VALDOSTA — Spring has sprouted. 

During this season, the Garden Center ladies at The Crescent tend to their individual gardens as they prepare them for new plants and flowers.

Club members garden daily year-round, maintaining long-term greenery and occasionally adding to or changing it.

The Crescent has old-time camellias, agapanthus plants, snowy joey viburnums, heart leaf skull caps, dotted horse mints, day lilies, hawthorn bushes and a fringe tree.

Nell Ricketts is a Southern Lily Garden Club member and master gardener. She is also The Crescent’s gardens and grounds chairperson.

Ricketts said the camellia flower is perfect for South Georgia. It’s low-maintenance, an evergreen and a winter bloomer, all features of why this flower is distinct.

Best Gardening Practices

Ricketts compared gardening to baking a cake, labeling the various steps as “ingredients.” The most important ingredient is the proper soil.

“Once you have the proper soil, then the next thing you have to do is you have to think about your climate … we’re coastal. Then, you have to think about the sun,” she said.

Discovering if a garden is a shade lover or sun lover is essential, she said. A water source is also important, she added.

Kae Sinkule, a member of the Southern Lily Garden Club, recommends home gardeners weed and clean their gardens and create planting diagrams to get working ideas of what the gardens will look like.

Why Garden?

Garden Club members say the pastime is therapeutic and beautiful.

“It’s more about a connection with nature,” Sinkule said. “You get away from your screen. You get away from your problems. It’s like a moving meditation.”

Ricketts said gardening has built camaraderie among the ladies at The Crescent.

How to See The Crescent’s Gardens

The Crescent is open 1-4 p.m. Wednesday through Friday for guest tours. Admission is $5 for adults. Children younger than 5, free.

The Crescent, 904 N. Patterson St., is available for rentals.

More information: (229) 244-6747, thecrescentvaldosta.com. 

Amanda M. Usher is a reporter at The Valdosta Daily Times. She can be contacted at 229-244-3400 ext.1274.