By Bob Labozetta —  What can home gardeners do to help their plants — veggies, landscape plants, shrubs and trees — survive the intense summer heat? Here are some do’s and don’ts of hot weather gardening: Don’t fertilize plants or trees during the hot summer months. The purpose of fertilizers — especially those high in nitrogen — is to help ...

MARIPOSA — Every year, researchers and citizen scientists gather at known locations in the monarch migration pattern to count the monarch adults as well as the eggs and cats found on native milkweed. You may think the release of monarchs would be a tremendous boon to the declining global population of this bright and colorful species. This is far from ...

MARIPOSA —  The UC Master Gardeners of Mariposa County welcome 13 new graduates to their Master Gardener program. UC Master Gardener volunteers are trained representatives of the University of California Cooperative Extension. Trainees complete an 18- week course and pass a written examination to become ambassadors for the statewide UC Master Gardener program. They also complete annual volunteer hours and ...

AHWAHNEE — Students at Wasuma Elementary School got a little dirt under their fingernails recently when they enjoyed two special event days celebrating all the goodness that goes with terra firma. For Earth Day last month, students learned about vermaculture, composting and pollination, and planted in the garden, with the help of Mariposa and Madera Master Gardeners who taught classes ...

By Bob Labozetta —  Whether you sowed seeds in late February/early March or you purchase plants from a nursery or the Mariposa Master Gardeners Annual Plant Sale, make sure your transplants are young, stocky seedlings instead of larger plants. They will establish more quickly and suffer less transplant shock, soon catching up in growth to larger plants. “Harden off” your ...

AHWAHNEE — Wasuma Elementary will be honoring Earth Day in the school garden on Friday, Apr. 26, and working with local Master Gardeners to accomplish some important spring tasks. Activities for the day include the creation of bowling ball art, worm-ology and composting, planting and “Tasting with Ooooby Farms.” Want to help? It’s easy. Organizers are looking for donations of ...

By Bob Labozetta —  This is the first of a three-part series about growing tomatoes in the Sierra foothills. Parts two and three on tomato care will follow in the weeks to come. Tomatoes are adversely affected by temperature extremes. When temperatures stay over 90℉ during the day and the nights remain above 70℉, non-adapted tomato blooms often fail to ...

MARIPOSA — As the gardening season winds down, gardeners always think about the future. What can we do to improve our soil? Enhance our landscape? Ease the workload? What plants have caught our eye? Master gardeners are thinking about the future in a different way. Master Gardeners go through training to help you with gardening challenges. We write, answer questions, ...

Written by Greg Dunn – MARIPOSA – If you’re a foothill-area landscaper, gardener or would-be gardener, let the University of California Master Gardeners of Mariposa County help you with university-based research on gardening in our foothill locale. The UC Master Gardeners offer workshops, a free helpline, a website and a Facebook page (both overflowing with great tips and event notices) ...

MARIPOSA – There are dozens of diseases, insects and other pests that attack fruit trees. With that in mind, the UC Master Gardeners of Mariposa County are offering a free “Fruit Tree Pest Management” workshop on Saturday, June 23, from 10 a.m. to noon in the Board of Supervisors Chambers at 5100 Bullion Street in Mariposa (see map below). Maxwell ...