Planning, planting classes and videos offered by the area's master gardeners
Sacramento County master gardener Tamara Engel demonstrates how to prune a mature blueberry plant in a YouTube video. Screenshot from Sacramento County master gardeners' YouTube channel
We’re back to rain today (and likely Sunday) but even with wet conditions gardeners can still make progress the next several days toward their spring gardens. Choosing and starting seeds, for example, planning irrigation, or learning how to maximize planting spaces will all contribute to success.
The region’s master gardeners have three classes coming up that can help in those pursuits:
– “Gardening in Small Spaces,” 9 a.m. to noon, Wednesday, Feb. 8. This three-hour in-person class from the El Dorado County master gardeners will be held at the Cameron Park Community Center, 2502 Country Club Drive, Cameron Park. Master gardener Mike Pavlick will cover site location, design, raised bed options, container gardening and other methods that will allow anyone to have a vegetable garden in a small backyard setting. No pre-registration required. Information on the El Dorado master gardeners' events can be found here.
– “Growing Spring and Summer Vegetables,” Zoom online class, 9 a.m. to noon, Saturday, Feb. 11. El Dorado master gardener Zack Dowell will discuss garden plant selection, planting times, site selection, soil preparation, proper seed planting techniques, and pest management. Pre-registration is required to get the Zoom link. The registration link can be found under the class listing here: https://mgeldorado.ucanr.edu/Calendar/
– “Improving Water Efficiency in Your Garden,” in-person and Zoom workshop, 10:30-11:30 a.m. Saturday, Feb. 11. Presented by the Placer County master gardeners, it will include tips and resources for maximizing their water efficiency. Participants will gain water-wise ideas and visuals for transforming their landscape, organizers note. The in-person site is the Loomis Library, 6050 Library Drive, Loomis. The registration link for the simultaneous Zoom workshop can be found here.
Meanwhile, the Sacramento County master gardeners recently posted two helpful YouTube videos for this time of year: “Pruning Mature Blueberry Plants,” with master gardener Tamara Engel, and “Transplanting Nursery Plants for a Healthy Start” with master gardener Lisa Odom. Each is just 5 minutes, succinct and easy to repeat.
– Kathy Morrison
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Garden Checklist for week of May 12
Get your gardening chores and irrigation done early in the day before temperatures rise.
* Plant, plant, plant! It’s prime planting season in the Sacramento area. Time to set out those tomato transplants along with peppers and eggplants. Pinch off any flowers on new transplants to make them concentrate on establishing roots instead of setting premature fruit.
* Direct-seed melons, cucumbers, summer squash, corn, radishes, pumpkins and annual herbs such as basil.
* Harvest cabbage, lettuce, peas and green onions. This heat will cause leafy greens and onions to flower; pick them before they bolt.
* In the flower garden, direct-seed sunflowers, cosmos, salvia, zinnias, marigolds, celosia and asters.
* Plant dahlia tubers. Other perennials to set out include verbena, coreopsis, coneflower and astilbe.
* Transplant petunias, marigolds and perennial flowers such as astilbe, columbine, coneflowers, coreopsis, dahlias, rudbeckia and verbena.
* Keep an eye out for slugs, snails, earwigs and aphids that want to dine on tender new growth.
* Feed summer bloomers with a balanced fertilizer.
* For continued bloom, cut off spent flowers on roses as well as other flowering plants.
* Got fruit trees? If you haven't already done so, thin orchard fruit such as apples, peaches, pears, pluots and plums before they grow too heavy, breaking branches or even splitting the tree. Leave the largest fruit on the branch, culling the smaller ones, and allow for 5 to 6 inches (or a hand's worth) between each fruit.
* Thin grape bunches, again leaving about 6 inches between them. For the remaining bunches, prune off the "tail" end, about the bottom third of the bunch, so that the plant's energy is concentrated in the fruit closest to the branch.
* As spring-flowering shrubs finish blooming, give them a little pruning to shape them, removing old and dead wood. Lightly trim azaleas, fuchsias and marguerites for bushier plants.
* Add mulch to the garden to help keep that precious water from evaporating. Mulch also cuts down on weeds. But don’t let it mound around the stems or trunks of trees or shrubs. Leave about a 6-inch to 1-foot circle to avoid crown rot or other problems.
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