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Thyme to Garden: Autumn Issue

Author: Rhonda King-Curry

Published on: October 1, 2023

Crocus Sativus

By Karen Seroff

Saffron Crocus showing the stigma that is the saffron spice and the stamen

When most gardeners hear the name ‘crocus', they think of charming little bright purple and yellow flowers coming up through patches of snow heralding springtime. But there is another famous crocus that instead blooms in the fall, and is unique in that it is harvested for its stigmas.

Crocus sativus, also known as Saffron Crocus, was first introduced to Spain by the Moors of North Africa. It has influenced the cuisines of many countries worldwide, and has the reputation of being the most expensive spice in the world. This is due to the small yield of the plant and the intensive labor of harvesting the three long red stigmas of the plant—otherwise known as saffron. Each plant usually produces between 2-4 flowers, and approximately 150 flowers are needed to provide 1 gram of the dried spice.

The lovely purple flowers bloom for approximately two weeks in the fall and must be harvested quickly. The three stigmas per flower must be carefully removed with tweezers, air-dried, and then stored in a tightly sealed vial or bottle until they are used.

Interestingly enough, Saffron Crocus can grow well in many different climates, and it is not difficult to cultivate here in Santa Clara Valley. This perennial loves full sun to partial shade and does best in well-drained, loamy soil. It prefers moderate to low watering and is frost-tolerant. Corms should be planted 2-4 inches deep and spaced 4 inches apart.

The corms (similar to bulbs) are best planted in the fall, with leaves appearing in early spring, and then dying back during the summer. New leaves will appear as the weather gets cooler in September and October, and the new blooms will soon follow. Every three or four years, the Saffron Crocus corms can be divided to prevent overcrowding. Division should be done in the summer months during the dormant period.

Gophers, squirrels, and mice will eat the corms if they have access to them. Planting them in raised beds with hardware cloth or in pots may help. Another issue that can arise is fungal disease. This can happen if blooming occurs during a rainy period. Root rot can also be a problem if the soil is overwatered or has poor drainage.

There is another fall-blooming crocus-like flower that is similar in appearance to Crocus sativus. It is commonly called meadow saffron or autumn crocus, and is in the genus Colchicum. It is important not to confuse this with Crocus sativus, as Colchicum flowers are toxic. You can tell them apart by looking at the stamens. Colchicum have six stamens, while the Saffron Crocus has only three.

Growing Crocus sativus can be a fun and rewarding new gardening experience. There are many different recipes that include saffron, and it can be exciting to experiment with new spices and cuisines. Corms can be purchased at many nurseries, as well as through online companies. And someday, you may be able to share your extra corms with your fellow gardeners!

More information:

Photo via UCCE Santa Clara County Master Gardeners

Attracting Hummingbirds - Nature's Aerial Acrobats

By Catherine Wire Roberts

hummingbird in flight feeding at a flower

The whir of tiny wings is an unmistakable and welcome sound to a gardener, announcing the presence of an efficient pollinator and fantastic flier. These tiny birds are nature's best acrobats - besides hovering, they can fly in reverse, sideways and upside down! Not only are they fun to watch, they are expert pollinators, covering more territory than insects can in the same amount of time.

We are fortunate that several species of hummingbird make their home in Santa Clara County, or come through our area during their migration. In fact, Mount Umunhum, which towers over Santa Clara Valley, was named after this little bird by one of the area's indigenous tribes – “Umunhum” is Ohlone for “Resting place of the hummingbird.” [1]

Depending on migratory patterns, six species of hummingbirds, either reside in, or migrate through, California [2]:

Allen's Hummingbird (Selasphorus sasin) - breeds in coastal areas from Southern California to Oregon, a close relative of the Rufous Hummingbird and similar in appearance.
Anna's Hummingbird (Calypte anna) - the largest hummingbird in California, a year-round resident, able to sing.
Black-chinned Hummingbird (Archilochus alexandri) - breed in the U.S. during summer and travel to Western Mexico for winter. Prefer habitats close to water.
Calliope Hummingbird (Selasphorus calliope) - smallest breeding bird in North America - the weight of a penny! Spends summers in mountain habitats from Southern California to Oregon.
Costa's Hummingbird (Calypte costae) - can be found in California's deserts and along the coast. Has a distinctive voice.
Rufous Hummingbird (Selasphorus rufus) - travels from summer in Alaska to winter in Mexico - one of longest known migratory flights. Populations are in decline.

A Hospitable Habitat

Some hummingbird species are threatened by climate change and human stressors on critical habitat. These include limited availability of nectar-producing plants impacted by temperature changes; loss of forested areas (critical to the life cycle of more than 80% hummingbirds) from invasive plant species or human actions like timber harvesting. Additional threats include wildfire, groundwater pumping, insect or disease outbreaks, and pesticide use.[3] You can help counter these and enjoy the antics of these special birds by providing a welcoming habitat.

Here are a few ways to make your space hummingbird-friendly:

Offer flowering plants: Colorful, tubular flowers are favorites, and it's true hummingbirds are attracted to red. Bees, who are red/green colorblind, will pass up the red flowers, leaving more nectar available for hummingbirds to enjoy uncontested. You can find pictures and inspiration in the UC Davis Arboretum's Hummingbird Plant List. Three plants recommended by the California Native Plant Society[4] to plant for winter blooms are:

Franciscan manzanita (A. franciscana) - a 1' tall mounding groundcover with pink and white flowers
Chaparral currant (Ribes malvaceum) - a small fragrant shrub with pale pink hanging flowers.
Fuchsia-flowered gooseberry (Ribes speciosum) - a large, easy-to-shrub with abundant hanging red flowers.

Avoid pesticides: With such a tiny body, even ingesting a minor amount of pesticide could be fatal. Additionally, hummingbirds do not live solely on nectar. Entomologist Doug Tallamy of the University of Delaware says that "hummingbirds like and need nectar, but 80 percent of their diet is insects and spiders." [5] If those are diminished by pesticides, the hummingbirds will lack a sustainable food source.

Provide clean water: These tiny treasures enjoy a bath! If you have a water feature, make sure it stays clean to minimize the spread of disease.

A word about feeders: liquid feeders can attract hummingbirds to your garden and can be conveniently placed to capture the acrobatic action. If you choose to have a feeder, make sure you clean it regularly, so harmful bacteria does not accumulate, and keep it free from ants and bees. Also consider that if they are consuming the nectar freely at the feeder, they are not pollinating other plants in your garden.

Attracting hummingbirds is a matter of providing the right environment with plenty of nectar to power their flight. With a little extra care and savvy plant choices, you can enjoy these special birds by providing a resting place in your own outdoor space.

Sources:

More information:

Succulent Topped Pumpkins

by Rhonda King-Curry

Step 1: Select a pumpkin (colors, textures and sizes can vary but pumpkins with a flat top will provide more area to work with). Rinse and dry the pumpkin. Does it have a stem? it's not 100% necessary but a stem is helpful to apply hot glue to it so that items stand up and give some height to the creation. In the end, you might not even notice the stem because it will be covered in succulents and other dry material.

Step 2: Gather materials

Tacky glue
Dry moss
Hot glue gun
Garden clippers
Wooden chopstick (to keep your fingers away from the hot glue)
Succulent cuttings (consider different textures, colors, heights, sizes and shapes). Be wary of succulents with farnia on them (it's a natural coating that acts like sunscreen for the succulent). Touching the farnia will cause it to rub off and it won't look so great to have fingerprints on your succulents.
Dried material (examples include small pine cones, dried seed pods, poppy pods, dried grasses such as wheat or barley, acorns, magnolia seed pods, black walnut seed halves, clusters of dried berries, dried Jacaranda pods -- anything that won't come apart as it dries further.

Step 3: Apply the tacky glue to the top of the pumpkin, spreading it out about 2/3 of the way to the edges.

Step 4: Add the moss and press down gently to adhere. You don't need to wait very long for it to dry. I usually just get right to the next steps and let it dry as I'm working.

Step 5: Select Thrillers, Fillers & Spillers. Thrillers will be larger, spectacular succulents, using 1 - 3 depending on the pumpkin size. Spillers are materials that will dangle over the edge and spill down. Fillers are not as spectacular as thrillers but will add some color or texture to the arrangement.

Apply hot glue to the succulent stem (and/or pumpkin stem) then apply pressure using the chopstick until it stays where you want it. Repeat with more succulents and dried material, turning the pumpkin as you go to keep your arrangement filled out on all sides.
Be sure to remove the lower leaves from succulents so that you have at least an inch of stem to apply hot glue. You save the leftover leaves or stems. They will eventually continue to grow. Place them on top of soil and keep them moist by spritzing them with water to keep them from drying out. Leaves will shrivel up and give energy to make a new tiny succulent.

Tips: If you see a big gap that you don't know what to do with, select a succulent with a rosette shape to fill the gap easily with its wide flower shape.

Start with longer stems, but snip to shorten them as needed.

Your succulent-topped pumpkin will last for months (longer if you give enough indirect light so that the rosette shapes don't elongate to reach for the sun). Spritz with water each week to keep the moss a bit moist and for root development. After the holiday season succulents can be replanted or you can cut off the top of the pumpkin and plant that.

Seed Saving: Harvest and Storage

By Hillie Salo

The first consideration when harvesting seeds is the practice of selecting seeds from the most vigorous and healthy plants that have fruits with traits that are desired. Next is determining seed maturity. Mature seeds have the highest germination rates. In order to ensure that the seeds reach greatest maturity, they need to be left on the plant to ripen for as long as possible.

Seed harvest can be divided into wet seeds and dry seeds. Wet seeds include tomatoes, capsicums, chillies, and eggplants (aka as the Solanaceae plant family) and melons, squashes, and cucumbers (the Cucurbitaceae family).

For wet-seeded crops, the most mature seeds will be found in fruits that are over-ripe and just past the edible stage. Cut open the fruit, remove the seeds, then wash and dry. Tomatoes and cucumbers can benefit from a ferment for a few days.

There are some signs to look for in dry seeds that indicate they may be ready for harvest. Most seeds will exhibit some change of color, usually from light to dark. They may easily release from the plant or rattle when shaken. Noticing how dry the pod or seed feels may help determine if the seeds are ready to harvest. Seed pods can be harvested individually as they mature or wait until 60-80% of your seeds are ripe to make a whole crop harvest.

Many flowers can be easy to collect seeds from including alliums, nigella, poppies, cosmos, calendula, zinnias, cleome, sunflowers, honesty and foxgloves,

Seeds need to be extremely dry before storing. Some considerations when drying include making sure that there is plenty of air circulation and temperatures do not exceed 95°F (35°C). It is not recommended to dry seeds in direct sunlight.

There are a couple of tests to help determine dryness in seeds. For thin seeds such as melon seeds, bend the seed. If the seed snaps then the seeds are dry enough for long-term storage. If instead the seed bends, it will need more drying.

For larger seeds, such as bean seeds, take a hammer to the seed. If the seed shatters, it is ready for storage. If it should smash or mush, continue drying until able to pass the hammer test. Another easy test is to bite the seed. If a tooth mark is visible, it still needs more time to dry.

When seeds are dry enough, they need to be separated from the non-seed material, known as chaff. Threshing is the method that separates the seeds from the plant. This is done by some mechanical means, such as beating with a flail.

Before seeds can be stored, they need to be as clean as possible. Non-seed material can lead to mold and rot. Cleaning seeds can be done by winnowing and screening. Winnowing is a process that uses weight to separate seeds from the chaff. The lighter chaff is blown away separating it from the heavier seeds as they fall.

Screening uses size to separate seeds from the chaff. With two screens together, one a little larger than the seed and the other a little smaller, most of the chaff can be filtered out.

Once your seeds are clean and dried, they are ready for long-term storage. The rule for seed storage is cool, dark, and dry. A closet can be a fine place for storage for many years for most seeds. For longer storage, a refrigerator or freezer can add even more time for any special seeds.

Seeds should be stored in airtight containers such as Mason jars. Make sure to label your seeds. The more information the better, but at a minimum: name and date. Consider leaving a label inside with the seeds as added insurance in case the first label is lost.

To check for viability in your seeds, a simple germination test can be useful. On a damp paper towel, lay out 10 Seeds. Roll up the paper towel and place it in a plastic bag. Leave a small opening for the seed to breathe.

Check your seeds after 3 days, continue checking for the next 10 days. Most seeds sprout between 7-10 days. Divide the number of sprouted seeds by the total number of seeds started and multiply by 100. This will give you the germination percentage. If your percentage is less that 70%, adding additional seeds when you plant may increase the number of plants that may germinate in your garden.

Happy Seed Saving and don't forget to check the UCCE Santa Clara Master Gardener Saving Seed Basics page for more information.

More information: Seed Saving Basics

The Tale Of Two Dwarf Alberta Spruce Christmas Trees in Santa Clara County
by Jeffrey Jenks

Dwarf Alberta spruce tree exhibiting reversion

Planted over 30 years ago, this mature dwarf Alberta spruce (Picea glauca var. albertiana 'Conica') in Cupertino has reverted and is now growing like a normal white spruce. This phenomenon is called "genetic reversion."

How did this happen? Originally, buds or cuttings from an Alberta spruce plant were grafted onto a spruce rootstock and remained true to form. This is how many cultivars, such as Alberta spruce, originate. However, just as the original genetic mutation occurred to produce the cultivar, occasionally a reverse mutation occurs and portions of the plant “revert” back to the species' normal growth.

A blog post from the UC Master Gardener Program of Napa County describes this same reversion with a confirming photo.

What should have been done when the reversion occurred? Examine the tree to determine where the reversion originated and prune the branch back to that point. Often, reverted shoots grow more vigorously than the rest of the tree. Unfortunately, this dwarf Alberta spruce was left with multiple un-pruned, reversions that now dominate the tree.

This has created a difficult decision that may result in removing the tree completely since it has outgrown its place in the landscape, pruning out the normal white spruce branches leaving “holes” in the conical shape, or pruning the outgrowths to be flush retaining the conical shape. It's best to “nip it in the bud” when a reversion first appears.

dwarf alberta spruce flintshire front yard (1)

Transplanted from a nursery in about 2020, this dwarf Alberta spruce Christmas tree in the same yard in Cupertino is dead. How did this happen when the same species of tree grew to maturity in the backyard as shown above? One explanation is that dwarf Alberta Spruce is only hardy in USDA zones 3 – 8. Cupertino is in USDA zone 9b.

What can be learned from these stories about two dwarf Alberta spruce Christmas trees?

If you want to take the dwarf Alberta spruce Christmas tree that you bought at the nursery and transplant it in your landscape and have it be hardy, check to be sure you are in USDA zones 3-8.
If you do plant a dwarf Alberta spruce Christmas tree and you want it to retain its conical shape and avoid reversion, then at the first sign of a branch emerging that is below the graft union prune the branch back to the point of the reversion.
Finally from the Holiday Ideas section of the UC Master Gardeners of Santa Clara County, consider renting a tree from Our City Forest as it's on its way to a permanent home in the community.

Fall Fruits

by Amanda Crooks

Fall is here, which means it's time to start harvesting fall tree fruits. If you have any apple, pear, pomegranate, persimmon or nut trees in your yard, you may be closely monitoring the fruit to harvest it at the right time. Read below for some fall fruit harvesting tips.

Some general fruit harvesting and storage tips include:

Use your senses to determine when the fruit is ripe enough to pick. Look at the color, feel it, and pay attention to the size.
Harvest when the fruit is cool (ideally in the early morning) and keep the harvested fruit cool to promote fruit quality and shelf life.
Twist and lift the fruit up to remove it from the tree; don't pull straight down on it.
Handle harvested fruit carefully to avoid bruising or puncturing the skin.
If needed, let the fruit ripen in a cool, dry place inside. Then store in a refrigerator or other cool storage to maintain freshness.
Fruit on the same tree may ripen at different rates, so you may need to harvest at different times.

Apples

Apples can either be left to ripen on the tree, or you can pick them before maturity and let them ripen after harvest. But don't leave them too long, as apples left on the tree tend to drop off the tree and can also become mealy. After harvesting your apple crop, fertilize the tree and remove any fallen fruit to control for codling moths. After leaves fall, remove and discard or compost them to prevent the spread of apple scab.

Two pears ready to pick, and one left too long on the tree (photo credit: Amanda Crooks)

Pears

Unlike apples, pears must be picked before they're ripe. Do not let them ripen on the tree. Follow similar horticultural practices with pears as you would an apple tree post-harvest.

Two persimmons starting to change color. (photo credit: Amanda Crooks)

Persimmons

Persimmons should also be harvested before they fully ripen. Harvest after the skin has turned orange, but before they begin to soften. Make sure to use some shears or snippers to cut the persimmon off the tree; don't twist and pull them off like pears and apples.

Pomegranates

Look for shiny, red, leathery skin and large firm fruit before harvesting pomegranates. Like persimmons, pomegranates should also be clipped off the tree using shears rather than pulled off. Wear thick gloves and protective clothing to avoid getting poked by thorns. Pomegranates are highly susceptible to damage, so handle them carefully.

Nuts

Depending on the nut tree you have, look for changes in size, color, or cracks or changes in the hulls before harvesting. Most nuts will drop easily off the tree when they're ready to harvest. You'll want to cure some nuts, such as hazelnuts or walnuts, before consuming.

Sources:

Focus Area Tags: Agriculture, Environment, Food, Yard & Garden

Thyme to Garden: Summer Issue

Published on: July 1, 2023

Welcome to Thyme to Garden, the new blog from the UC Master Gardener Program of Santa Clara County.

We look forward to offering you content that is thought-provoking, informative, and helpful in your gardening adventures. We hope we can provide you with some of those “I learned something new” moments and that you'll look forward to each seasonal issue of Thyme to Garden! Subscribe to receive our quarterly blog in your inbox!

Pollinators Need Our Help

By Rhonda King-Curry

You've probably read that pollinator populations are declining worldwide. Pollinators are important. They are responsible for 1 of every 3 bites of food we eat. Mounting evidence shows that home gardens can make a big difference in helping pollinators. How can you help? In addition to skipping the pesticides, pollinators need three things: food, shelter, and water.

Food: Grow flowers of different sizes, heights, shapes, and colors that are planted in clusters (3'x'3 drifts) that offer different blooms almost year-round. Growing different kinds of flowers will ensure there's something for everyone. Pollinators will be busy from late winter through the end of autumn foraging at flowers, so having a variety of flower types will ensure different pollinators have something just right for them.

Tiny native bees need tiny flowers—let some of your herbs make their tiny flowers. Umbel-shaped (umbrella-like) and flat flowers allow landing pads for butterflies and medium-sized bees. Tubular-shaped flowers are good for hovering pollinators like hummingbirds or larger bees that grasp onto the petals of flowers to hang on. Don't worry about focusing on planting only red tubular flowers for hummingbirds. They'll forage at all flower colors. With red flowers, they have less competition from bees because bees only see ultraviolet light. Bees can't see red, so they generally leave red flowers to the hummers, and are instead attracted to colors such as white, blue, and yellow.

Why grow flowers that bloom in late winter? Some native bees, such as bumblebee queens, emerge from their nests early. They'll fly in rainy cold weather while honeybees stay in their hives. After hibernating all winter, bumblebee queens are hungry, so Manzanitas, Ceanothus, and other early bloomers are quite the welcome sight.

In California, we have about 1,600 different species of native bees. Most are solitary, meaning they don't live in large hives or cooperate with organized divisions of labor like the non-native honeybee. Native bees, without a colony or hive to protect, are not aggressive and rarely sting people. They come in all sizes and most are generalist feeders, so they'll forage at all flowers. But some native bees are specialists, so they'll only be interested in particular flowers or flower families. Having a variety of flowers for bees to choose from will ensure something for everyone.

Shelter: Most native bees are cavity-nesters (either in hollow stems above ground or in tunnels underground). When deadheading plants with hollow stems, leave some taller stalks for the native bees. Also, don't cover your entire yard with deep layers of mulch. Many native bees need bare soil to make nests. Leave some unmulched soil, perhaps behind taller shrubs, for nesting sites.

Water: A shallow dish of muddy water will help pollinators stay hydrated. Why muddy? Because butterflies engage in a behavior called ‘puddling' where they suck up nutrients necessary for reproduction that nectar can't provide. Bees find water by smell, so if the water is too clean, they might miss it. Bees can't swim, so add some wine corks, large pebbles, or marbles to the shallow dish so they have somewhere to land.

Summer Seed Saving

by Hillie Salo

As we transition from spring to summer, consider letting your plants go to seed. You can then harvest your seeds for future plantings.

The easiest crops to save seed from are of those that self-pollinate, such as lettuce, peas, beans, and tomatoes. Self-pollinating plants reduce concerns of cross-pollination and will produce seeds true to type; that is, future fruit just like the parent. Hybrid seeds will not breed true.

As the weather warms, lettuce will become noticeably bitter to taste. Soon the plant will start to bolt. Bolting is the process where a stem shoots up and a seed head forms. At first, yellow daisy-like flowers will appear, which then turn white and fluffy. Under the fluff, you will find seeds. The seed heads do not ripen uniformly and can be harvested individually as they ripen. If this is too tedious, you can wait until about 50% of the seed heads are fluffy, then cut the stalk. Place the stalk and seed heads into a paper bag until totally dry and most of the seed heads have ripened.

Though peas can be grown in spring and fall, they are best saved as we go into the warm season. The heat of summer will reduce issues with powdery mildew. Peas and beans are best left on the vine for as long as possible to dry. When they dry and rattle in their pods, they can be harvested individually or you can pull the whole vine. Then, let the pods continue to dry for another week or two. When the beans are totally dry, put them into the freezer for a few days to kill weevils.

Tomatoes are best harvested at just past peak ripeness. Squeeze or scoop out the seeds into a jar and leave for a few days to ferment. This will let the seed gel surrounding the seed dissolve, which allows for easier germination and will rid the seed of some seed-borne diseases.

Useful seed saving resources:

UCCE Master Gardeners of Santa Clara County seed saving basics

Seed Savers Exchange

Seed Alliance: A Seed Saving Guide for Gardeners and Farmers

Mornings At Martial Cottle School Field Trips

by Pamela White

Master Gardeners host native bee and pollinator field trips at Martial Cottle Park. The half-day morning field trip is offered to school groups, homeschoolers, and scout groups throughout Santa Clara County. Children rotate through four teaching stations spread across our 4-acre garden. The trip includes introductory lessons about native and non-native bees and ways of observing bees. The curriculum is based on life science standards for elementary grades, and the different learning styles of students are considered using a multi-modality approach. The closure lesson uses riddles to review what was learned and songs to review key concepts. There's even a bee waggle dance!

At the honeybee station, students create a hive with manipulatives (these are physical tools of teaching which engage students visually and physically with objects such as coins, blocks, puzzles, etc), learn what different types of honeybees do, and what jobs they have throughout their lifetime.

At the walk and talk station, students observe and learn about the Yellow-Faced Bumblebee, the Valley Carpenter Bee, and the Ultra-Green Sweat Bee. They tour the gardens, learn how to protect habitats for bees, learn about social and solitary bees, ground and cavity nesters, and different ways bees collect nectar and pollen.

At the bee anatomy station, students learn about bee anatomy and create a model of one of the native bees. They also sing a song about bee anatomy parts to reinforce learning.

At the pollination station, they learn what pollination is, the different ways plants are pollinated, and how bees navigate to locate, collect, and transfer pollen. The children make seed balls to use later to start their own small pollinator patch.

Interested in learning more about our school field trips?

'Mornings at Martial Cottle Park: Lessons In The Garden' are provided each spring and fall. These field trips are offered to students throughout Santa Clara County. Lessons are about plant life cycles, nutrition (why we eat all colors of vegetables and fruits and that we eat all parts of a plant), pests and beneficial insects in the garden, and insect anatomy. Lessons are based on life science standards taught in the elementary grades. Master gardeners and community volunteers provide these hands-on lessons.

Make a reservation request for a field trip and get more info on the UCCE Master Gardeners of Santa Clara County website.

The Fountain of Youth: Look No Further Than Your School Garden

by Lisa Fraboni

Since 1493, when Ponce de Leon, a Spanish explorer, attempted to reach the island of Bimini (now Puerto Rico) in search of the Fountain of Youth, mankind has sought the mythical spring in which youth is restored to anyone who drinks or bathes in its waters.

Research has shown that youthfulness can be maintained and even restored with proper exercise, time spent outdoors, and a quality diet rich in fresh fruits and vegetables. Today, most Americans, including children, spend most of their time indoors. Today's children devote an average of seven minutes a day to unstructured outdoor playtime. An August 2022 article, from The American Academy of Pediatrics states, “The prevalence of childhood obesity in the United States is high, and obesity in early life is linked with long-term poor physical and mental health.”

School gardens have been found to be an effective way to promote lifelong healthy eating habits and connect students to the natural world. Gardening provides educators with opportunities to enhance student education through practical, reality-based learning. Benefits of school garden programs include:

Academic Achievement: The goal of every school is to excel in academia. The school garden is the perfect environment for hands-on learning, observation, and experimentation in all core curriculum subjects. Children can use scientific methods through plant-related experiments to measure plant growth, or observe the effect of sunlight on the quality of fruit, or analyze the quality of soil and water on food production.

Environmental Enlightenment: School gardens bring desperately needed green space to urban landscapes. Children can rest, heal, and meditate while experiencing the natural environment. These opportunities often lead to better mental health.

Healthy Lifestyle: California school-age children are increasingly overweight and unfit. They do not exercise regularly, nor do they eat the recommended daily servings of fruit and vegetables. These behaviors are directly related to increases in diabetes and heart disease. One in three school-age kids is considered overweight. Gardens are not only academic learning environments, but they also offer a place for children to learn where their food comes from. Children that are exposed to the process of growing and caring for their food show an increased interest in trying new foods which leads to a higher consumption of fruits and vegetables.

Regardless of socioeconomic standing, school gardens introduce children to diverse and varied food. Lastly, maintaining a garden requires students to dig, plant, and weed their beds, a great way to get quality outdoor exercise.

Social Skills: Maintaining a school garden introduces students to life-long social skills: responsibility, teamwork, ownership, and leadership. A school garden program also fosters a sense of community, bringing students, parents, teachers, administration, and community members together for a common purpose.

Sensory Enrichment: Gardens are the perfect place to create a sensory environment. Students can touch fuzzy Lamb's Ears, taste Chocolate Mint, hear the rustle of Broom Corn in the breeze, or see the vibrant colors of a Carnival Zinnia. Time in gardens has been directly linked to alleviating ADHD symptoms in children.

The Fountain of Youth is not a mythical spring but a way of thinking and living. School gardens bring the natural environment into the classroom and the students into the garden. Maybe we were looking for the Garden of Eden all along.

If you would like more information on the Master Garden School Advisory Program, please go to the site and complete a request form. Master Gardeners can answer school garden questions and if needed, come to your site and provide a garden consultation.

Six Plant Palettes to Quench Your Thirst

by Monique Frappier

Not so different from creating a habitat for native garden pollinators, the Garden-to-Glass Demonstration Garden holds a collection of nourishing plants to help sustain people. Focused on representing home gardeners with small spaces, as is the case for many county residents, and being alert to the need to conserve water, the idea emerged to showcase a compendium of edible plants to be used for crafting refreshing drinks.

The Master Gardeners of Santa Clara County carried on with the fun theme at the intersection of two realms where conservation meets the end game of creative concoctions. The Garden-to-Glass Demonstration Garden at Martial Cottle Park was established in 2020 to encourage home gardeners of all ages to ‘Drink What You Grow' through an evolving display of six raised garden beds, each one featuring its own potable plant palette.

The Lots of Lemon palette is made up of plants with a taste and fresh scent of lemon to grow in a raised bed if one is short on space for a lemon tree. One of these plants is Lemon thyme, an herb for a Lemon thyme Prosecco! Lemon Verbena (Aloysia citrodora), Lemon balm (Melissa officinalis), and Lemon grass (Cymbopogon citratus) aptly fit in this plant assemblage to eventually also get snipped and sipped.

A Refresh & Rehydrate palette includes plants to use as ingredients to flavor water – think agua fresca or spa water. To craft cool season smoothies, we grow kale, parsley, beets, fennel, and celery amongst the pollinator-friendly perennials; such as French Tarragon (Artemisia dracunculus), Mexican Mint Marigold (Tagetes lucida), and Anis Hyssop (Agastache foeniculum). All three re-sprout in the spring to supply us with licorice-like leaves that expand our repertoire of sweet-flavored drinks from around the world. And, from the tip of your tongue, the famous ‘La Vie en Rose' song rolls out when you sip on a Spritz made from the easy to grow Rose-scented Geranium (Pelargonium capitatum, ‘Attar of Roses'). This is another must-have plant in any palette and a great indoor plant as well.

The Mint & More garden bed holds a palette of plants from the mint family, including basils (Ocimum spp.), bee balm (Monarda spp.), and shiso (Perilla fructescens). These offer up a mint-like flavor to any drink without worrying about them invading your garden like true mints. While Shiso is oftentimes grown as an ornamental in border gardens, packing a punch of chartreuse or maroon against a dark green backdrop, it is however ‘shisolicious'! Imagine basil, cinnamon, and mint all rolled into one as Shiso juice; it pairs wonderfully well with cucumbers.

Our Soothing Sips palette is a mix of some popular plant choices to infuse, like culinary Lavender (Lavandula angustifolia ‘Munstead') and calming German and Roman Chamomiles (Matricaria recutita and Chamaemelum nobile). Additionally, the not-so-well-known North American native plant of Yaupon Holly (Ilex vomitoria), the only North American source of caffeine, is a plant we included in dwarf form. It's doing wonderfully. We are eager to start roasting some leaves to brew some tea.

We also have one bed to showcase a Flower Power palette, where one can find examples of blooms to be used to flavor, color, and let's not forget garnish your drinks. Be mesmerized by, for example, the evocative fragrance of Violas (Viola odorata), the elegance of purple-star-shaped borage (Borago officinalis), or the tasty red tartness of karkade tea made from hibiscus (Hibiscus sabdariffa) sepals.

And finally, one raised bed holds the Close to Home palette, inspired by low-water, native plants that grow in similar climates to ours. Native strawberries (Fragaria vesca) and olive herb (Santolina rosmarinifolia) are some of the plants that have found a home here only to make their way to either a shrub or a bitter for a twist on the classic Negroni. We must mention Yerba Buena (Clinoposium douglassii), an overlooked low-water, ground cover that thrives in partial shade. The best thing about this mighty yet delicate plant is its leaves; which can be dried to steep a tea with hints of spearmint and bubble gum.

Even though the number of plants to include in the Garden-to-Glass Demonstration Garden is innumerable, we have doubled down on promoting water conservation, polyculture, and high-density planting in small spaces – all ways to improve plant health and yield. And, let's not forget that quenching your thirst with the plants you grow connects us, together, with nature. Cheers!

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Happy Gardening!

Focus Area Tags: Environment, Yard & Garden

New Three Sisters Garden Video

Published on: June 25, 2020

We are proud to introduce a new video, 3 Sisters Garden, now available on our YouTube channel. Over a year and a half in the making, the video was made possible through the hard work of the 3 Sisters Garden crew and the inspired production of our video team. Enjoy watching squash, beans, and corn, growing together in perfect harmony!

Tags: In the News (75), vegetables (6)

Bay Area gardens thrive with beneficial insects, like lacewings

Published on: December 26, 2019

Lacewings are among the most beneficial garden insects. Here, you can see their eggs suspended at the end of threadlike stalks. (Courtesy Liz Calhoon)

The natural world is truly incredible. Thousands of good and bad bug varieties inhabit our yards, landscapes, and gardens. If we don't interfere too much, don't use harmful chemicals, and make a point of planting appropriate plants that encourage beneficial insects, they will create a balance that keeps our local ecosystem thriving.

Take lacewings. This tiny, but mighty beneficial insect is one of the best things that can happen to anyone's backyard or garden.

Lacewings are part of the Chrysopidae family. They're beautiful creatures with translucent, lime-green wings, golden eyes, and green bodies. They fly at dusk or during the night and are drawn to light, which makes them easy to see. They lay tiny, oblong eggs that are attached by silken stalks to a plant's tissue, and their metamorphosis is remarkable. During the larval stage, they look like tiny, pale alligators with dark brown markings.

Lacewings are fierce predators and use their prominent mandibles to attack their prey. Thankfully for us, they're not picky eaters: Their diet consists of aphids, mealybugs, mites, whiteflies, and even small caterpillars and leafhoppers.

Studying beneficial insects, pests we need to deal with (in an eco-friendly way) and a vast array of diseases, fungi, and microorganisms is what being a Master Gardener is all about. Over the past 12 years, I have learned so much and gotten to interact with thousands of first-time gardeners and seasoned pros throughout the Bay Area. I've been thrilled to show people how to grow their own food, practice sustainable gardening methods, care for trees, interact with nature, and become happier, healthier human beings. That's what all Master Gardeners do — and we are here for you year-round.

It has been a complete honor to write this column for you. This is the last edition, but you'll find Master Gardeners in every community eager to help and answer questions at any time of year. Look for us at workshops, library talks and community events, online, and at the other end of your phone line. You can reach the Santa Clara County Master Gardener Help Desk at 408-282-3105 from 9:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. on weekdays. And you'll find links to Help Desks and email contacts for every other California county at Find a UC Master Gardener Program.

As we enter a new year, I have one resolution to share: Please grow more food than you can eat and share it with your neighbors – I believe we are growing community one plant at a time.

By UC Master Gardener Rebecca Jepsen

This article first appeared in the December 17, 2019 issue of the San Jose Mercury News.

Tags: Beneficial Insects (4), In the News (75), San Jose Mercury News (39)

Love ’em or hate ’em, snakes are good for your garden

Published on: September 15, 2019

A Pacific gopher snake (Master Gardener Hank Morales)

Some 45 of my Master Gardener friends and I recently went on a field trip to Berkeley's UC Botanical Garden and Alice Water's Edible Schoolyard. And, yes, we were just as excited and enthusiastic as a bunch of school kids.

Of course, we were wowed by all the incredible plants from around the world that we got to see, but we were especially excited about the snakes!

I know you may not want to adopt a pet snake — although many people do — but they are extremely beneficial to have slithering around your garden and landscape. Snakes prey on mice, rats, moles, voles, lizards, frogs, slugs, and even other snakes.

More than 30 species of snakes make the Bay Area home. Of those, only rattlesnakes are venomous to humans.

The Pacific gopher snake is the most common snake in Northern California and is often mistaken for a rattler. It is generally brown or tan with dark gray, black or brown spots along the length of its body. Adults are 4 to 5 feet long.

This snake is diurnal, meaning it hunts during the day and sleeps at night. It is found in woodlands, grasslands, chaparral, agricultural and riparian areas from sea level to the mountain ranges. If threatened it will flatten out its body and shake its tail. Although it has no rattle, the movement against dry grass can mimic the sound of a rattlesnake.

The Northern Pacific rattlesnake can range in color from olive to brown to black. It has dark brown and tan blotches along its body and medium to dark bars at the tail. Adults are typically 3 to 4 feet long.

Usual habitats include seaside dunes, rocky hillsides, woodlands, grasslands, and sometimes residential landscapes. You will often find them on hiking trails or bike paths, soaking up the sun.

A rattlesnake has a triangular head and a relatively thin neck. The body is thick, dull and non-glossy. A gopher snake's head is more pointy and just a bit bigger than its neck. It has a slender, glossy body and a pointed tail.

King snakes are extremely common throughout California. They are either black or dark brown with light striped bands circling their bodies. Adults are generally 3 to 4 feet long.

They can be found in nearly all habitats — forests, woodlands, grasslands, wetlands, and even the desert. They have been known to eat rattlesnakes as they are immune to the venom.

The Northern Rubber Boa is usually a fairly solid shade of brown, tan, pink or olive green. It has small, smooth scales and looks, well, very much like rubber. It only grows to about 2 feet in length.

Although Boas are very common, they are generally nocturnal so you may not see them. They are often found in meadows, grasslands, chaparral, and deciduous and coniferous forests.

Pacific Ring-necked snakes are beautiful small, thin, smooth-scaled snakes. They are black, gray or dark olive green with vivid orange rings around their necks. The underside is bright yellow or orange with black specks. They only grow to about 3 feet long and will coil their tails (showing off their bright colors) when threatened.

They like moist habitats such as wet meadows, gardens, farmland or forests. They eat insects, worms, lizards, salamanders, and tadpoles.

Other common snakes you may find while out hiking, biking or even hanging out in your backyard are Night snakes, Striped Racers, Sharp-tailed snakes, and many others.

You may not learn to love your snakes, but please learn to appreciate and respect them. They really are quite good at taking care of the rodents that are wrecking your lawn and eating your tomatoes!

By UC Master Gardener Rebecca Jepsen

This article first appeared in the June 16, 2019 issue of the San Jose Mercury News.

Tags: Garden (20), In the News (75), San Jose Mercury News (39), snakes (1)

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