Takes place on March 29 at Holyoke High School.
The Western Massachusetts Master Gardener Association urges area residents to “think spring” as it prepares to host the 18th Annual Spring Gardening Symposium. With a theme of “Inch by Inch, Row by Row: Going to Make this Garden Grow,” the symposium, featuring 24 workshops, takes place on March 29 at Holyoke High School.
The event features three sets of sessions, with participants given the choice of eight workshops in each session. Workshops run the gamut from natural pest control, creating health gardens, and herbs for stress and anxiety, to making antique garden troughs, berries in the landscape and rain gardens.
The symposium will also include two groups of mini-workshops, a concept which was first introduced last year. The groups include three smaller topics, allowing participants to get an introduction on more areas of interest.
“These work well for subjects which may not require a full workshop, or which may provide an introduction to the subject,” said Toi Graham, president emeritus of the association and co-coordinator of the event. “If there is sufficient interest indicated on our evaluation sheets, we will devote an entire workshop to them next year.”
Master Gardener Margaret Larson will run classes entitled “The ABCs of Growing Vegetables” and “Seed Starting.”
Larson said growing vegetables or flowers from seeds can be intimidating for some people.
“People don’t know how to start,” she said. “They don’t know what equipment they need, and it can sound daunting.”
Larson said common problems with beginner seed starters are that their seeds failed to grow or started growing but died.
“Maybe they didn’t have enough light,” she said. “You need a specific seed starting soil. It can be discouraging if you invest in the seeds, but if you don’t do these things, it doesn’t go well.”
Larson said the class is ideal for beginners to more experienced gardeners who are looking for tips and tricks to get better at it.
“We’ll talk about which ones are easiest to grow,” she said. “Some need to be scraped first; some need to be put in the refrigerator. Some are better to grow with children, like beans, radishes or carrots, because they grow pretty quickly.”
Larson said tomatoes and marigolds are both very popular, so she’ll be sure to talk about growing both.
She’ll also have seed packets for all participants.
In “The ABCs of Growing Vegetables,” Larson said she’ll start with the basics, such as soil preparation and placement of the garden.
“Then, we go through the steps to building a garden, having proper soil, having proper watering, what types of vegetables you want to grow, which ones grow well together, and which ones don’t,” she said.
She added there's ’s a lot of interest in which vegetables grow at what time of year,”
“When do you put them out, when do you harvest them? There’s a lot of interest in maximizing the garden space.”
The workshop will be interactive, and will cover much material.
“It’s a huge topic,” Larson said. “It’s a fairly high level discussion, but there will be handouts. And, we’ll have time for questions; that’s a big part of these presentations.”
Master Gardener Edward Sourdiffe will do a mini workshop called “Seed Starting with Shop Lights” and a regular workshop called “Soothing Sound of Water in Your Garden.”
In the seed starting class, Sourdiffe will focus on how to set up an inexpensive do-it-yourself lighting system for seeds.
“Instead of the high-tech grow lights you find in garden catalogs, I found you could use basic shop lights you can buy from a big box store,” he said. “Some people try to do seeds at home, and there’s not enough light. They give up or they have spindly seedlings. With my technique, your seedlings are as good as if you bought them (as plants) at the garden center.”
In Sourdiffe’s water gardening class, he’ll talk about the main benefits of adding a water feature to the garden.
“It will drown out noise,” he said. “Just watching water lowers people’s blood pressure.”
From a simple table top fountain to a large, in-ground pond, Sourdiffe will talk about creating a water feature inexpensively.
“I’ll talk about different sources for different kinds of plants for your water garden, and the benefits of having water in your yard,” he said. “It creates a microhabitat. Even the smallest of water features in your yard will attract more birds. It also attracts amphibians.”
Both birds and amphibians will eat unwanted insects in the garden.
Sourdiffe will also talk about adding plants to a water feature, as well as fish, and a new kind of water feature that does not create a pool of water.
“Instead of a pool, it ends in a gravel pool and just seeps through the gravel,” he said. “Some people like that because you don’t have to worry about mosquitoes.”
Sourdiffe said he hopes to turn people on to the benefits of having a water feature in the garden.
“A lot of gardeners think it’s too hard…too much maintenance,” he said. “But anybody can do this. It’s all very simple.”
In addition to the workshops, the event includes a marketplace and a garden book sale at a 20 percent discount. Turkey sandwich box lunches can be purchased for $5 in advance. The price for the symposium, not including lunch, is $30 through March 15, and $35 after March 15. The symposium opens at 8 a.m. with registration, and workshops conclude at 2 p.m. Attendees are encouraged to register by mail to ensure they are assigned their top choices for workshops, if available. Visit www.wmmga.org to download a registration form.