April in Sonoma County

Sundays with Sue

By SCMG Sue Lovelace
Updated: April 21, 2019

Happy Easter, Happy Passover, Happy Earth Day, Happy Weekend everyone! A time of new beginnings, it is mostly evident in our gardens. With the current warm days, perennials are waking up and seemingly growing overnight. Many gardens are full of insects eager to greet the new growth, sip the nectar from blooming flowers and start new life cycles.

Our grandchildren, who were visiting this week, enjoyed being out in the garden, nibbling on kale and fava leaves, sharing with the chickens, and painting tiny birdhouses in which we put straws in the round opening to invite Mason Bees to create nests for their eggs. Interestingly, the bees create a cell in little holes for laying a single egg, equip it with a “loaf” of pollen, then seal it up for the bee to experience its metamorphosis and expand its population. The bonus for us is the pollination gained in the process!

At Bayer Farm, we as Master Gardeners along with Jonathon Bravo, garden coordinator, and many members of the community garden and the neighborhood surrounding it, celebrated Earth Day with a Spring Garden Workshop. We had a wonderful interpreter, “U.B.,” who helped us convey information about sustainable gardening, more specifically, soil building with cover crops, dealing with weeds, details about a community seed project initiated by Sonoma County Seed Savers, planting blueberries, planting a container garden, and creating a Monarch Way Station. Because there is a demo garden on site, basics about pest management and planting in the right place at the right time was talked about and displayed. Again, grandchildren were “employed” to gather snails and take them to the chickens at the farm.

Speaking of children and gardening and new beginnings, it was wonderful to see that the School Garden Network here in Sonoma County has a new home for its incredible programs and supporting services. They are sharing spaces with the Center for Social and Environmental Stewardship in Windsor (non-profit, community based organization that provides educational and vocational training and support services that empowers youth to achieve their unique human potential, foster success, and personal achievement). School Garden Network Program Director, Sue Davis, showed us a wonderful planting area, a huge greenhouse with enormous potential for propagation, and meeting rooms for youth to gather and learn about gardening. Our schools and our youth are blessed with this steadfast dedication to broadening an awareness of sustainable garden knowledge and skills.

If you have ever been to the Sonoma County Wildlife Refuge, you have experienced an incredible program to shelter wildlife and foster youth in their care, plus care for a fully functioning garden, encouraging the confidence to carry this nurturing throughout their lives. Master gardener, Tari Trethewey, who volunteers there, treated us to a tour of the garden, greenhouse, and state of the arc garden concepts that have the promise of an enriched life for many children. Rounding out our day were trips to the wonderful gardens of Thomas Page Charter School and University Elementary School.

I hope all of you have a nice week and experience new beginnings in one way or another!

“The environment is where we all meet, where we all have a mutual interest; it is the one thing all of us have in common.”  Lady Bird Johnson

Master Gardeners in Print

The Garden Doctors
Dana Lozano &  Gwen Kilchherr, The Press Democrat

Coaxing seed to germinate, using newspaper to suppress weeds 3/1/2019

Tricks for growing great wisteria 2/15/2019

 

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