The recently redesigned UC ANR backyard orchard website is easy to navigate and chock-full of useful science-based information.  Fruit trees in the home or community gardens are a wonderful way to improve food security and nutrition.

The website is designed to help gardeners from site planning through postharvest. Topics include:

• Site considerations
• Tree selection
• Propagation
• Preparation & planting
• First year care
• Irrigation
• Pollination
• Pruning & training
• Fertilization
• Fruit thinning
• Pests & disease
• Harvest & postharvest

The Ventura County Master Gardeners are also available to answer your home orchard questions from 1-4 pm on Tuesdays and Thursdays.  They can be reached by phone at 645-1455 or at mgventura@ucdavis.edu.

The Ventura County Cooperative Extension/County of Ventura Farm Advisor office currently has a display at the Hall of Administration in the County Government Center.

Gardening offers many opportunities to improve one’s life by providing outdoor exercise, and superior nutrition with home-grown fruits and vegetables. Working outside at home makes it easier to meet and greet neighbors – or make new friends at a community garden. But perhaps most importantly, during these uncertain economic times, gardening can help people be self-sufficient.

A wealth of information is available to the public in an effort to encourage people to begin or expand their gardens. Topics covered at our display include: water conservation, fruit trees, vegetable gardening, food safety, pests, and composting.

If you have business that brings you to the government center between February 1 and February 26, please plan to stop by and visit our display. If you are interested in the information, but will not be in the area, please contact us so we may provide it for you in a different format. Much of it can be found on our website or at the CA MG garden website.

Vegetable gardening has been making a popular comeback in recent years! If you, or someone you know, are interested in starting a garden UC ANR’s Vegetable Garden Basics publication is a great place to start.

Topics covered include:

• Planning your garden
• Sunlight
• Soil
• Irrigation
• Fertilizer
• Tools & equipment
• What & when to plant

Our UCCE Ventura County Master Gardeners are also a great resource for vegetable gardening. The Master Gardener helpline is available on Tuesdays & Thursdays from 1-4 pm. You can reach them by phone at 805.645.1455 or by email at mgventura@ucdavis.edu.

In addition the California Master Gardener website has a lot of good information too.

Our director, Rose Hayden-Smith works to promote self-sufficiency through home gardening at a national level.

Container gardening

Straw mulch in vegetable garden surrounding eggplants, peppers, tomatoes.

Our Ventura County UCCE Master Gardeners work hard delivering science-based gardening information to the public. One of the ways they accomplish this is through their MG Speaker Bureau. The speakers are very knowledgeable in their subjects and are available for group meetings.

The current topics offered are:

• Composting
• Container Gardening
• Container Vegetable Gardening
• Fruit Gardening
• Garden Design/Plant Selection
• Gifts from the Garden
• Introductory Horticulture
• Pest Management
• Water-Wise Gardening
• Low Cost/No Cost Gardening
• Low Maintenance Gardening
• Propagation
• Pruning
• Roses
• Tomato Culture
• What About Soils?
• Succulents and Cacti
• Vegetable Gardening
• What is a Master Gardener?
• Peppers, Onions and Tomato Facts
• Fertilizer Use
• Weed Killers

Additional information and instructions on how to request a speaker can be found by clicking here. Please contact our office if you need additional information.

On a late day in August, Ventura County UCCE Master Gardeners and 20 hard- working youth in the Oxnard City Corps program began installation of a rain garden at the Camarillo Ranch House. Channels were dug, and rocks and boulders moved. An estimated 100 wheelbarrows of dirt was moved on one of the hottest days of the year all by volunteers to create the rain garden.

So what you may ask is a rain garden? Ventura County UCCE’s Monique Myers provides the following answer:

Rain gardens collect rain water and beautify a yard. They provide a simple form of rain water harvesting, allowing homeowners to save valuable rain water. Although more commonly found in wetter climates, rain gardens are certainly beneficial in water-thirsty California where local rainfall often does not meet water demand and imported water is necessary to support the majority of the population. As water prices climb and the threat of droughts loom-large homeowners and municipalities are looking toward conserving and utilizing water that falls on-site. Rain gardens offer a simple, attractive and inexpensive option.

Basically, rain gardens receive rain that falls on a roof or other collection surface.  The water is channeled, via rain gutters, pipes, swails or curb openings, into a depression in the yard where it soaks into the ground and waters vegetation. Contrary to what many people think, a rain garden is not a pond feature. A properly functioning rain garden holds water for only a short period of time. The purpose is to retain water just long enough for it to percolate into the soil. Most of the time, the bed of the rain garden is dry.

More work days will be scheduled soon, including one on Monday October the 5th. This will be a planting day. Work will start at about 9:00 am near the barn. Bring gloves, hat, shovel and smile! If you are unable to make that day, but are interested in helping, please contact our office.

Oxnard City Corps youth working on rain garden project

Oxnard City Corps youth working on rain garden project