Home&Real Estate Home Front
BOUQUETS TO DESIGNERS ... Local floral designers participating in this year’s Bouquets to Art, in which floral designers create arrangements to complement art at the de Young Museum in San Francisco March 19-23, include Kiwi DeVoy of De Voy Designs, Atherton; Thanh Nguyen of Eclosion and Isabella Boyer Sikaffy of Florabella, Menlo Park; Katsuko and Leo Thielke of Hunter-Lee Flowers, Mountain View; Charlene Schmidt of Miss Scarlett’s Flowers and Cheryl McGuire of Flair, Portola Valley; and Francesca Perez of Francesca’s Flowers and Garden, Woodside. Tickets are $20 for adults, $17 for seniors, $16 for students, $10 youths (6-17 years), children 5 and under free, members free. The event takes place at the de Young Museum, Golden Gate Park, 50 Hagiwara Tea Garden Drive, San Francisco. Information: 415-750-3600 or http://deyoung.famsf.org RHODODENDRON BREEDING ... Norman Beaudry will talk about Charles Dexter, an East Coast gardener who started a massive rhododendron breeding program, at the next meeting of the De Anza Chapter of the American Rhododendron Society at 7:30 p.m. on Wednesday, March 20. The group meets in Room 12 of the Hillview Community Center, 97 Hillview Ave., Los Altos. Information: www.deanza-ars.com
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HERBS AND FLOWERS ... Food and garden writer Jody Main will teach a class on “Salad Gardening with Herbs and Edible Flowers” from 10:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. on Saturday, March 16, at Common Ground, 599 College Ave., Palo Alto. Lettuce, spinach, carrots, beets, fennel, arugula, radishes and more will be included in the class, which also will cover soil preparation, planting instructions and harvesting techniques. Cost is $35, which includes a take-home salad garden to plant. Information: 650-493-6072 or www.commongroundinpaloalto.org
Also online at PaloAltoOnline.com
Class series covers how to create an edible garden
Veronica Weber
PLANT PROPAGATION ... James Kern, a master gardener, horticultural consultant and landscape contractor, will talk about “Native Plant Propagation” from 9:30 to 11:30 a.m. on Saturday, March 16, at Gamble Garden, 1431 Waverley St., Palo Alto. The class will cover seed handling, cuttings and division, including groundcovers such as redwood sorrel or wild ginger. Cost is $35 for nonmembers, $25 for members. Information: 650329-1356 or www.gamblegarden.org
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Robin Mankey pulls sunchoke roots (top) out of a vegetable bed in a home in Palo Alto. Mankey will be teaching a series of gardening classes for moms and tots at six homes in nearby cities beginning next week.
A COUNTRY GARDEN ... Landscape historian and author Judith B. Tankard will talk about “Gertrude Jekyll and the Country House Garden” from 2 to 3 p.m. on Thursday, March 21, at Filoli, 86 Cañada Road, Woodside. Tankard will cover Jekyll’s theories on color, planting and design, as well as her collaborations with Sir Edwin Lutyens (including Hestercombe, Folly Farm and Deanery Gardens). Her book of the same title will be available
by Carol Blitzer e grow food at home!” That’s Robin Mankey’s motto and the mantra for the new class she’ll be offering for moms and preschoolers beginning next week. The class, dubbed “Mother, Earth and Me,” will take place in six home gardens in Palo Alto, Los Altos, Menlo Park and Atherton. Mankey views the six gardens as a “roaming classroom,” with a different topic covered at each location. “Everyone’s going to learn outside their boxes, so to speak — their gardens,” Mankey said. Before beginning the class series, Mankey will make home visits to assess each garden to determine the space required to grow what the participant will want to eat. “Two families already have raised beds. Some aren’t even there,” she said. The first class will take place at Common Ground in Palo Alto so students can check out such necessities as tools, seedlings and compost. Each week features a new topic: planning the garden, seed propagation, soil preparation, transplanting and spacing, composting, irrigation and troubleshooting.
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Veronica Weber
Veronica Weber
Kale, left, grows in a Palo Alto garden bed tended by Robin Mankey. Above, a bumblebee pollinates a flower in that mainly vegetable garden.
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