Mtn. View Garden Club tours White Nursey

The March meeting of the Mtn. View Garden Club was an exciting tour of the George O. White State Nursery in Licking, Mo. Twelve members and guests got an early start as they carpooled to the nursery. Members were greeted by Mike Fiaoni who gave a well-informed guided tour of their facility which started thirty years ago. The members first stop was the shipping department where they watched as the trees were counted into bundles of ten, strapped together, wrapped in a protective layer of mulch and loaded into shipping containers. Following that, Matt Elledge guided the members into the very frigid cooler where the trees are kept dormant until they can be shipped. Elledge then showed the members all of the different seeds that are collected and eventually used for growing their trees. Tamra Higgings was the last stop inside of their large facility. Elledge explained that Higgings had just completed her two-year training of "the Macerator", a big machine, similar to a food processor, that removes all of the pulp on the seeds so that they can be stored without the fear of getting moldy and rotting. The members final stop was their all-weather tram, which took them out to the fields where all of the trees are grown. The trees are only grown one and two years before selling them. When asked about the dark areas in the fields, Elledge explained that what the members were looking at where walnuts and hazelnuts that had been planted and then dug up by either deer or squirrels. 

 

The tour was followed by a trip into Houston where members had a delightful lunch at the Savor Grill. A short drive over to the Emmet Kelly Park provided an ideal location for a short meeting where they discussed the details of April's Greenhouse Tour and upcoming State Convention. 

 

The Mountain View Garden Club is a member of the National Garden Clubs, Inc., the Central Region Garden Clubs and the Federated Garden Clubs of Missouri, Inc. Please visit their Facebook page at www.facebook.com/mvgc.mountainviewmo to see all of the photos taken during this tour and the many other activities of the Club.