders to be taken from April 23 to 28. Pick up will be on April 30, when any plants not previously spoken for, along with some garden ornaments, will be offered for sale on site at the Cairnsmore and Hospice gardens. Also on that day master gardeners will be on hand to give tours of the gardens.
Organizers say that there are more than 700 plants available this year, including a wide range of flowering shrubs and perennials, with an especially large selection of hostas.
The plant list, prices, and complete sale information will be available on April 21 by sending an email request to plantsale2022@gmail.com.
The gardening group says sprucing up the gardens has encouraged others to help out as well. Local businesses provide discounts on necessary items and have donated many gifts in kind. Thankful Cairnsmore families make donations to the gardens on behalf of loved ones who enjoyed both watching the weekly activity of the gardening volunteers as well as enjoying the blooms of their labour.
The group’s success rests on the common desire to make the gardens beautiful and inviting for residents, their families, the staff, and the surrounding neighbourhood, they say. New volunteers are always welcome.