UNIT REPORTS JUNE 2005 Va Tech, Blacksburg
AMHERST, CAMPBELL and LYNCHBURG (Hill City MGA) Al Thompson	Our Festival of Gardening (FOG) was a tremendous success. We raised nearly $5,000 to support our Youth Horticulture Grant Fund, Master Gardener Training, and the Volunteer Programs of the Hill City Master Gardener Association. The Festival of Gardening consisted of a plant sale, a bake goods sale, a creative Garden Art sale, and offered to the public at no charge, free educational workshops and children’s activities. We would like to thank those patrons who supported this event, especially the Master Gardeners from other Units within our State. Our next major event will be Thomas Jefferson's Tomatoe Faire. A community celebration of horticulture, it is a joint effort of the Hill City Master Gardeners and the Lynchburg Federation of Garden Clubs. It is an opportunity for our community residents (including our children’s gardening programs) to display the results of their hard work in vegetable gardens, flower gardens and orchards. The produce and flowers are displayed, judged, and the winners are awarded ribbons. Tomatoe Faire is the first Saturday in August (August 6^th), come join us.
BEDFORD Gail Augenreich	Farm Tour - August 20 (Bedford MGs will have an information table). Sunflower Festival - August 27 (Bedford MGs will have an information table). Master Gardener Training Class - September 6 thru November 3. Centerfest - September 24 (Bedford MGs will have an information table).
BRUNSWICK, LUNENBURG, MECKLENBURG & NOTTAWAY (South Central Master Gardeners) Nancy Drewry	During the months of March, April and May, the Brunswick Ext. Office with the help of some of our master gardeners and some current interns co-ordinate a gardening program for some of Meherrin-Powellton Elem. students.  Proceeds from a grant from International Paper were used for materials and supplies.  This program consisted of several 8'x16' raised beds for cold crop veg. gardens.  The 45 students worked with soil, seed, renewable resources and planted gardens and a few trees.  The high-lights of the program will be to harvest the produce before school ends and a tour of International Paper in Franklin, Va.
CHESAPEAKE Pinky Derieux	Chesapeake MGVs participated in Paint Your Heart Out on April 23. We were assigned three houses. Our energy was devoted to establishing and planting flowerbeds, cleaning existing beds, sprucing up overgrown grassy areas and generally putting a "cared for" appearance on the neglected yards of our allotted houses. Ten MGs assisted. Chesapeake's annual plant sale was held on April 29 and 30. It was a very successful sale and we netted $10,359 for our treasury. Regional Advanced Training took place on May 6 and Chesapeake hosted this event. There were 60 in attendance to learn about what and how to repair storm damage after a major storm. Chesapeake Jubilee occurred on May 20, 21 & 22. Backyard gardening was our theme. We featured raised beds, drip irrigation, composting, compost tea and the use of rain barrels. Chesapeake has a new program which is open to the public and free of charge. It takes place the second Saturday of every month at the Chesapeake Arboretum and is the creation of Ed Bradley, one of our CMGVs. It is an introduction to urban forestry in Hampton Roads and features a two-hour walking tour.
FAIRFAX George Graine	More than 100 laboratory reports have been processed thus far in the Fairfax laboratory facility. These samples did not go to VaTech. We are still seeing cicada damage. Other main problems are sooty mold and scale on many plant samples. Service awards will be announced at the 18^th Annual MG College. 64 MGs received awards including three MGs at the 1000-hour and three at the 2000-hour milestone. Presented a check for $400.00 donation to endow the State MG Coordinator position at the April VMGA board meeting. Preparations are underway for the State MG Coordinator visit in July.
FAUQUIER Jim Scibek	Completed our 3-part Spring Gardening lecture series for the public in Warrenton In May, began staffing plant clinics regularly Saturday mornings at the Warrenton Farmers Market and held a 1-day clinic at the Piedmont Small Farms Festival. Presented a $500 scholarship to a graduating senior from Liberty High School who will attend VA Tech. Are staffing our Phone Horticultural Hot Line for the public every weekday, 9 a.m.-3 p.m. Calls and walk-ins are significantly ahead of 2004. Presented our "Ready, Set, Grow!" program to every elementary school, the local Catholic school, and several groups of pre-schoolers, reaching well over 1000 children. Held a spring bulb sale for our Master Gardeners with profits to go to the VMGA Coordinator Endowment Fund. Donated $250 to the fund. Continued development work on the demonstration garden at #18 Schoolhouse and the Rady Park Arboretum.
FLUVANNA Pat Platt	With a new fence completed, the children’s garden at Central Elementary was finished for another season with a celebratory trip for the students and teachers involved to Lewis Ginter Botanical Gardens in Richmond with some of our members. Our annual “Flowers, Flowers, Flowers” seminar and plant sale was a big success. Thank you to everyone who attended and supported us. The archeological dig at the Demo Garden in Pleasant Grove is progressing with work parties every Friday and Saturday. Master Gardener, Pam Peltier, presented an interesting program on “Continuous Color in the Garden” to our group and handed out a description to coordinate with the slide show. She showed us what we can use to have continuous color in our yards. Our July meeting will include our annual potluck picnic. Check out our website at www.fluvannamg.org to learn more about what we’ve been doing.
FREDERICKSBURG, STAFFORD, SPOTSYLVANIA, KING GEORGE, CAROLINE (Central Rappahannock) - Don Saunders	The MGACRA Master Gardeners have been busy over the last few months. Our summer plant clinics at the Porter Library in Stafford County and at the farmer’s market in Spotsylvania County are up and running. First Saturday in the Gardens is ongoing. On July 2, “First Saturday” will be held at Ferry Farm, boyhood home of George Washington. Among the events, will be Cooking demonstrations using produce from the farm’s colonial gardens. We have published a cookbook containing more than 300 recipes. It will go on sale in August. Cost is $15. To order, contact Ann Gorrell at anngorrell@cs.com. Our yearly Master Gardener picnic was held at Stan and Linda Zack’s home and a good time was had by all. The theme this year was “Make it, Bake it, Sew it, Grow it” A silent auction based on that theme was very successful. Lastly, we have applied for non-profit status.
HALIFAX (Southside VA) Grace Elliott	We will again compete at the Halifax County Fair for our 6th first place ribbon for educational booth We will support the Youth Education Halifax Town 4-H Club with advise and monetary support for plants to beautify the planters on Main Street. Last Sat. of June we will have a booth at the local South Boston Farmers Market, with a table for pamphlets and advise to local gardeners. A Pruning Workshop at the local YMCA, with actual pruning of the shrubbery around the premise.
HANOVER Cheri Haggerty	¨ Plant Clinics are fully staffed through October. We have had a great season so far and have not lacked for volunteers to staff our events. ¨ Our Plant sale in late April raised in excess of $3000 for our scholarship fund. ¨ We co-sponsored a booth at the Central Virginia Food Bank Family Fair with Richmond City VCE. We planted bean seeds and offered information on caring for them to 322 children and 165 parents. We also had handouts on nutrition and healthy eating. ¨ Our Graduation speaker was Glenn Chappell, VCE agent extraordinaire, from Prince George County. He gave an exceptional presentation on Edible Plants. We have been given the task of a pilot project on Composting from the county to partner with the Department of Public Works and the school system. One entire school will be involved from the kitchen staff to the administration staff. This will kick off our participation in a community compost education program.
ISLE OF WIGHT, SOUTHAMPTON, SUSSEX (Western Tidewater) Betty Jo Hendrix	Plant Clinics. July 1 will be the kick-off for our plant clinic at the Windsor Tailgate Market from 5pm til sundown on Friday evenings through August and July 2 at the Olde Towne Curbside Market in Smithfield on Saturday mornings from 9am-12 through the month of August. Both plant clinics will be staffed by interns and their MG mentors. County Fair. Plans are underway for landscaping the new fairground entrance and helping in the horticulture tent. Junior Master Gardeners. The after-school program ended with a Spring Fling for the participants with food, fun and games on May 28. A JMG day camp will be held in August for one week. Senior Program. A group of MGs visit with seniors in a local assisted living facility once a month to help them pot plants, install birdhouses and other gardening activities.
JAMES CITY COUNTY, WILLIAMSBURG Ann DeForest	Our unit recently relocated thirty varieties of plants from our Water wise Low Maintenance Garden in Toano to the Human Services Building in Williamsburg. Our board members will attend another Strategic Planning Session again using a creative “visioning” format. We were very proud to present four outstanding projects at Brag Night at MG College. Our popular Landscape Love now has lots of info as well as an application form online at our website. Our enthusiastically led Junior Master Gardener Program has continued into summer with a “Bugs and Books” program at the library. Our largest children’s garden, Mattie’s Garden, has expanded their educational program with an “Herb of the Month”. “The How, Why, When and Where of an Apple Tree” by Peninsula Tree Stewards took a barren 24’ by 30’ corner of the playground at Stonehouse Elementary School in James City County and with the children’s help turned the area into a small apple orchard. In addition to seven dwarf apple trees the school was given two large framed apple posters and six books on growing apples and six books about Johnny Appleseed. For more info on our unit, please visit our website at www.jccwmg.org.
NELSON Maudie Ratliff	We had 2 delegates who represented us at MG College. Our silent auction donation was a beautiful birdbath made of native VA limestone. We also voted to make a $500 donation to the endowment fund. The Nelson County Festival was recently held at Oak Ridge Estate where MGs conducted tours of the demonstration gardens. These gardens were planned, planted and maintained by MGs. We helped to landscape Habitat for Humanity houses and instruct the owners on plant care. A local nursery donated plants for this project. Save our Streams is another project that keeps some MGs busy this time of the year. We have gathered critter samples of the rivers to use in determining the pollution levels.
NEW RIVER VALLEY Trish Kyle Cregger	2005 Trainee class ended mid-April and on May 20th we held our annual Spring Potluck and Graduation.  Trainees were presented with their certificates of completion and a small potted plant.  Potted plants were patricianly donated by the local Wal-Mart in Christiansburg.  We also tried our hand at a small in house silent auction during our potluck and were very pleased at the donations made and the mad bidding that took place. Mid-March through April is when we run our plant clinics and this year we held several at local nurseries, libraries, Lowe's and at garden fairs in Blacksburg and Pulaski.  From early reports all were attended well. Right now a lot of our members are gearing up helping Dave Close with this years Master Gardener College. And of course a number of our projects are in high gear.  Work at the horticulture gardens and Smithfield plantation both at Virginia Tech, Plant-A-Row, Friends of the Library Garden tour, YMCA Community Garden and help in judging at this year's annual FFA Conference at Tech just to name a few.
NORTHERN NECK MASTER GARDENERS REPORT Jinny Estell	We have started a new Marsh Stabilization and Community Education project working with the Reedville Fishermans’ Museum, Bethany Methodist Church, and VIMS to develop 5 demonstration plots on tidal waters of Cockrells Creek. The demonstration plots will consist of various landscaping and shoreline management solutions to protect both the eroding bank and to control upland water runoff. Seven MGs, including Ellen Hollows one of our interns who stayed at the camp for 2 nights, presented an” Identifying Elements in the Micro & Macro Environment” program on 3 consecutive days at the 4-H camp in Jamestown during the week that Northern Neck youngsters were in camp. The last activity, printing tee shirts using flora and fauna that were collected during the previous 2 sessions, was most enjoyable for the kids. We continue with our Hot Line 2 mornings/week, plant clinics at the Farmers’ Markets 2 mornings/month, Hort Therapy at RWC, and maintaining our other demonstrations gardens.
ROANOKE Kathryn Debnar	On behalf of the Roanoke Unit, we are hoping that other units are holding their fair weather programs, and raising lots of funds for Master Gardeners across the state.  Our unit held the most profitable event in our history.  Since we are chartered to enhance the commonwealth via informational programming Roanoke has decided to give our local 4 H group nearly one third of our recent earnings.  We expect this will allows many more youngsters to participate in the annual summer educational camps.  It is important to expose our children to our resources and our conservation programs as early and as often as possible.  Who knows how many of these campers will grow up to be future Master Gardeners!
ROCKBRIDGE AREA Ted Jenks	RAMGA’s annual June picnic was held on Thursday, June 16, and included election of new officers: Jim Davis, president (incumbent); Maureen Becker, vice president (incumbent); Kate Jenks, treasurer; Heather Marion, secretary; and Ted Jenks (incumbent), VMGA representative. Master Gardener Barbara Thomas presented a lecture on Home Gardening to a ninth grade class at Rockbridge County High School. She reviewed what plants need to prosper, what soil is and what makes it ‘good’ as well as to answer the prime question – ‘why bother with a home garden’? We think they will follow through with the goal: to plant and tend one tomato plant this year and to savor that wonderful taste when biting into it! On May 14 our annual plant sale and clinic took place and, once again, was very successful, earning over $3500 for our organization.
VIRGINIA BEACH Liz Maurer	Recapping the last two months, the VBMGs continued to maintain several local gardens and on May 19^th, two of our projects received formal recognition. The Virginia Beach Beautification Commission presented the first place, city-wide, institutional landscape award to the Virginia Tech Agricultural Research and Extension Center for their display beds and arboretum. Second place was awarded to Old Donation Church, a historical church whose gardens include 30+ crepe myrtles, 125 boxwoods, a Japanese garden and an herb garden. VBMGs maintain both areas. Our spring plant sale held on May 14^th at the VB Farmers’ Market was a resounding success! We awarded two $1,000 scholarships to two very deserving local students who will be continuing their horticultural studies. The Regional Green Thumb Series has been very well attended this year at its new venue, Va. Wesleyan College. Up to 35 attendees for the eight-part horticultural education program for the public is an all-time high for the three-year-old program put on by the Norfolk, Portsmouth and Va Beach MGs. Planning efforts are ongoing for the Bugs, Birds and Blooms summer camp for children and September’s Annual Community Gardening Festival.
YORK COUNTY Jackie Lohr	York County's summer social was at the Waterman's Museum on the York River. Our 4-H Mum project participants are busily pinching their mums.  We are touring local landscapes this summer for fun and knowledge.  We have just completed our lawn training class in preparation for the lawn clinics we do in the fall.  Then, we're taking a break for our spring study trip to the west of Virginia and for Master Gardener College.   After MG College, we'll be back to work with the Junior Master Gardeners, and the Peninsula Tree Stewards will complete their plant ID of the plants along the wetlands raised walkway at the 4-H Camp.