Children’s activities offered at Kids’ Day in the Garden

Carolee James

Across the country, community gardens are sprouting up like seeds on a warm summer day!

Not only do folks want fresh fruits and vegetables to feed their families, they also want to grow them organically. With this surge in home vegetable gardening, schools are also planting gardens to teach our young people how to grow vegetables and plants without the use of chemicals. Master Gardeners have been involved with school gardens in Tuolumne County for many years, and at our Demonstration Garden we promote organic production of vegetables and fruits.

On the first Saturday of each month, Master Gardeners hold demonstrations on various gardening subjects and practices. Not only are the organic vegetable and fruit production topics popular, there is also a great deal of interest in water conservation and native plants for the garden as well as water conserving grasses to replace turf lawns. The community attendees to the demonstrations are almost always adults. Very few children attend with their parents. Yet, we have found that children are more and more interested in gardening, especially when they can actually “eat” the fruits of their labor. From preschool-age children to teen, the act of planting a seed and watching it sprout and grow to become something edible seems like a miracle. Sadly, some children never have the opportunity to enjoy this process.

As Master Gardeners, we feel it is never too early to start kids playing in the dirt! Imagine, we tell the kids it’s OK to get dirty! And we have found that they love it … just like we do! But the purpose of playing in the dirt is to grow something wonderful to

Children take part in arts and crafts projects at a previous Kids’ Day in the Garden at the Master Gardeners of Tuolumne County Demonstration Garden in Sonora.

eat or beautiful to look at.

To do just that, on Saturday, June 3, Master Gardeners will host our annual Kids Day in the Garden from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. This Open Garden Day will be devoted to showing the children of our community how to grow vegetables, fruits and plants. We also invite them to take part in fun learning activities.

Children are always welcome in the garden, but June 3 will be specifically devoted to them. Every child will be able to choose craft activities, gardening projects and educational gardening materials to take home. And, of course, there will be special treats.

Master Gardeners will be throughout the garden answering questions and providing information about the different areas of the demonstration garden. On this special Saturday, we hope to encourage our children’s interest in gardening, not only to put food on the table, but also to have a beautiful water-wise garden. Of course, parents and grandparents are also invited to attend, and Master Gardener volunteers will be happy to help them with any gardening problems or questions they may have.

So, mark your calendars for Saturday, June 3. The Tuolumne County Master Gardener Demonstration Garden is on the Cassina High School Campus at 251 S. Barretta St. in Sonora.

Carolee James is a former University of California Cooperative Extension Master Gardener of Tuolumne County.

University of California Cooperative Extension Central Sierra Master Gardeners can answer home gardening questions. Call (209) 5335912 in Tuolumne County or (209) 754-2880 in Calaveras County, or fill out an easy-touse problem questionnaire (https://ucanr.edu/survey/ survey.cfm?surveynumber=7269 ). Check out our UCCE Master Gardener webpage (https:// ucanr.edu/sites/mg_of_cs/ ). You can find us on Facebook, and on the radio at kaad-lp. org or 103.5 FM on Motherlode Community Radio