demonstration garden
Gardening Seminars
See our Events Calendar for dates and locations of upcoming gardening seminars. You can also call our hotline, 408-282-3105, M-F from 9:30 a.m. - 12:30 p.m., for details on upcoming workshops, classes or talks.
Palo Alto Demonstration Garden
- Free, one-hour workshops
- First Saturday of the month, 10 a.m.
- Followed by Open Garden and tours and Q&A with Master Gardeners
Past and upcoming workshops include:
- Easy Drip Irrigation
- Cool Season Gardening Tips
- Saving Seeds From Your Garden and Propagating Plants
- Fall Garden Maintenance Tasks
Sunnyvale Teaching and Demonstration Garden
- Free, two-hour workshops
- Second Saturday of the month, 1 p.m.
- Followed by Grand Rounds in the Community Garden, with tours and Q&A with Master Gardeners
- Please note: some workshops may be on weekday evenings in the Sunnyvale library from 7-9 p.m. Check the Events Calendar for this month's workshop.
Past and upcoming workshops include
- When to Harvest that Great Produce
- Less Work, More Food: A Cool Season Edible Garden
- Design and Plan the Water-wise Garden of Your Dreams
- Let a Cover Crop Do the Work!
Palo Alto Demonstration Garden
The First Six Months' Report - December, 2003
PADG Home | 2004 | 2005 | 2006 | 2007 | 2008 | 2009
The summer of 2003 was the first growing season in our new demonstration garden, located in the Eleanor Community Garden within Eleanor Pardee Park at the corner of Channing Avenue and Center Drive. On this site we started work on our project's goal of creating two gardens that each emphasize pleasing design and best practices for home gardening.
Our initial focus was on getting the Edible Demonstration Garden started. There we planned to grow edible and decorative plants together in one garden, showcasing new and unusual varieties of flowers, vegetables and fruits. Our Water-Wise Nature Garden of drought tolerant ornamental plants that attract birds and beneficial insects would be started in the fall.
Sunnyvale Teaching and Demonstration Garden
Fourth Year - December, 2009
STDG Home | First Year | Second Year | Third Year
Overview
In 2009, the Sunnyvale Teaching and Demonstration Garden completed its fourth summer in its garden space at Sunnyvale’s Charles Street Community Gardens.We continued our popular series of free gardening classes in the garden and continued to grow seasonally appropriate, organically grown vegetables and ornamentals in our demonstration beds.
Teaching
This year our monthly free public classes covered topics ranging from the design and use of drip irrigation systems to garden bed preparation and planting vegetable seedlings to ways to renovate an aging home landscape. We taught seven of our classes outdoors in the community gardens’ growing circle meeting space. These classes were followed by rounds in our garden where class participants could see examples of what was taught in class, try their hands at techniques taught or learn about ways our project gardeners were meeting various gardening challenges. Two classes were taught in the Sunnyvale Public Library. Overall, 432 gardeners attended our nine project classes.
Sunnyvale Teaching and Demonstration Garden
Third Year, 2008
Sunnyvale Teaching and Demonstration Garden
Second Year, 2007
Palo Alto Demonstration Garden
Second Year, 2004
PADG Home | First Year, 2003 | 2005 | 2006 | 2007 | 2008 | 2009
The second year of the PADG project has been a productive and rewarding one. To fulfill the goal of demonstrating attractive edible landscaping, the Edible Garden was divided into three international-themed beds; Asian, Latin American, and Mediterranean. A fourth bed was dedicated to testing various varieties of lima beans. The four beds were planted with appropriate vegetables and enhanced with ornamental flowers. Decorative structures to support climbing plants were constructed in each bed.
Fruit trees were added in a high-density orchard area, an espaliered fruit tree row, and along the fence line. A raised blueberry bed was also made. We were able to obtain donations of fruit trees and several varieties of blueberry plants.
Additional perennials were added to the Water-wise Garden, and the beds were "adopted" by team members to assure their weekly hand watering. The Santa Clara Water District has donated funds for an irrigation system, that will be installed in 2005.
