HIGHLANDS
NORTH CAROLINA
The Mountain Garden Club
has been serving Highlands, NC since 1979.
Our Annual Plant Sale Fundraiser
We sing, we dance, we pot-o-lot!
Each year, our dedicated members dig and pot hundreds of mountain-hardy plants for the club's major fundraiser,
an annual plant sale, held on the Saturday of Memorial Day weekend at Highlands' baseball field.
This popular event generates money to fund college scholarships and vocational scholarships - the majority of which are awarded to Highlands High School graduates - conservation, and educational projects.
Currently we have five students that we are partially funding for all four years of their college education!
What We Do
The Mountain Garden Club tends several community gardens, including the Eckerd Living Center at the Highlands-Cashiers Hospital, Highlands Elementary School, and Highlands' Historic Old Jail. Locally, we are best known as the dancing ladies in the annual Highlands' Christmas Parade!
Highlands' Historic Old Jail
The Mountain Garden Club added a new garden surrounding the
Old Highlands Jail on Maple Street in dedication to Wiley Sloan,
who passed away in March 2020, for his dedication to helping the
community. Locals love our resident jailbird J.B. He comes out to
enjoy the holidays and special events!
Eckerd Living Center
Each week during the growing seasons, the Mountain Garden Club
lovingly cares for the gardens for the residents at the Eckerd Living
Center to enjoy. These beautiful blooms put a smile on the faces
of the ELC workers and residents. They love to watch the flowers grow
and to come outside to greet our gardeners. We maintain several
gardens with new plantings, weeding, potting, dead-heading, watering,
and all the TLC that goes into growing spectacular Dahlias and plants.
Jill Hargis runs the weekly captains and design of the garden, and the
gardens have never looked so beautiful! Ann Maxwell is our Dahlia guru,
and her blooms are second to none.
Highlands Elementary School
Ross Gronfield and Sara Noah have been working
hard to renovate the Butterfly/Pollinator Garden at
Highlands Elementary School. It has taken a lot of
work to clean out the old plant material. Ross has
put in new edging and created a pathway. Fall-
flowering plants have been added, Spring flowering
plants to come! Check out the Gallery for more
progress photos.
All About Pruning. October's Speaker: MGC Member Oliver Young
Our own Oliver Young gave a fabulous educational lecture on Pruning. He covered a lot of ground including seasonal maintenance, tricky Hydrangea pruning, timing of pruning, techniques, equipment, and so much more.
He also showed us some great resources from the NC State Extension. These educational links have been added to our website under a new tab called "Resources".
Oliver has decades of professional gardening and pruning experience. We are so fortunate to have him as a member of our garden club.
Thank you Oliver, for a wonderful presentation.
MGC Rocked the Jailhouse
for the 'Seasons of Highlands' 2023 Dahlia Festival
We are so pleased that our fun seasonal display will continue to bring enjoyment to the local Episcopal and Presbyterian pre-school children! Special thanks to Ginny Dunwoody, for everything!
2023 Dahlia Festival
Barbara Corcoran, Ginny Dunwoody, Donna Rymer, Wanda Cooper
2022 Highlands Christmas Parade
