Ah, the bounty of late summer! At the time of this writing, the beds at Our Garden are bursting with produce: tomatoes of all shapes and colors, cucumbers, eggplants, and those irrepressible zucchinis that somehow either manage to hide until they are yule log size or else spring to that size overnig...

Blue sky, warm temps (but not TOO warm), no wind: a perfect day for a UC Master Gardener Ask A Master Gardener booth in San Ramon! As you may know, Dougherty Station is a brand new market. It opened in May 2022.

A garden is certainly about plants, but its so much more. A garden is creativity, beauty, sanctuary, community and unique. Having had the pleasure of touring our many community gardens and urban farms this past year, one thing stands out.

The Growing Gardeners project was first adapted for CoCoMG in 2018 by Darlene DeRose based on a UCCE-Los Angeles County program. Monika Witte assumed the lead role just in time for the Pandemic to change everything.

Dear UC Master Gardener, My mango plant seems to have stopped growing. I have several of these plants which I have sprouted from a seed. Does it require fertilizer to continue to grow? The plants are several months old. Thanks.

The summer has been good to us at Our Garden. Heat waves have been short followed by reasonably mild temperaturesa relief to the garden and the gardeners. Our twice-weekly harvests have yielded over 11,000 pounds of produce for our friends at the Monument Crisis Center, and were not done yet.

Rivertown Demonstration Garden has been planning and re-grouping, and planning some more, as the garden has been reoccupied over the last year, following little to no activity during the pandemic.

I had just finished tying down the last zip-tie on the new Water Conservation Garden signdesigned by UC Master Gardener/Designer, Fletcher Oakes (2019)anchoring it tightly to the gardens fence, when a car stopped behind me and a young woman jumped out.

I recently had the pleasure of participating in a teacher exploration seminar at Jack London Elementary in Antioch. We gathered in a classroom and divided the teachers into three groups. Each group was given a brown paper bag full of items to remove, examine and share.

Clients question: I'm growing milkweed in hopes of creating a habitat for monarch butterflies. Every day every plant is infested with oleander aphids. I pick them off but I'm wondering if there's anything else I can do that would not require such careful attention. Thanks so much for your help.