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The Master Gardener Program

© Mary Henry

What is a Master Gardener? Most people have heard the term but, if you asked, you would get a variety of answers. They are volunteers who assist the county agents of the Cooperative Extension Service to meet the exploding need for home gardening information. The program began in 1972 when several county agents in Washington state trained the first Master Gardener volunteers to help out. Today the program operates in 46 states with more than fifteen thousand volunteers participating nationwide.

Who becomes a Master Gardener? People who have grown a vegetable or flower garden, grown roses or houseplants, kept a lawn or maintained a landscape and love to share what they know with others become Master Gardeners. Time, as with everything else, is the limiting factor. A potential Master Gardener must have time to give. The program requires completion of the initial core training of approximately 40 hours. Minnesota graduates of the program are expected to give 50 volunteer service hours the first year in exchange for that training and 25 hours a year afterward. They are also asked to participate in 5 to 12 hours per year of continuing education.

What do Master Gardeners do? The list is practically limitless because they not only help with existing needs, but are free to develop projects of their own. Here's some of the areas and projects that have been included recently: answering phone questions concerning home horticulture, staffing booths at local fairs and exhibits, working with 4-H youth, school groups, and nursing homes, holding plant clinics, giving programs for community groups, planting demonstration gardens, participating in horticultural therapy with various groups, assisting other youth groups and churches with their horticultural needs, and an unlimited number of personally designed projects. Some of the help that is needed doesn't even require the examination or discussion of plants, but all of it assists the Cooperative Extension Service with its mandate to provide horticultural information to the public. Check out the Minnesota Master Gardener home page.

"Don't you have to know a lot?" "I'm not that smart." You know more than you think you do, especially if you have enjoyed working with plants or gardening for a while. The training provided by the Extension Service will fill in the blanks. You will get expert information on botany, soils and fertilizers, insects and diseases, pesticide use and safety, plant propagation, diagnosing plant problems, home vegetable gardening, composting, tree fruits and berries, tree and shrub culture, flower gardening, lawn care, houseplants, landscaping and more.