Garden Center

Lowe's home improvement plans to open a new store at 1400 Taylor Ave. in Parkville in the fiscal fourth quarter of next year. The store will have 94,000 square feet of retail sales space and a 26,600-square-foot garden center. It will create up to 120 new jobs and generate a $12 million investment in the community, Lowe's said. Lowe's has 25 stores in Maryland that employ 3,800 people. - Andrea K. Walker

Commerce Corp., a Maryland-based distributor of lawn and garden supplies, said Thursday it is laying off some employees as it seeks to find a buyer or develop a new format. CEO Richard Lessans said the privately held company is still trying to determine how many of its 280 employees nationwide will be laid off. Commerce is based in Curtis Bay and has facilities in Grand Rapids, Mich., and Ontario, Calif. Some sales staff were told they were laid off. "The business is not closing," Lessans said.

Robert W. Wentz, former owner of a Pasadena garden center, died of emphysema Sunday at a hospice in Fort Myers, Fla. The Bonita Springs, Fla., resident was 62. Mr. Wentz was born in Baltimore and raised in Ten Hills. He was a 1960 graduate of McDonogh School and attended the University of Maryland, College Park. He had been vice president of Tri-State Vehicle Leasing for a decade before opening Wentz Garden Center and Florist Shop in Pasadena. He closed the business in 1992 and moved to Bonita Springs.

Santa knows that I really look forward to receiving unusual gardening tools as Christmas gifts. Every year, though, it's becoming more difficult for Santa to find ones that I don't already have. By the way, even though I enjoy getting tools as gifts, my wife would probably show Santa the door, if he dared to gave her a tool or an appliance as a present. Except my wife isn't a gardener, and gardeners are different. In fact, I know several men and women who would jump for joy if they got gardening tools or gardening appliances as Christmas presents, especially ones that save time, money and muscles.

Metzler's Garden Center and Christmas Shop will have a grand opening celebration from 8: 30 a.m. to 7: 30 p.m. Friday, Saturday and Sunday in its newly renovated quarters in Winfield.The family-owned and operated garden center includes 10,000 square feet of greenhouses, a full-service florist and a 3,000-square-foot Christmas shop.The Metzler family, John and Dotty and children Hans Metzler and Katrina Bellofatto, have owned a center in Howard County for the past 30 years. The center is on the site of the former Rolling Hills Farm and Garden Center at 935 W. Liberty Road.

Thomas Randolph Bender Sr., a longtime Severna Park resident who owned a nursery, died July 14 of cancer at Sunrise Assisted Living Center in Severna Park. He was 86. Born and raised in Cumberland, Mr. Bender earned a bachelor's degree in horticulture from the University of Maryland. He opened Bender Nursery in 1962 and ran the Severna Park garden center for 25 years. Azaleas were among his favorite plants. Mr. Bender served in the Army from 1940 to 1945 in the coastal artillery unit at Fort Monroe in Newport News, Va. The unit was responsible for protecting Hampton Roads and its naval base from possible attack by enemy submarines during World War II. Mr. Bender was an active member of St. John the Evangelist Roman Catholic Church in Severna Park, where he was a pastoral home visitor and an usher.

After a decade of providing the supplies that helped Severna Park residents landscape yards and grow their gardens, Wentz Garden Center and Florist Shop is closing its doors.For now, anyway.Owner Bob Wentz said last week he plans to close the shop Dec. 26 or 27. He has found several potential buyers who probably would continue running a nursery at the site on Ritchie Highway, he said.But if they don't come through by March, he said he would reopen as a limited, seasonal gardening center.Mr.

Robert Cross Watson Sr., a familiar face at his family's garden center in Lutherville, died Friday at the Heartland Home in Towson, a year after heart surgery. He was 73 and lived in Lutherville. In 1955, two of his three brothers founded Watson's Garden Center in a two-car garage with a dirt floor and a pot-bellied stove on Chesapeake Avenue in Towson. In 1961, they built and opened the store at 1620 York Road, and Mr. Watson joined the business. "He was our personality, of the three brothers, " said his brother, James S. Watson of Towson, chairman of the board of the company.

Carroll Gardens a quaint and slightly ragged cinder-block garden center at the end of a dirt road in Westminster, is closing at the end of this month after having been a resource for gardeners since the 1930s. Alan Summers, who has owned Carroll Gardens since 1984 and hosted a garden talk show on WCBM-AM for nearly as long, announced his decision Saturday on the show, stunning customers and disappointing longtime employees who had hoped against hope for a reprieve. Though Carroll Gardens is having a very good season, last summer was the worst in memory and the debt has finally overwhelmed Summers, he said.

Commerce Corp., a Maryland-based distributor of lawn and garden supplies, said Thursday it is laying off some employees as it seeks to find a buyer or develop a new format. CEO Richard Lessans said the privately held company is still trying to determine how many of its 280 employees nationwide will be laid off. Commerce is based in Curtis Bay and has facilities in Grand Rapids, Mich., and Ontario, Calif. Some sales staff were told they were laid off. "The business is not closing," Lessans said.

As I've said before, I'm an "Accidental Hamptonite. " I belong more in the "land of genteel decay," as a colleague once described Roland Park, than in a summer playground of the rich and sometimes-famous. That said, I have just returned from my 10th summer visit to Long Island, N.Y. Again I visited close college friends and their families. One has a house in East Hampton; the other is in Sagaponack, near the site of the Hampton Classic, where she and her daughter ride each year.

Beating a peppy tempo on snare and bass drums, wearing white tights, boots, glitter and pompoms, the marching team strutted up the winding road under full morning sun, heading for a big Saturday event at … Cylburn Arboretum? Cylburn Arboretum, pastoral enclave of garden clubs, bird lovers and genteel ladies in large hats — that Cylburn Arboretum? Yes, that one. The "Dream Nation" marching unit was invited from the Cylburn community across Greenspring Avenue because it was the arboretum's grand opening after an 18-month hiatus and a new day at the preserve.

Seeds or seedlings? Those eager to join the vegetable gardening revolution this season have a decision to make. Are you going to grow your vegetables from seed? Or will you purchase seedlings from your local garden center or a farmers' market? If you are going to grow your own seedlings, it is just about time to get started. The advantages include savings, pride and choice. You can grow exactly what you want, in the numbers you want and you don't have to count on somebody else's idea of variety.

Financial regulation bill would strip Fed of some powers WASHINGTON - The chairman of the Senate Banking Committee unveiled Tuesday his version of legislation to overhaul the nation's financial regulations, which sharply differs from the Obama administration's plan by proposing the creation of a single federal banking regulatory agency and stripping significant power from the Federal Reserve. The 1,136-page proposal by Sen. Christopher Dodd, D-Conn., is likely to be strongly opposed by the Fed and the three other bank regulatory agencies.

Lowe's home improvement plans to open a new store at 1400 Taylor Ave. in Parkville in the fiscal fourth quarter of next year. The store will have 94,000 square feet of retail sales space and a 26,600-square-foot garden center. It will create up to 120 new jobs and generate a $12 million investment in the community, Lowe's said. Lowe's has 25 stores in Maryland that employ 3,800 people. - Andrea K. Walker

A former employee of Homestead Gardens went on trial Wednesday, accused of stealing thousands of dollars from the high-end Davidsonville garden center over several years in a complicated scheme involving gift cards. Virginia Lee Christian, 46, of Davidsonville, helped with the 2005 switch from paper to plastic gift cards and then used the new system to siphon off funds, Assistant State's Attorney Michel Cogan told an Anne Arundel County jury in his opening statement. Internal audits in 2007 showed discrepancies between amounts that an electronic payment company was recording in plastic gift card use and sums in the garden center's purchases, he said.

A former employee of Homestead Gardens went on trial Wednesday, accused of stealing thousands of dollars from the high-end Davidsonville garden center over several years in a complicated scheme involving gift cards. Virginia Lee Christian, 46, of Davidsonville, helped with the 2005 switch from paper to plastic gift cards and then used the new system to siphon off funds, Assistant State's Attorney Michel Cogan told an Anne Arundel County jury in his opening statement. Internal audits in 2007 showed discrepancies between amounts that an electronic payment company was recording in plastic gift card use and sums in the garden center's purchases, he said.

For years, we relegated gardens to the back yard or to discretely planted aprons around the house. But lately, gardeners -- hungry for beauty and eager to embellish any bit of earth available -- have begun to create curbside gardens. "People want to see some color when they pull in," says Kelly Williams, manager of Kingsdene Nurseries and Garden Center in Monkton. Many also want to make a personal statement. "They want their house to stand out," Williams added. Curbside gardens can enhance the strip between curb and sidewalk, the napkin of ground around the mailbox, or even the dirt around street trees, which can host a gorgeous collection of tough shade-lovers like hosta and coral bells (Heuchera)

Not every garden project is a raging success. If you have been a gardener for more than 10 minutes, you know that. The ladybug project is one of those not-a-raging-success stories. The cool and rainy spring brought with it plenty of garden pests, including the aphids that were chewing on my roses and the white flies that were attacking my herbs. At the suggestion of one of my colleagues, I decided to try the ladybug cure. Her husband had great success releasing ladybugs in his garden.