At their Annual Appreciation Dinner in early October, the Board of Directors for the Conejo Valley Botanic Garden (CVBG) honored Master Gardener, Bill Dobner as their Volunteer of the Year for 2009.
Every year the Board of Directors honors one of their volunteers for their involvement in the garden.
Dobner was in the Master Gardener Class of 2006 and started volunteering at CVBG in the same year. His primary area of interest at the Garden is composting, a program that he started in 2006. Otherwise Dobner works throughout the Garden and this year he directed four Master Gardener Trainees who recently completed a renovation project in the CVBG Salvia Garden. He has also been a featured speaker in recent years at two of the annual CVBG Matilija Poppy Festivals.
Dobner gives 4 to 6 presentations a year on Composting as a participant on the Master Gardener Speakers Bureau. He has spoken about the benefits of composting to a wide variety of groups and organizations ranging from elementary school students to senior citizens.
For 2010, Dobner is working with the other Master Gardeners on the development and installation of a Drought Tolerant Demonstration Garden at CVBG featuring 100 California All-Star Plants. The purpose of the project is to acquaint home gardeners with drought tolerant plants with hope that they will incorporate them in their landscape.
Dobner holds a bachelor and masters degrees from Gonzaga University in Spokane, Washington. Raised in Montana, Dobner is retired from careers in education as a teacher and administrator (16 years), and ending after 25 years in property management.
In addition to gardening and the Master Gardener Program, Dobner’s other interest in retirement is Thousand Oaks Senior Softball Program where he plays 3 days a week and also served a term as the League President. Dobner noted that many of his fellow softball players bring him their gardening questions, but that he doesn’t hesitate to refer them to the M.G. Help Line.
Conejo Valley Botanic Garden News
How Your Garden Fits the Conservation Big Picture: Watershed, Wildlife and Weed Management.
This second event in the theme of Water, Living with Less and Loving It will take place November 17 in Ventura at the City Hall at 1:30 PM.
Mr. Casey Burns will speak and then conduct a tour of the water wise demonstration garden a few blocks away called the Pepper Tree Corner Demonstration Garden.
Mr. Burns is a biologist with the National Resource Conservation Service in Somis. He has a Masters in Conservation Biology from the University of Missouri, St. Louis.
He will discuss Ventura County Watersheds and the problems which affect them. He will then discuss gardening methods which minimize adverse impact on the watershed including use of native plants for landscaping, rainwater capture, and vegetative swales. Our Master Gardener training supports the use of these methods.
To illustrate the talk we are invited to a tour of the demonstration garden at Pepper Tree Corner. This site has a wide range of plants including a “bioswale”, native plants, and water conserving irrigation practices.
Logistics:
There are 50 available spaces and a waiting list as well. So if initially you don’t get a spot, one may open up later.
Cost: None
Master Gardeners will be given preference so please indicate if you are an MG, spouse or guest.
Location: Ventura City Hall Community Room, 501 Poli St., Ventura with parking behind city hall and the Pepper Tree Corner Demonstration Garden at the corner of Poli and Seaward streets in Ventura with parking on the street and in the high school parking lot.
The event contact person and organizer is Dale Dean and you may email him at deans130@roadrunner.com
To register: Email Maryellen Benedetto at marbobben@aol.com and be sure to indicate in the subject line of your email message “November 17th CE”. This will alert Maryellen of your desire to register for this CE opportunity. Please be sure to include your full name, email address and best phone.
Transportation: Carpooling is encouraged and a list will be created of attendees by the registrar so you can look for or offer a ride that way. The City Hall is at the top of California Street in Ventura and can be accessed from the California street exit from the 101.
Continuing Education Hours: This event qualifies for at least 2 hours of continuing education but more if the tour runs longer.
Once the reserved spaces are full, those names will be posted on the Continuing Education Calendar, located on our website. (After logging in, look for Event Calendars on the left. Click on Continuing Education and proceed to November. The 17th already has information there. Just click on the underlined text and the event will open up. Look under description for the names). If your name is not there, you will be notified when a space opens up. If your name is there, you are registered to attend. Please let Maryellen know if you must cancel. Remember, there may be MGs who need CE hours on the waiting list.
Master Gardeners have many opportunities for continuing education, and our recent visit to San Marcos Growers is among the most pleasant. This wholesale-only nursery in Goleta was especially interesting to us because of its emphasis on plants growing in a Mediterranean climate, the climate in which we live and garden. During our tour of the nursery with General Manager Randy Baldwin and Lynn Kravitz, Propagation and Production Manager, we viewed huge expanses of beautiful plants being raised for the retail trade, and we learned about the many propagations options available to commercial growers. Some options - like those involving test tubes and Petri dishes - are probably beyond our capabilities, but others - like propagation from cuttings, seeds, and grafts - reinforced what we learned in our initial training.
It was fascinating and a little amusing to learn that plants, like fashion, have their fads, and plants fall out of popularity just like leisure suits and go go boots. However, it’s not only a capricious public that makes a plant a “has been.” Our current and possibly permanent drought conditions have turned landscapers and home gardeners increasingly toward more drought tolerant plants with lower water requirements. San Marcos currently is devoting a large percentage of their site to the propagation and production of various Agave varieties.
Randy described San Marcos Growers’ efforts to seek out and propagate new plants that meet the changing needs of gardeners. Plants come to them from all over the world – or at least from all over that part of the world with a Mediterranean climate. The progeny of a plant that began its life on a small Pacific island might one day find itself in the garden of a Master Gardener. Nowhere was this more evident than in San Marcos Growers’ private garden, home to many unique and rare specimens that we visited at the end of our tour.
(contributed by Ron and Nancy Lindsey)
Rumor has it that a nursery profited greatly by some Master Gardeners who stopped by there on the way home!
Carol Haverty received these emails after the event.
“Yesterday I did a google search on the cold hardiness of a plant and ended up at the San Marcos site. It's really great to have learned about the man who is the brains behind all that information. Thank you for organizing the trip. Debra Russell”
“Hi Carol, We got an education on rare plants, nursery life, and a secret garden, very nice. Thank you, Diane Bertoy”
If you're interested in volunteering for plant sales, review Power Point presentation at the end of this document then contact, Barbara Hill at barbhill@aol.com for additional information.
See you in the Potting Shed!
Plant Sale Area training 09.ppt
