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Helping People Help Themselves

Master Gardeners are community members who have been trained under the direction of the University of California Cooperative Extension. Each volunteer has completed more than 50 hours of formal classroom training. Master Gardeners, agents of the University of California, assist the UC Cooperative Extension by providing practical, scientific gardening information to the home gardeners in the Lake Tahoe Basin.

The Lake Tahoe Master Gardeners extend research-based information by:

  • offering workshops and classes
  • answering questions via email hotlines, farmers markets and at community events
  • publishing articles in newsletters, local newspapers and social media.

 

     
Bug Blog
  • A monarch butterfly gliding over a Mexican sunflower, Tithonia rotundifola on Sept. 17 in a Vacaville garden. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
    Wings Up! Let's Go!

    Wings up! Let's go! The monarch fall migration is underway. "Unlike most other insects in temperate climates, monarch butterflies cannot survive a long cold winter. Instead, they spend the winter in roosting spots," explains Monarch Watch....


    By Kathy Keatley Garvey
    Author - Communications specialist
  • A female monarch nectaring on Mexican sunflower, Tithonia rotunifola, in a Vacaville garden at noon, Sept. 17, 2024. At left is a territorial male longhorned bee, probably Melissodes agilis. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
    A Monarch Kind of Day

    What we've been waiting for all season... A migratory monarch butterfly fluttered into our Vacaville garden at noon today (Tuesday, Sept. 17) and nectared on a Mexican sunflower, Tithonia rotundifola. Then she treated us to a...


    By Kathy Keatley Garvey
    Author - Communications specialist
  • Spotted-wing drosophila (SWD), Drosophila suzuki, on a raspberry. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
    Tiny Bug, Big Trouble, Great Science

    You may have never seen this tiny bug that's causing big trouble. But agriculturists and scientists have. The spotted-wing drosophila (SWD), Drosophila suzukii, is an agricultural pest that is super tiny. It's approximately 2 to 4...


    By Kathy Keatley Garvey
    Author - Communications specialist
  • A black syrphid fly, a Mexican cactus fly, Copestylum mexicanum, foraging on a Mexican sunflower, Tithonia rotundifolia, in a Vacaville garden. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
    It's Friday Fly Day: How About a Mexican Cactus Fly?

    It's Friday Fly Day, when folks post images of flies.  Flies seem to the entomological equivalent of Rodney Dangerfield's "I-don't-get-no-respect" quote. So how about a black syrphid fly, a Mexican cactus...


    By Kathy Keatley Garvey
    Author - Communications specialist
  • A female praying mantis, Mantis religiosa, pops up between the petals of a Mexican sunflower, Tithonia rotundifola. Surprise! (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
    Jackie-in-the-Box

    In your childhood, somebody probably gave you a jack-in-the-box toy, a music box that you crank up, and then the lid springs opens and out pops a wildly dressed clown, startling you and everyone around you. A praying mantis sighting is something...


    By Kathy Keatley Garvey
    Author - Communications specialist