Extending the Clematis Season

Leaside Garden Society – Speaker Series presents:

Speaker: Dugald Cameron

Topic: Extending the Clematis Season

Date: Thursday May 9th, 2024

Time & Place: 7pm In-Person at Leaside Library (165 McRae) – Guests Welcome

I’m a gardener, re-greener, scientist and plant lover. Although I’ll try growing almost

anything for fun my core interest is using gardens, parks, and other public spaces to re-

green the ecology of where we live. I’m the author of “How to Make a Pollinator

Garden”, and practice what I preach, having helped create many pollinator gardens in

front yards, city parks, and roadsides.

I have a particular interest in what it takes to make grassroots re-greening initiatives

successful. I was on the Advisory Board of the City of Toronto’s Pollinator Protection

program, and I do workshops with groups wanting to create green oases in their

neighbourhoods.

I study insects – their behaviour, their genetics, and the “big-data” area called

genomics. Among the insects, bees are a special focus.

I’ve been a member of the Canadian Association of Professional Apiculturists (honeybee

professionals) and I received the Canadian Pollinator Advocate award for 2011 from the

North American Pollinator Protection Campaign. I’m an adjunct professor at York

University and VP of the Horticultural Societies of Parkdale & Toronto. I helped found

the Parkdale society in 1987 and Project Swallowtail in 201

Dugald Cameron has been a frequent speaker for LGS over the years.  He will be putting an emphasis on ways to extend the clematis season both by suggesting ones that bloom for longer periods of time as well as ones that you could plant that would compliment each other by  including spring, summer and fall blooming times so that you have colour  throughout the season.

About Dugald Cameron

My gardening career began at an early age in my English Grandmother’s garden where I’d occasionally help out with weeding & digging. I must have “caught the bug” then, because I’ve been interested in plants and gardens ever since. My wife Lynn Pashleigh, Father and I started Gardenimport, a mail order nursery in 1983 because we couldn’t find the quality or selection of plants we wanted for our gardens. Offering a top quality selection of the latest seeds, flower bulbs and plants to Canadian gardeners from a catalogue and website. After 32 years of business Gardenimport was closed in 2014.

Dugald was on the board of directors at The Toronto Botanical Garden for 13 years and continues to volunteer there, teaching and writing for the Trellis magazine. He speaks on many subjects to Horticultural Societies in Southern Ontario and has sat in for Ed Lawrence on CBC’s Ontario Today and recently filled in for Paul Zammit on Later the Same Day. He was the founding president of the Greater Toronto Bulb Society and is a member of numerous horticultural societies. His diverse gardening interests include spring & summer flowering bulbs, shrubs, perennials and clematis.