Casting a long, floral shadow

CHENEY – For over 35 years, Delmer and Jeanie Fitzner have bestowed the gift of flowers to people passing by their home at the intersection of Betz and Granite Lake roads.

Free of charge. No conditions — just be sure to stop by Jeanie’s wagon early because the flowers get snatched up quickly.

That practice is likely coming to an end as the couple who celebrate their 63rd wedding anniversary next week are moving to a new home on Medifor Road near the Medical Lake-Four Lakes Road on Aug. 28. Delmer and Jeanie are swapping houses with a relative, leaving the home they built over 50 years ago for smaller digs.

And while the new place is equipped with gardening beds, Jeanie said she isn’t sure she’ll continue what she began years ago out of necessity. The Fitzners planted a vegetable garden to help provide food for their young family, and as that family grew to four children, the garden grew accordingly.

And as the kids grew up and left home, the garden changed.

“As they were leaving here, I started having more space to experiment,” Jeanie said.

At her daughter Sue Hines’ wedding, Jeanie prepared arrangements of gladiolas, and received many comments about how beautiful they were. That gave her some ideas, she said.

She began planting more gladiolas, along with other flowers such as dahlias. Soon, the house at Betz and Granite was booming with color as Jeanie, with Delmer as always doing a lot of the heavy duty work, began planting a bit more each year than before.

“I couldn’t do it without him, he’s my hard worker,” she said of Delmer. “Pretty soon we had too many to give to friends and family.”

Jeanie hated to see the flowers go to waste — and that’s when she had the idea to set up a little cart alongside Betz Road with a “Free flowers” sign. Not sure how this would go, she was pleasantly surprised when the flowers began disappearing quickly off the cart.

Each year the Fitzners would plant flowers and put them out — usually between 7 – 7:30 a.m. — more often for people to enjoy and take home. This year, the most Jeanie said they put out was seven dozen.

There have been challenges. One year the floral garden was hit by thrip — which according to Webster is “a minute black winged insect that sucks plant sap and can be a serious pest of ornamental and food plants when present in large numbers.”

Jeanie said the aphid-like insects materialized in the flower bulbs and ruined the batch. Eventually, they used insect powder to rid the flowers of the pests.

A better method was provided by a neighbor, who said the trick to keeping garden pests away was to soak the bulbs in one tablespoon of Lysol per gallon of water for about three hours.

“That seems to work the best,” she said. “And you cross your fingers every year.”

The couple’s knack for growing beautiful flowers has inspired others as well, including their daughter Sue Hines. In a November 2018 Cheney Free Press story, Hines said her mom’s flower garden was a big part of her launching a florists career, one she continues to this day on the West Plains.

Jeanie said she’s enjoyed the years of raising flowers and being able to brighten someone’s day by giving them away. And while she’s learned a few secrets along the way, the best secret to successfully growing anything in a garden is something her grandmother told her years ago.

“The best thing you could put on your garden is your shadow,” Jeanie said.

John McCallum can be reached at [email protected].