Our members know that being in the garden is an invigorating mood booster, stress reliever, and energy enhancer that creates a peaceful feeling of well being. On our fun and amazing Members Organic Garden Tour, we toured four members gardens. Our first stop was at Tracy’s beautiful Veggie Garden in her ¾ acre yard. She is a Garden Consultant, Tracy by the Yard, that helps folks to spruce up their yards and prepare home landscapes for real estate photography.

Tracy displayed many different containers for her veggies to be able to freshen the soil every year. She put her salad greens in a shallow pot with tomatoes in 15 gallon pots under mosquito netting in a greenhouse frame.

Tracy showed us many techniques she uses to deter critters and pests in her garden. She likes this battery powered sprayer that she uses with neem oil, soap, and water for aphids, powdery mildew, fungus gnats, and black spot. To keep rats and squirrels out of her tomatoes, she puts wire around them and a flat held by a rock on top. She also has bird netting and mosquito netting. She uses gopher cages underneath and on top of her veggies.

She planted potatoes in grow bags, and she put some tomatoes and carrots in large grow bags with tomatoes in large pots; she buried some pots of tomatoes in her raised bed with an A Frame Trellis; It made a lovely display!

Tracy has several compost bins and a huge compost pile. She’s been creating rich organic soil for over twenty years, continually feeding and nourishing her soil and the living organisms in it with compost rich in organic matter.  Compost improves soil structure, retaining more water and giving plant roots room to grow. It aids in carbon sequestration and contains natural antibiotics that enhances the plants resistance to pests and diseases. 

The second stop on our Members Garden Tour was at Jeanette’s house with her stunning drought tolerant and native plant landscape for her front yard.

Jeanette removed her lawn and created an inspiration for her neighborhood. Her pollinator garden is a place for happy butterflies, birds, and bees.

In her backyard, Jeanette created brick pathways among her drought tolerant and native plants.

Bill told us wonderful stories of his adventures with fruit trees. He grows macadamia nuts and lychee fruit amid natives and drought tolerant plants in the front yard!

The macadamia tree is behind where Bill is standing with containers and irrigation hoses for members to take home. The lychee tree is covered in blossoms and forming baby fruits. On the side of Bill’s house, he showed us how he had added more grafts to his avocado tree that already had four varieties grafted to it!

He has 29 different fruit trees including fig, mango, peach, nectaplum, avocado, pear, and several grape vines. Bill has grafted about 50 varieties of apples on 8 apple trees with 17 varieties of apples blooming for the first time this year! One apple tree has 12 different yummy apple varieties surrounded by lovely alstroemeria to attract pollinators and keep the weeds away!

Our fourth stop and last stop on our Members Garden Tour was at Nancy’s incredible flowering raised bed fruit and veggie garden. She interplanted her wildflowers, herbs, veggies, and fruit in a blaze of color!

 Nancy planted her tomatoes, squash, beans, peppers, and peach tree among herbs and wildflowers next to her Meyer lemon and Valencia orange trees.

Nancy told us how she designed her landscape, built the beds, and offered us clippings and zinnia starters to take home. We had organic lemonade and organic homemade cookies. The soothing waterfall danced delightfully amid the flowers, creating a space for us to tune into the natural world.