Plant Culture Field Trips

Bro. Dewey's Plant Culture (HORT 201) class has been on two field trips so far this semester. The first one they went on stopped at a few different areas on the way up to Sawtelle Mountain. It was a day trip. At each stop, the students must analyze the area and explain the phenomenon that naturally occurred there. This tests the student's knowledge of plant characteristics and how the plants are affected by the climate they are in. The rest of the pictures can be accessed through the AgBio server in the Benson building.

The other field trip they went on was a few days long down in the Salt Lake City area. The student's stopped at various companies in the horticulture industry and learned how they adapt to the field they are in. Among the places they visited were Thanksgiving Point, Cactus and Tropicals, Ginger Belnap, owner of Meadow Brook Design, and the BYU campus. The remainder of the pictures for this field trip can also be found on the AgBio server in Bro. Dewey's folder.

These and other great field trips are one way that our department gets our students out in the real world and to see how many people use horticulture in their every day lives to earn a living. These trips also help to bring our department together as friends and colleagues to create the unique tight-knit group we have.

Hub Trip to Phoenix

Brother Dewey is the professor over the Phoenix, AZ upcoming internship expedition December 2-4 of this year. If you are planning on going, he is the one to talk to and coordinate which companies you, personally, would like to visit. His email address is deweyd@byui.edu.

San Francisco Hort Field Trip

There are still openings for the San Francisco field trip November 2-7! This field trip is connected to the Evergreen class but it is open to all horticulture students.

The deadline is October 16th!

There is a sign-up sheet in Sister Ruud's office.
If you have any questions, contact Bro. Toll at tollj@byui.edu.

A little more PLANET fever!

Here is a look back at Student Career Days, 2009. www.studentcareerdays.org



Student Career Days, sponsored by the Professional Landcare Network (PLANET) is an annual event for higher education students in landscape career programs nationwide. The 2009 event was held at Cal Poly Pomona, Pomona, CA, March 25-29, 2009. The 2010 event will be held at the North Metro Campus of Chattahoche State Technical College, Atlanta, GA.

We Are The Champions!

A sixteen member student team recently returned from Pomona, California after taking first place in a National Horticulture Competition. The Professional Landcare Network (PLANET) sponsored the 33rd annual event, which has the format of Horticulture Olympics, consisting of 25 events.
Approximately 60 schools from across the nation participated. In addition to the competition, there was a Career Fair in which the top green industry companies came to recruit and hand out scholarships.

The BYU-Idaho team was awarded $5000 for the university and captured eight individual scholarships of $1000 each, plus job offers. In addition, Eric Ball received the Presidential Scholarship for $2500, and Seth Reed received the Superstar Scholarship for $1500.

Important incidental highlights:
Seth Reed – first place in Superstar category, the student receiving the highest total points
Catherine Zimmer – First place in Cost Estimating
Eric Ball – Top Presidential Scholarship
Greg Galbraith and Kyle Steadman – first place in Paver Installation
Kyle Steadman – Mini-Excavator

Instructors Byron John and Reese Nelson are firm believers in the benefits of getting students and industry together in close proximity. This high team placement marks the third time in recent years that BYU-Idaho has captured the national title.

Here are a few more fun shots of the trip, and the competition.

And after all their hard work, what else did they have to do? Well, go to Disneyland and show off, of course! Congrats to the PLANET team for making 2009 another successful year at Career Days!

Rose Bowl Parade

Over the Christmas holiday, Sister Bass and three students, Christa Beaty, Tyanna Jones, and newly graduated Crystal Lyman, spent part of their vacation in sunny southern California. After doing such a great job last summer in Portland decorating a few floats for the Rose Parade, they had been invited to decorate a float for the Rose Bowl Parade on New Years Day.

This is what the float looked like when they arried. All the prep work had been done, as far as gluing seeds and such to it, but all of the floral elements had to be designed, secured, and it all had to have unity as an entire design.

A large portion of the flowers used were tropicals and roses, which created some pokey situations for those designing. Aside from occasionally cutting their thumbs with knifes, their hands and arms came in close contact with thorns and jagged leaves.

According to the Rose Parade website, the theme for the float the ladies worked on, "reflects NAMM's [The International Music Products Association] efforts to promote the fun and benefits of music making for people of all ages, especially children and young people who need music education opportunities in school . . . [the] theme builds on "Hats Off To Entertainment" with emphasis on music making and music education. NAMM actively supports and promotes the benefits and importance of music making for people of all ages; NAMM and it's partners, including Music for All Honor Band, work so that every child can have music education in their schools."

Here's the float nearing it's completion.

The float out on the road!

Tyanna, Crystal, Sister Bass, and Christa.



What an incredible float!


The float was a huge undertaking, and took three days to complete, but it was a great success winning the Presidential Award!

Plant Culture Field Trip

November 6-7th, Brother Dewey's Plant Culture class took a field trip to the Salt Lake, UT area for some hands on experience in different areas of Horticulture. On their trip, they visited eight different establishments, including: Thanksgiving Point, Meadow Brook Design, Cactus and Tropicals, Temple Square, Roots or Huddart Flower Shops, Mountain States Plants, the USU Utah House, and Willard Bay Gardens.

Starting at Thanksgiving Point, the students participated in "hands on learning," by walking through the gardens with the head gardener, Tony Latimir.

Here are the Rose Gardens.

During the tour, the landscape crew was blasting the excess water out of the sprinklers, making them look like they were still on, despite the snowfall.

The students spent some time with a former BYU-I student, Ginger Belnap, owner of Meadow Brook Design, who designed this landscape:

For the third and last stop on Thursday, the students went to the Draper location of Cactus and Tropicals.
Cactus and Tropicals began in the garage of the owner, Lorraine Miller, who retired a few years ago. Now, there are two locations, each offering different plant specialties.

At the Draper location, there is a section devoted to European Designing, which combines plants in one container, but still in separate pots.

As you see, the plants can be quite ferocious!

At Temple Square, the group was up bright and early for a dewey morning view of the gardens in downtown Salt Lake City.

At Mountain States Plants, this is a greenhouse full of poinsettias, preparing for their winter harvest.

Here is a greenhouse full of Cyclamen, also preparing for a winter bloom.

Lastly, at Willard Bay Gardens, a retail nursery specializing in herbaceous perennials and annuals, the students snacked on popcorn as the sun went down, and were given paper-white daffodil bulbs.

Tiffany Jacox, a freshman emphasizing in Floral Design, said, "It was a great trip! I got to know my classmates a lot better, and really enjoyed seeing the different aspects of Horticulutre."

All Horticulture majors are required to take Plant Culture, so an exciting field trip like this one is something to look forward to as a Hortie!