Community Outreach

The Livermore-Amador Valley Garden Club has a number of service projects in the Tri-Valley Area. We also support the Penny Pines program, which is a joint partnership of the National Garden Club (NGC) and the USDA Forest Service sustaining our national and urban forests through this reforestation/forest education program.

---

---

Sensory Garden

Third Fridays. Next: Friday, May 17, 2019 9:00 am to Noon

5353 Sunol Blvd., Pleasanton; Across from Raley's. Adjacent to the Pleasanton Senior Center on Sunol Blvd

As usual, we will do the maintenance tasks to keep the garden attractive and presentable to the public. Tasks include weeding, pruning and deadheading spent growth.

The Sensory Garden consists of two ground-level beds and three raised beds. Working in the ground-level beds requires kneeling and stooping while working in the raised beds requires standing, so let your preference be known.

Please bring your own hand tools (trowels, pruners, soil knives, etc.), kneeling pads and work gloves. Larger tools and supplies will be provided.

Restroom facilities are available in the Senior Center Building.

After the work party, for those interested, we adjourn to a near-by eatery for lunch and conversation.

We invite all of the club members to participate. We will be happy to show less experienced members how to do the tasks. Even if you can't spend the full three hours working in the garden, any time that you can participate is welcomed, so please come early or come late.

Please signup at the monthly LAVGC meeting or RSVP Daniel McCright. See the LAVGC Yearbook for Dan's contact information.

For more information, please contact Daniel McCright. See the LAVGC Yearbook for Dan's contact information.

Even if you cannot attend the work party, we invite you to visit the garden on any day. We try to have a large variety of plants that put on a display at different times of the year.

FEATURED PLANTS for MAY

Chinese Snowball (Viburnum macrocephalum).

In May this snowball bush dominates the Sensory Garden. Greenish buds open to pure white on a 6 foot high shrub. The plants goes dormant in winter and blooms on old wood, so we don't prune it until the flowering period is finished. The flowers are sterile so no fruit is formed, unlike many other viburnums. Beyond occasional pruning, this plant needs no other special care.

---

Spanish Lavender (Lavandula stoechas).

The Spanish lavender is the first of its kind to bloom each year. It bears colorful flag-like bracts that ressemble rabbit ears. It needs little care and irrigation water, which is why it is used so much as a landscape plant. If the spent blooms are removed, it often sends up a second crop of blooms. The purple varieties are the most grown, but there are varieties that bear rosy-pink, off-white and lavender flowers. The entire plant is aromatic.

---

Seep Monkey Flower (Mimulus guttatus).

Several kinds of monkey flowers are native to California. An unusual one is the seep monkey flower, because it is found where water seeps from the ground. While it enjoys the moist period when flowering in spring, it adapts to drying conditions in summer by going dormant. The flowers are a very bright yellow. In the Sensory Garden, we have planted in an area where the soil remains moist in the plant's dormant period because it never wants to get completely dry. When the monkey flower goes dormant, near-by cannas cover the area in summer. When the cannas die back in late fall because of frosty weather, new growth of the monkey flowers reappears.

---

White Rockrose (Cistus hybridus).

White Rockrose (Cistus hybridus) is a dwarf form of rockrose that blooms abundantly in spring. As a Mediterranean plant, it needs little water in summer. When the flowers finish, the shiny green aromatic

---

Pictures from 2017 and 2018 Sensory Garden work parties Here are some photos taken at Sensory Garden work parties in the recent past. Work parties are fun for getting to know our members and the participants learn about horticultural practices as they perform the work of transplanting, weeding, dead heading, pruning, fertilizing, controlling pests and propagation of plants.

Garden Angels

We have a group of members willing and eager to go out and help any garden club member that is not able to keep up their garden temporarily possibly because of illness, chemo, etc. We can deadhead, sweep, plant annuals, and generally tidy up the garden. Do you need this kind of help or know someone who does? If so, please use the signup sheet at the monthly club meeting or contact Peggy Despotakis.

Looking for Garden Angels. Periodically club members need some help in their gardens due to illness. If you would like to be on the Angel call list for a workparty, contact Peggy Despotakis.

Livermore 1st Street Pots

No workparties are currently scheduled

Please contact Mary Davis for more information.See the LAVGC Yearbook for additional contact information.

Penny Pines

The Penny Pines program, which is a joint partnership of the National Garden Club (NGC) and the USDA Forest Service sustaining our national and urban forests through this reforestation/forest education program.

Have you wondered what that cute green box that is passed around at the meeting and people are putting money inside is for? Each $68 that we collect is used to plant an acre of burned out national forest land. Since 1999, our club has donated money to help plant 109 acres of trees for a total donation of over $8,000.

Through the years the members of our garden club have been very generous through donations to the Penny Pines box circulated at each meeting. We have purchased 143 plantations in honor of current and former club members as well as donations to honor the first responders for 9/11 relief, as well as others in our community.

We have also participated in the Arbor Day celebration for last two years in partnership with Alden Lane, The California Association of Nurseries and Garden Centers, and Davey Expert Tree Company to purchase a plantation for each of eight Pleasanton elementary schools. They are presented during an Arbor Day training session presented by club members.

At our September, 2018 meeting the club voted to donate 10 plantations to honor the first responders to the many recent fires in our beautiful state. A vote was taken to choose the two forests where we would donate 5 plantations each. By popular vote we decided to send 5 plantations to the Shasta-Trinity National Forest in Redding, CA and 5 to the Mendocino National Forest in Porterville, CA.

Since then the club has donated 3 plantations in memory of Pat Burnett, Donald Bird (husband of Christine Bird) and Robert W. Kuenning (husband of Maudie Kuenning). In addition we have had members order gifts for 13 additional plantations to either honor their loved ones at Christmas or to memorialize a loved one. This means that since September 1 we have donated 27 plantations which total 71 plantations since we started the program. Big congratulations to each of you who have participated with either your change or a gift of a plantation.

In addition to donations made by the club, you can make private donations as Jeri Stark did this Christmas. She felt her children have everything they need and so she gave them each a certificate honoring them in the forests near Yosemite where they have spent many years at their grandparent's home. Giving back a bit for all the years of enjoyment for the many happy and fun filled days spent in the area. How it works:

• LAVGC can honor current or past club members, a member's life partner, or child by contributing funds to the USDA Forest Service.
• A club member may privately honor an individual by submitting a completed form along with a check for $68, payable to LAVGC.
• At each monthly meeting, the club collects change that is set aside for a time when a plantation is to be purchased to honor a club member.
• A PENNY PINES Certificate will be sent to inform the family of the location of the plantation.
• Nomination to be approved or denied by the LAVGC Executive Board within 60 days of receipt.
• The Executive Board may also direct purchase of a Penny Pines Plantation for other reasons.
• To obtain a form from the LAVGC Members Only section, signin, click 'Forms', click the 'Penny Pines' form you want.
• To obtain a form or for more information, please contact Jeri Stark. See the LAVGC Yearbook for Jeri's phone numbers.

Click to see the NGC Penny Pines information.