Steinbach gardening host bids adieu

A gardening friend of mine always says, "Inquiring minds want to know." If you are a gardener, the need to know is a driving force for gardening better and more easily. A good case in point: the long queue of callers who have joined host Duayne Friesen over the years on his radio show, the Lawn and Garden Journal.

When Friesen was first approached by Golden West Broadcasting to become the host of a new call-in ­gardening show they were planning to air on Saturday mornings from their radio station in Steinbach, he admits to feeling some initial trepidation.

Fast forward to today and after 20 years and more than 7,000 conversations with callers (double that number in email messages) Friesen has announced his retirement and is hanging up his headphones.

The popularity of the show — it now airs every Saturday morning on four stations, AM 1250 in Steinbach, CFRY in Portage la Prairie, CFAM in Altona, and CJRB in Boissevain — attests to the drawing power of Friesen as well as the rampant enthusiasm by local gardeners for quality gardening information that is relevant to our unique growing conditions.

First, let it be said that Friesen won’t be stepping away from our gardening community any time soon. While he is ending his gig as a weekend radio host, Friesen is keeping his day job with Ball Seed Company, a major North American supplier of seed and young plants to commercial greenhouses. Friesen knows plants and has the enviable job of revealing each year to his many customers an exciting portfolio of products that represent the latest in plant breeding and innovation.

Criss-crossing Manitoba and northern Ontario as a sales representative for Ball Seed to meet with nursery owners and greenhouse operators has helped add to Friesen’s horticultural knowledge by providing him with a bird’s-eye view of the regional differences in soils, terrain, even climate, but also the opportunity to learn about the differences in gardening practices between urban and rural areas.

But then, Friesen has always been interested in horticulture. Growing up in Steinbach, his parents owned Oakridge Greenhouse. After graduating from the University of Guelph where he earned a diploma in horticulture, Friesen made his home in Steinbach until moving to Winnipeg after becoming the manager in 2004 for Lacoste Garden Centre.

Come Saturday mornings, he would drive to the radio station in Steinbach each week until 2010 when the demands of his job with Ball Seed took him to other places in the province or out of the country to visit plant trials or attend trade shows.

No problem, Golden West provided him with equipment to do the show from his home office or on the road. Friesen has hosted the show from locations coast-to-coast. One time he set up his equipment at a nice spot at Sydney Harbour, N.S., before discovering, once he was on-air, that a busker festival complete with a drum quartet and bagpipers was happening at the same time.

"You can’t make that sort of thing up," Friesen said. "It’s the beauty of live radio — you never know what’s going to happen."

Often, listeners would call the show to share their own experiences with a particular gardening-related issue. If there wasn’t a ready answer, the discussion was inevitably picked up the following week until the problem was solved. "It takes a brave person to call into a radio show and put their voice out there," Friesen said.

The different perspectives of callers, but also the sharing of new information, made for lively discussion. When one caller mentioned a new potato variety named Adora that contains 30 per cent fewer carbohydrates, callers were eager to know more. The discussion carried on for weeks, said Friesen, who then invited a representative from Kroeker Farms to be a guest on his show to talk about the Adora potato, which Kroeker grows in its potato fields and makes available at The Potato Store in Winkler.

Whenever Friesen’s radio show host alter ego was in play, his focus shifted solely to his callers and their gardening questions. Now, for the first time in 20 years, Friesen is wearing only one hat. I asked him to share with Free Press readers a preview of some of the new flowering annuals that we can look forward to seeing at garden centres next spring.

Commonly known as million bells, Calibrachoa is a pretty petunia-like annual widely used in container designs. It’s available in almost as many different and colourful varieties as there are stars in the galaxy. There are two new notable entries, Friesen said.

Can-Can Bumble Bee Pink is a mini petunia with a mounded, trailing habit. It is billed as the first eye-type calibrachoa with a star pattern. A picotee flower, the lighter pink margins dance around a vibrant pink centre set off by a bright yellow star-shaped throat. With a height and spread of 25 to 38 centimetres, Friesen says that Can-Can Bumble Bee Pink is suited to larger containers.

Bloomtastic, a new series from Dummen Orange, is heralded as a vigorous calibrachoa with extra-large flowers and reliable heat tolerance. There are two varieties to choose from, pink-flowered Rose Quartz and lavender-flowered Serenity. Their big size, Friesen said, makes them well suited to hanging baskets. According to the National Garden Bureau, 2018 is the Year of the Calibrachoa.

Gardeners who are familiar with Kent Beauty ornamental oregano will fall in love with Kirigami. This new ornamental oregano has small rose-like flowers with soft purple-green bracts and light green leaves. How does it compare to Kent Beauty? Kirigami, Friesen said, has a fuller and tighter habit.

Longing for something unique and pretty that thrives in dense shade? The New Guinea Impatiens Wild Romance series is an upright impatiens with semi-double flowers. There are two varieties, White and Blush Pink. Friesen says that the blooms resemble gardenias as they start to open and look almost like a rose when they are fully open. Caution: Wild Romance won’t tolerate even an hour of sunlight. Just think of how this gorgeous new series of New Guinea Impatiens will transform the shadiest areas of your garden.

Friesen calls new Sunfinity Sunflower an incredible breakthrough. A reblooming sunflower with multiple branches, Sunfinity Sunflower blooms continuously all season long. Friesen says that a single plant produces more than 50 large (10 cm) blooms. Developed by Syngenta Seed over a period of 17 years, this interspecific hybrid has been bred with the best qualities of two selected sunflower species and represents the next generation of sunflowers.

Sunfinity’s compact size — 90 to 120 cm tall and 60 to 90 cm wide — makes it an ideal annual for flower beds or patio containers. In addition, it is a superlative, long-lasting cut flower.

The news of Friesen’s retirement as host of the Lawn and Garden Journal may have fans saying, "Say it ain’t so," but the show will go on. Congratulations go out to the new host Carla Hrycyna, co-owner of St. Mary’s Nursery and Garden Centre, who will put on the headphones starting Feb. 3.

colleenizacharias@gmail.com