I came across an interesting 84-post thread started by coffeemom back in 2010 on the same subject. So many great folks in that post! Stirs the memories...

Calling all old timers!

Carol

There are a lot of people who no longer post, mainly because of the formatting changes. Changing once or even twice is rough, but considering how many times this place has changed I don't blame them.

I for one can't post as easily any more, but I still show up almost daily to read and keep track of certain people around here. :-) I still love this place and the people here.

Carol, I wonder and feel sad about the same thing but I understand that people change or sometimes life changes on us. I hope all the posters that we used to know and we had fun and learn from them are okay, life is too short and this gardening hobby keep us active and our hands and minds busy.:) All the posters are important and have something to share with us.

Mark is very active in facebook and once in a while we keep in touch by email, I have learned so much from him! and I never forget his garden or plants...

Hi Barbie! I missed you, please share with us your gardening adventures and I hope all is well with your garden and wonderful family!

Silvia

I miss tomncath, he was so generous with sharing seeds he tried and was very knowledgeable about Florida gardening when I was a newbie! I think he is one of those that didn't like the format changes when Gardenweb was taken over. Miss Lou's posts too.

Carol, I really enjoyed reading the 'old timer's post and miss all the knowledge from these people. There were many lively posts in the good old days of Garden Web. Spike monitored the page. If things got out of hand (which they did frequently!) they were not allowed on Garden Web and redirected to Disney, the happiest place on earth. After they promised to behave, they could once again post on Garden Web.

I have learned so much from Garden Web. I don't post very often, but just check in from time to time to see what is going on.

Linda Leaf

I stopped posting in 2004...hurricane charley blew the heck out my house and i lost the gardening bug for a long while...all my lovely trades and plants grown from cuttings blown away or trampled in the rebuild. But i have gotten the bug back and so wandered back here to see the lay of the land. Tis so much quieter than before for sure.

I am an old timer but I forgot my password and when I tried to retrieve it GW had an bad email address. I finally gave up and started over. I think I've been on since 2001.

We had a couple of swaps at Susan's although I can't remember her online name. Also, Kara and Kitkat used to post a lot.

Aww, man. I had a huge post ready, and it deleted. *sigh*

Silvia- I was saying that you are so right. If we don't each contribute some, the party as a whole fizzles.

My garden has fallen into great disrepair this past year as we were building our retirement home in Alabama. While the buildings shell was completed in June our contractor fell very ill and is terminal. We were left with a ton of issues, including a constantly flooding basement we are still trying to sort out.

I did however turn my backyard into a nursery during this time. I propagated and grew out roughly 50 plants/trees to transplant on the property up there. Now that most of them are transplanted I am back to repairing my garden.

This past weekend we began construction on a new retaining wall for my main garden bed. We also took the pavers off the sides of my raised beds. Turns out stone does not adhere well to metal. It worked for 3 years, but one by one they were falling off and looking terrible. So, I am excited to get back to gardening even though fall will probably be the first full season I will get.

This brings a new challenge in and of itself. During the year I took off the trees have dwarfed the beds, and now they mostly get full sun for less than 6 hours a day. Time to learn about veggies that do well in half shade. :-)

Barbie~

Barbie, a lot of news! I thought for a moment that you already moved, I am happy that you are still with us and gardening one way or another. Congratulations on the propagation of the plants/trees. It is good that you and hubby are doing all that work while you are both young, son must be getting handsome and older too.:)

My garden looks different these days, I am going by the motto "less is more", very busy with fruits, veggies, cooking and sharing the surplus...

I am glad that you are back with us !

Silvia

I first signed up here in 2002 so I guess I qualify as an "old timer". I still drop in from time to time to see what is going on but rarely post any more. I still think about the many people I have met here and wonder what has become of them. I hosted two swaps many years ago and especially wonder where those who attended are. {Hello Laura!} I toy with the idea of trying to contact them and throw a "reunion" swap.

I am still gardening and probably always will.

your garden is beautiful susan! Do you still have that beer bottle garden path? (Like, why would you un-do it???)

I haven't gone to a plant swap in a long time.

I haven''t even seen Lori (crueltyfree?) who lives very close by.

Hey Laura, Yes I still have the bottle path and it has proven to be quite durable. I found some pictures of the swaps I had and was amazed to find out they were 9 and 10 years ago! Time really does fly!

Unfortunately I have pretty much lost touch with just about everyone who attended but I still remember what a good time we had!

I dont remember when I joined Gardenweb but it was before houzz took it over and I had a different username then.

Anyway, I followed Gary's illness for years (without posting) and cheered with all his successes. I hope he's ok.

The people, the swaps, the wild threads, have all disappeared. Facebook has certainly replaced a lot of what happened here but I don't have any gardening friends there. I used to run a swap at least once, sometimes twice a year at our garden and we had upwards of 30 people. The last time I tried this was several years ago and I think we got around half that number. There were dozens of heavily subscribed threads running at the same time, now it's rare that any thread other than "Air plants are killing my trees" gets more than a few responses.

GardenWeb was a vibrant, powerful force. Since Houzz has taken over, it's become limp and lifeless. Very sad.

We haven't seen bamboorabbit or louinfloralcity for a long time either. Even Sylvia doesn't post as often as before. I kinda backed off when the forum ownership changed. We seemed to have a bunch of old posts being resurrected by people that didn't realize snow and frost heave don't happen down here.

Great to hear from Barbie and others here.

I have been concentrating on my garlic experiments and have been mostly having success. The area nematodes are still having their parties in my gardens. And what escapes the knot worms gets sucked dry by huge potato bug like critters. It doesn't seem to matter how much black-cow and compost I pour on my sand dune, so I have given up on most vegetables. I just ordered some heirloom southern peas to try out. Maybe??

Ricky, you were an inspiration to us for our garden parties....And I know what you are talking about that threads get hardly any response, let's hope that all change in the future and we get old posters back and also new posters that love to garden like us.

Larry!!! so good to hear from you, you are one of my most favorite gardening friends, no matter what you grow! You worked so hard at our parties! can never thank you enough.

I stopped posting like I used to because I saw not much interest or feedback from gardeners, I also tone down at the parties in my house because my doggies are getting older, they will be 20 soon.

I am very active in the garden, the harvest and the cooking. Larry, if you like butterbeans, I still have the Black Jungle ones that do very well here, let me know...

Silvia

I did go to one of ricky's swaps but darn it was a long way from tampa. I remember I took a sylvester palm ( got 4 and planted 3) my palms are now 25-30 tall. Yep, I can believe it was 10 years since Susan's swap.

the problem with swaps now is that my yard is FULL.

There were a few years when I wasn't posting but I now visit hoyas, cactus and succulents pretty often.

Thank you Silvia. I didn't plant the jungle beans last year, so my saved beans are probably 2 years old. I will be getting them in the ground soon, so I'll let you know if I need fresher seed. I am getting White Whippoorwill Cowpea,Ozark Razorback Cowpea, and Guatemalan Black, Lima from Baker Seed in a few days. The Ozarks should do well here since Arkansas is rife with nematodes, too. I have been discovering Thai and Indian cooking lately. I put in a Curry tree, Greater Galanga.

Larry, bean seeds if kept with the right conditions last a very long time. In my experience lima beans do very well and don't seem to be bother by the nematodes, on the other hand yard long beans are a different story. One season I planted the pink purple hull cowpeas but the family did not like them too much so I did not grow them again. It is good that you are trying different cuisines, you know me and the cookbooks, I have a lot of Indian and Thai cooking books but I have to admit I prefer Vietnamese cooking. I lived in India for a while when I was very young, good memories! When Tomcath was active in the forum, we planted some gourds, the vines were beautiful and I made some dishes too but the smell of the leaves I did not like it. Someone gave me a curry tree and it grew very fast. I also planted Lemongrass and it grows like a weed. Currently I am only growing turmeric and love it! Use in food, medicinal, small plant and pretty! no smell,lol.

Larry, good luck with your plantings and cooking!

Silvia

small plant and pretty!

Yes, it's lovely when it blooms. I have a friend who lives not far from you in Windermere and he grows big pots of it on his front porch just as an ornamental.

Thank you all for this thread. I only found this place a couple of years ago, right after houzz took over. I saw how rapidly this forum shrunk, but it's really nice being able to hear a bit about each of you and those that don't visit so much any more. I learned (and still learn) so much here, even from the old posts.

Writersblock, today I went to Windermere to the blueberry u pick farm, they have the best blueberries, especially this year, they were loaded! In the morning I went to pick strawberries and in the afternoon the blueberries, I am sure tired now! but with a lot of fruit in the house.

Oldmangroot, my amaryllis are blooming now and I hope that yours are blooming too.

After this thread, I went to see the past garden parties pictures and that reminded me a lot of gardening friends, some are no longer with us, others have different interests. The pictures are good to catch a happy moment that otherwise would be lost in time....

Silvia

Silvia, I understand about the doggies since I have 3 rescues and a show princess of my own. I didn't realize they had aged so much. Time races ever faster the older we get.

I'm an old-timer here in Jax. I only make it back to GW about once a year. It is all I can do to keep up with my gardens as my youngest plays soccer in Orlando four nights per week! I will get back to it full time in about 2 years! Carol did we meet up for a swap several years back? I know a few of us met up, saw each others gardens and then went for Pizza. Don't remember who it was. That's when my boys were very little. The youngest was probably three. He's 16 now! That's how long ago it was!

I'm an old timer too. Started right in the beginning, don't remember the year. I was a New Yorker then and saw an article in the NY Times about a new website called Garden Web. Spike was in charge (Yikes, did he give me a few tours of Disney).

Topics were hot back then. Lots of posters. Lots of arguments. Being a New Yorker, I was a orchid grower, organic gardener, many outdoor garden beds both flower and vegetables.

I miss Gary so much. He always posted on Orchids. I often wonder about him and how he is doing. There were so many people who disappeared on Orchids and Organic Gardening.

Having moved to Florida 5 years ago, I discovered the Florida Gardening site and enjoy trying to learn the ins and outs of hot weather, buggy gardening while maintaining my organic style. Tricky!

I miss the old posters. So many are gone. I made wonderful friends and met many people through Garden Web.

I do see the membership declining and the activity on many of their sites almost absent. Its a shame. There is so much to be learned from gardeners in the area you live. Can't get that from a book!

Jane

About six months ago I spent some time trying to sleuth around Google via some old emails I had from folks, finding out where some old timers went. I was active here 2004ish-2010---I was going to mention Ricky/fawnridge and I'm glad to see he posted. I also remembered coffeemom and a several others but for the most part it was difficult to find anyone via Google.

When I moved back to Texas and hiked the AT, gardening went by the wayside for a few years and by the time I came back here (and tried to get involved in the Texas group, which was sloooowww) things had changed and everyone I knew on here was gone.

If you are on Instagram, that has a pretty active gardening community. I'm @oceanicwilderness over there if you are on Instagram.

I have some good swap photos on Flickr, too. Let me see if I can link to it, maybe people will recognize someone.

Swap 2006 Photo 1

Swap 2006 Photo 2

Swap 2006 Photo 3

I feel like I should have more, maybe from a coffeemom swap. I'll dig around and see.