BROOKINGS – One of the six featured gardens in the Brookings Area Master Gardeners’ annual Summer Garden Tour remains a bright spot in Brookings more than a decade after the death of the man who put so much of his life into it.

Myron Enevoldsen was a specialist in horticulture at South Dakota State University. He was diagnosed with a brain tumor in November 2005 and died in August 2009. 

“I’m doing this in honor of my husband,” explained Bernadine Enevoldsen, as she showed off how the garden has been kept up and made ready for this year’s tour, set for Saturday throughout Brookings. (Like so many summer 2020 events, the tour fell victim to COVID-19.) They had moved into the house in 1999.

“He loved plants and he loved planting. After he retired, he worked in his yard six months of the year: half a day, every day.

“Right now we’re just trying to keep everything alive. I’ve already lost some things that I’ve had to replace. We’re watering and we’re watering and we’re watering. We should have been watering twice a day last week when we weren’t.”

By way of background and history, Enevoldsen explained that the house was originally owned by Pat and Dale Larson: “They did the original landscaping and then my husband kept enhancing it and enhancing it and enhancing it. So he created this legacy that I now need to take care of.

“In 2005, he had 28 pots of flowers in this yard; I now have 14. I just couldn’t do that anymore.” 

As his condition progressed over the years and he could no longer do the work, Myron helped Bernadine by supervising. In 2009 the grounds got a bit neglected, because she was spending a lot of time with her husband at the United Retirement Center nursing home.

25 hours a week in upkeep

Enevoldsen is not a master gardener herself and admits that the grounds are now kept up by a variety of people, professionals and students she has hired for the maintenance. She estimates that for the past few weeks it has taken about 25 hours a week to keep the garden show-time ready: “There’s a lot of yard back there.”

“I tell my daughter Victoria that I live in an assisted living facility and I’m the only resident,” she said, smiling. “I have somebody who comes in and does the mowing. I have somebody that comes in and does the major trimming and puts the mulch on and does that kind of thing.

“A couple of years ago my housekeepers started helping me plant. They do the garden planting out there. They planted vegetables but never flowers. They do a lot.

“Right now I have three different teenagers that are doing the weeding. There’s a lot of rock here. The weeds grow up in the rocks.”

“I could never do this by myself,” Enevoldsen admits. She does, however, select all the plants.

“We’re watering a lot this year; we over-seeded. You know, things happen in a yard,” she explained. And sometimes that’s not good. Enter “creeping charlie.” (Latin name: “Glechoma hederacea) Wikepedia calls it “an aggressive invasive weed of woodlands and lawns in some parts of North America. … The plant’s extensive root system makes it difficult to eradicate by hand-pulling.”

“I don’t know where I got it, but we had to kill that off. It’s brutal.”

Mission is education

In addition to Enevoldsen’s garden on 16th Avenue, featured spots on this year’s tour include: McCrory Gardens; the SDSU Research Gardens; some garden plots at the Douglas Chittick Community Gardens on the I-29 bypass; and two more gardens in Brookings.

“It’s not just people that have great gardens, but they’re willing to share and educate,” explained Cathy Frederickson, a co-chair for this year’s tour and a four-year master gardener.

“We just try to make it interesting. The tour itself starts at McCrory Gardens. Pick up your wristband. That gives people access to that garden, of course: and showing how those plants can be used in the home landscape.”

“I’ll go up to McCrory and look at their plants and use that as a measure for myself,” she added. “Our whole mission is education. How can plants be used in the home landscape? Not just to beautify, but to encourage pollinators. How do we incorporate food into our landscape so it looks nice and is functional as well?”

Tickets cost $10 in advance and $12 on the day of the event.

Frederickson noted that monies made from this year’s tour will go to the general fund of the sponsoring Brookings Area Master Gardeners and be used for “a whole different kind of things.”

She also explained that South Dakota State University “is the parent for the Master Gardeners. We are an extension of the Extension. That’s the way I look at it. They teach us and then we take that knowledge and share it. It’s like an extra arm for them.”

Gaining that title of Master Gardener takes some extensive dedication and hard work that culminates in multiple hours of service to the community.

For additional information about this year’s Summer Garden Tour, from 10 a.m.-2 p.m. Saturday, June 26, and tickets, email Frederickson at dfredcfred@gmail.com or call 1-605-321-1220.

Contact John Kubal at jkubal@brookingsregister.com.