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A Gardening Blog for the East Side

The climate of the Eastern Sierra is very different from most of California and so gardening here is different, too! 

Preparing the contents of the pile.

In this blog we examine some of the quirks of gardening on the East Side, and cover horticultural issues that are important locally. Note that if you're visiting our site from the outside our little corner of California, you may find this information may not apply to your area.

Articles are written by local UC Master Gardener volunteers or the local Farm Advisor. 

 
And a website...

The Inyo-Mono Master Gardeners also have a website with local gardening and soil information. Visit it to learn more about our program and gardening.

 

A sprinkler spraying a driveway with water.
Article

Check Your Sprinklers

April 3rd, 2018
By Dustin W Blakey
As I was driving my kids to school recently, I noticed that a landscape on the way was irrigating its dormant turf. It had rained the night before. That seemed really unnecessary. Later that day I saw another landscape (with green grass) had a head spraying out into the street.
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Baptisia australis, False Indigo
Article

Baptisia, A Historically Valuable Plant.

March 23rd, 2018
A question from a Horticulture Quiz 101 might be, What was the first subsidized agricultural crop in the United States? Possible answers of corn, tobacco, cotton and hemp might be given, none of which is correct.
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Purple and Rose Potatoes
Article

Potato Possibilities

February 9th, 2018
Ed. Note: Potatoes grow well in the Eastern Sierra. Usually we grow them in the ground, but some gardeners have alkaline soil or no soil at all! Gardeners like to try new things and this article has some fun ideas to try. You can find some UC info on potatoes here.
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Red tomatoes, one slide. Photo credit R. Caldwell.
Article

Just Two Things Money Can't Buy

January 8th, 2018
It's that time of year again, when seed catalogs show up in the mailbox and the evening activity becomes sitting by the fire dreaming and planning next year's garden. It is the next best thing to actually working in the garden. Anyway, there are always a multitude of pages devoted to tomatoes.
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