Museum of Southwestern Biology Field Trip by Brandt Magic For the second year in a row, the Museum of Southwestern Biology at UNM (http://msb.unm.edu/ ) welcomed Sandoval Extension Master Gardener interns to view their world-class insect collection. The museum’s Arthropod collection is the most extensive in the southwest and includes a large number of the over 20,000 describe species in New Mexico. Dr. David Lightfoot, collection manager, spoke about the science of entomology (the study of insects). He talked about how he has worked at the museum studying insects and for Fish and Game d ..read more

What I learned at the 2024 “Think Trees NM” Conference by Ed Chappelle The nuts and bolts of Tree Culture was the focus of the 38th Annual Urban Tree Care Conference February 8th – 9th, 2024. You need to think of being on “Tree Time” when evaluating tree issues. It’s a little bit like island time, but much, much longer. Starting with proper tree selection for the landscape and soil conditions, followed by proper planting. Examine the root ball after removing ALL transporting material such as burlap and wire cages to insure the roots were not container bound. If root bound cut the circling ro ..read more

Meg Buerkel Hunn, Advisory Council Chair I wrote about the GROWTH mindset last year…  you’ll recall that I loved that my daughter’s third grade teacher taught her students the Yeti Way: changing definitive statements and ‘fixed mindsets’ into opportunities to grow and change.  In the Yeti Way, ‘I cannot do long division’ becomes ‘I cannot do long division YET!’  In the Growth Mindset, we always have the opportunity to learn and grow and change – and this does not stop when we finish school years (and long division)! I am still learning that there is a TON of gardening knowled ..read more

Santa Ana Nursery Field Trip by Brand Magic Mike Halverson, native plant expert, just hosted a fascinating field trip for the Sandoval Extension Master Gardeners. 40 Master Gardeners, interns, and mentors toured the green houses and the outdoor growing areas. Species grown at the nursery are primarily native to New Mexico and grown from seed collected regionally by Mike and his staff. The nursery mission includes support of pueblo farmers, cultivation of traditional plants used ceremonially, and species grown for restoration projects on native land and areas managed by the National Park Serv ..read more

Down and Dirty with Rachel Dusty tan. Red. Burnt orange. Bright orange. Dark brown. Grey. Green. Pink. The 800-mile journey from Corrales, New Mexico to Fayetteville, Arkansas brought with it four states, two time zones, 733 miles on I-40 East, one-and-a-half audiobooks, and a changing color palette. The sagebrush-spotted landscape and tan sandy soil of New Mexico and East Texas changed into rocky, red soil with slightly denser vegetation sometime in Texas, which morphed to burnt orange soil a little before Oklahoma City.  (The precise boundaries are a little blurry in my head.) Then n ..read more

Meg Buerkel Hunn, Advisory Council Chair I think January is hard… I adore December.  December traditions don’t leave a lot of time to contemplate like or dislike, we just go-go-go.  There is one December thing always that delights and inspires hope in me:  the lights people put up in December.  Throughout the entire month, I drive different routes just to see the way people light up the darkness – those lights are like twinkling grace… gifts freely given to and for the rest of us. But, then, in January, they come down, and the world is dark again.  It sort of matche ..read more

Down and Dirty with Rachel Animal pulling reeds The grass was alive. Okay, maybe that’s obvious, but I mean “alive”, like “Frankenstein alive”. I heard a rustle along the ditch bank and saw some dried, short reeds and a few sprigs of grass moving back and forth, sticking out of a layer of leaves. I bent closer to see what animal was moving amongst them and realized there was no animal amongst the reeds. One or two reeds at a time, an inch at a time, were being pulled into the earth. The animal was below the reeds, not amongst them. By morning, the clump of reeds and grass had been reduced ..read more

Meg Buerkel Hunn, Advisory Council Chair Six weeks ago, I planted out garlic for next year. Two weeks later, I put in hundreds of spring bulbs. I don’t think I have memory loss yet, but I sure don’t have any recollection of where I put either the garlic or those spring bulbs…  I guess I’ll know come spring time. This is a “don’t do as I do” post!  As well as a gift-giving idea for the upcoming holiday.  A challenge post.  A New Year’s Resolution in the makings.  I don’t know. But I do know I wish I knew where those things were planted so I could plant around them, a ..read more

Down and Dirty with Rachel Fire the weathermen. Hire my knee. The other evening, my knee was swollen, which is a good predictor of rain. Apple Weather had clear skies the entire following day. It sprinkled on me when I was running the next morning. I once impressed a host sister in Morocco when I told her there would be wind or rain the next day. We got both. I acquired the skill most often associated with gramps and grannies sitting in rockers on their porches at age fifteen, when I tore my ACL. Any doubts I had about their ability to predict the weather fell away. Our environment affects ..read more

Meg Buerkel Hunn, Advisory Council Chair Just the other day, my daughter’s piano teacher lamented about the growing darkness – and how this time of year, especially after the clocks change, makes her want to ‘hibernate.’   Indeed, as the days get cooler and daylight shrinks there is a feeling all around of slowing down, like a big tired sigh… For many of us, the gardens have been ‘put to bed,’ and hopefully the flowers and fruits of our labor have been good and gathered and enjoyed, eaten, and/or preserved by now.  We can rest (hibernate) for a time, at least until the holida ..read more