Posts Tagged: victory garden

Victory Gardens touted on Pearl Harbor Day

The Fresno morning news show KSEE Sunrise used the occasion of Pearl Harbor Day yesterday to encourage people to plant Victory Gardens. Victory Gardens are fruit, vegetable and herb gardens that Americans traditionally planted during wartime to aid the war effort.

Director of UC Cooperative Extension in Ventura County, Rose Hayden-Smith, is a vocal proponent of a Victory Garden resurgence in California. She maintains a Victory Grower Web site and blog. Hayden-Smith says the connection between American military involvement and the home front isn't what it was in the past, but the American way of life is imperiled by more than foreign wars. The country is facing ever rising fuel and food prices, the threat of global warming and a high rate of obesity.

UC Cooperative Extension Fresno County Master Gardener Carole Grosch explained on the morning TV program that gardening is not just for summertime, but that in most of California a variety of vegetables can be grown outdoors through the winter, such as lettuce, Swiss chard, onions and spinach.

The Fresno County Master Gardeners appear on KSEE Sunrise once a month year round to provide gardening tips and raise awareness for the county's very active Master Gardener program, which involves nearly 200 volunteers and includes a one-acre Garden of the Sun demonstration garden at the corner of Winery and McKinley avenues in Fresno.

Master Gardeners work at the UC Hansen Research and Extension Center in Ventura County.

First Garden, First Hives, First Bees

This week (June 22-28) is National Pollinator Week, and what better time to celebrate the honey bee than now? The White House Victory Garden, planted the first day of spring on part of the South Lawn, now has thousands of new residents: honey bees (Apis mellifera).  The two bee hives are a...

Poster Child

THE HONEY BEE (Apis mellifera) is a cause for celebration during National Pollinator Week, June 22-28. This honey bee is nectaring sage. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)

Victory in the Garden

If you like squash, you have a bee to thank. Without bees, no pollination. Without pollination, no squash. Honey bees in California pollinate some 100 agricultural crops, including fruits, nuts and vegetables. One of them is squash. When a squash blossom burst open last weekend in our garden, a...

Carpenter Bee and Honey Bee

A CARPENTER BEE and a honey bee head for the same squash blossom. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)

Covered in Pollen

COVERED IN POLLEN, a honey bee emerges from the squash blossom, victorious. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)

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