The 2012 ASHS Annual Conference

Since 2001, the University of Arizona Cooperative Extension Maricopa County Master Gardener program has sponsored a day-long public driving tour consisting of six gardens owned and maintained by Master Gardener volunteers and a school or community garden that receives Master Gardener volunteer support.  The garden tour helps educate the public in support of the Maricopa County Master Gardener mission statement “to teach people to select, place and care for plants in an environmentally-friendly manner with research specific to the low desert.”  This event, which over 1,000 people attended, is the major fundraiser for the Master Gardener program and over 3,500 volunteer hours go into making the event a success. In 2011, the 10^thAnnual Real Gardens for Real People Garden tour featured a 6.7 acre community garden with 287 individual plots and six residential gardens.  Eighteen Master Gardener garden experts were placed at different gardens based on specific features of each garden.  These experts provided additional information on such topics as growing vegetables and flowers, container gardening, correct landscaping watering techniques, Xeriscape landscaping, growing roses in the desert, cacti and succulents, citriculture, composting, integrated pest management, and attracting wildlife. The day of the tour, a paper survey was distributed to every attendee.  The survey asked attendees the likelihood that their behavior would change in the following area:  adjust irrigation system frequency or duration; adjust the location of drip emitters; select and plant desert adapted plants; and plant a vegetable garden.   Surveys were returned by 178 attendees the day of the tour.  Per the survey, 64.3% of respondents stated they would probably or definately adjust the frequency or duration of their irrigation timer, 51.4% would adjust the location of irrigation drip emmiters, 77.8% would select and plant desert-adapted plants, and 53.7% would plant a vegetable garden. Forty-three electronic surveys were collected nine months post-event. As a result of attending the garden tour, the respondees advised that 59.5% adjusted the irrigation schedule in the landscape, 35.0% planted a vegetable garden, 73.8% chose desert adapted plants for their landscape, and 76.7% considered the mature size when choosing and placing plants in their landscape.