theHword.com

Holiday decorating of the home and deck with wreaths, evergreen garlands and arrangements made from native materials has its advantages.  Not only will it show your creativity, or save on the budget, but it can help you plan next year’s additions to your landscape.  Our area has an impressive variety of natural material available to give that added touch to the holidays.  Materials can be gathered from the wild,  picked from a neighbors’ yard (with permission from the property owner of course), or cut from your own landscape.

One of the joys of being a Master Gardener in Adams County is the contact with resources of the University of Nebraska.  Not only does one give new knowledge, but it also increases awareness of the plant material around us that can be used for decorating during the holidays.

I like to collect a variety of evergreen branches this time of the year, taking advantage of the different textures and various shades of green.  It’s not hard to gather and bunch the branches, fasten the bases together with wire and you have a fan shaped door swag or deck roping material.  By fastenening branches along a wire, one can make roping for use for many indoor or outdoor holiday decorations.  If one places the longer needle branches such as those from white pine, Austrian or Scotch pine as the base or back branches, the addition of shorter needle evergreens laid on top gives a three dimensional, soft look.  Shorter needled evergreens such as blue spruce, junipers, red cedar, concolor fir, douglas fir and Japanese yew add shades of green color.  Several of the evergreens have beautiful cones that can be worked into the arrangements with a short wire attached to the cone.  I would probably take the hot melt glue gun and fasten cones where I want them.

Holly branches are a wonderful way to add color to decorations.  I don’t see too many holly plants with berries in the city.   I hope most of us are aware that it takes both a male and a female plant to get the berries.  Possibly your neighbor has holly and would share a sprig or two with you.  If you like this combination of interesting leaves and berries, now may be the time to begin making a list of things to plant in the spring.  A holly variety called “Blue Princess” and “Blue Prince” are recommended for our community.  Plant two or three “Princess” to one “Prince”, to assure berries in the fall.  Holly needs to be kept wet after being cut for decorating  to keep the berries fresh and firm, so I often use holly in table arrangements where it is placed in a wet foam block.

Another source of color for holiday decorating are interesting barks of shrubs and trees.  My redbark dogwood, which is green in the summer, turns red when the temperatures chill in the fall..  Cutting of branches can be done as needed without harming the shrub.    I use the branches of the pussy willow to give me height in winter arrangements.  The new buds may not be fuzzy at this time of the year, but they give one a feeling of hope and new life when worked into an arrangement.   Another berry shrub still holding on to its’ berries would be the pyracantha shrub.  The pyracantha  berries are orange-red, but look so colorful among boughs and arrangements. This is also a great time evaluate whether I need to thin or cut back the bush before next year’s growing season.  If I don’t have a plant, add “redbark dogwood” or white or pink “pussy willow”, possible pyracantha “kasan” to the list of shrubs to add next year.

Several of the birch trees have interesting bark that peels off about this time of the year.  Peeled bark from river birch and white paper birch tree trunk look like wallpaper and can be used as ornaments or a nativity scene.  A word of caution when peeling bark from trees, especially birch trees.  NEVER  use a knife or cut into the green growing layer just under the bark of any tree.  Birch trees are known as “bleeders”, which occurs when trees rapidly draw sap from the roots through the trunk and branches to open the buds in the spring.  Injury to the birch tree trunk or branches results in excessive sap release at the point of injury.

Have a very berry Christmas from natural material.  A trip to the native pastures or diches of the county will give you a plethora of plant material, be it grasses or native forbs. Milkweed pods, wild rose hips, etc. will docorate your home..  Your creativity can be the talk of the neighbors. Your use of native material will be as unique as your creativity.  You can revitilize your backyard be adding plants and shrubs that will meet your decorating needs for years to come. So, why not, DECORATE NATURALLY!!

About the author: Don Siffring

Don Siffring is a 6 year Master Gardener with the University of Nebraska Extension in Adams County. He is a professor emeritus with the University of NE, Institute of Agriculture. Don works part-time as a Horticulture Aide with UNL Extension in Adams County. Don and his wife, Bev, retired to the Hastings Community in in 2003 to be closer to their married daughter and husband, Christi and Brian Berns of Bladen.