Home&Real Estate Home Front
LEARN TO ID TREES ... Cal Poly botany professor Dr. Matt Ritter will lead a free tree identification workshop and walk from 9 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. on Saturday, Sept. 1, beginning at Gamble Garden, 1431 Waverley St., Palo Alto. Information: Canopy at 650-964-6110 or www. canopy.org
How do you like them
OPEN HOME GUIDE 38
Also online at PaloAltoOnline.com
apples?
SEEDS AND A SALE ... UC Master Gardeners will present a free class called “Create Your Own Heirlooms: Seed Saving Basics” from 10 to 11 a.m. on Saturday, Sept. 1, at the Palo Alto Demonstration Garden, 851 Center Drive. They will discuss how to gather, process and store seeds of vegetables and ornamentals. The class will be followed by a fall vegetable plant sale, from 11:30 a.m. to 2 p.m. Included will be 10 varieties of lettuce, arugula, chard, kale, cauliflower and cilantro, all grown from seed by Master Gardeners. Information: Master Gardeners at 408-282-3105, between 9:30 a.m. and 12:30 p.m., Monday through Friday or http://mastergardeners.org WHAT’S COOKING? ... Hands-on cooking classes at Sur La Table, #57 Town & Country Village, Palo Alto, include: “Paella Workshop” (Will VanBrackle, Tuesday, Sept. 4, 6:30 p.m., $69); “Thomas Keller’s American Cooking” (Will VanBrackle, Wednesday, Sept. 5, 6:30 p.m., $85); “Country Cooking in Provence” (Michelle Marquez-Cino, Thursday, Sept. 6, 6:30 p.m., $69); “Secrets of Perfectly Prepared Fish” (Michelle Marquez-Cino, Friday, Sept. 7, 11 a.m., $79); and “Celebrating Food & Wine: Farmer’s Market Feast” (Will VanBrackle, Friday, Sept. 7, 6:30 p.m., $69). Information: 650-289-0438 or email Cooking073@surlatable.com FALL CLASSES ... Registration for Palo Alto Adult School’s fall quarter kicked off Aug. 17. Home-related offerings include: “Upholstering: Basic Techniques” (Marjorie DeBois, Ann Laveroni and Kathleen Koenig, Tuesdays, Sept. 11-Nov. 13, 9 a.m.-2:30 p.m., or Thursdays, Sept. 13-Nov. 15, 9 a.m.-2:30 p.m., $205); “Floral Design with Ikebana” (Thanh Kosen Nguyen, Tuesdays, Sept. 11-Nov. 13, 1-4 p.m., Greendell P2, $70); “Basic Slipcovering” (Kathleen Koenig, Wednesdays, Sept. 12-Nov. 14, 9 a.m.-2:30 p.m., $185); “Knitting” (Paola Trombetta, Wednesdays, Sept. 12-Nov. 14, 6:30-8:30 p.m., $126); “Gardening in Fall” (Sherri Bohan, Wednesdays, Sept. 12-Nov. 14, 10 a.m.-noon, Cubberley A-2, $50); “Sewing” (DeAnne Appleton, Wednesdays, Sept. 12-Nov. 14, 7-10 p.m., JLS Sewing Room 140, $70); and four woodworking classes from beginning to advanced. All classes are held at Palo Alto High School, 50 Embarcadero Road, Palo Alto, unless otherwise noted. Information: 650-329-3752 or PAAdultSchool. org N
UC Master Gardener Candace Simpson prunes an espaliered apple tree at the Palo Alto Demonstration Garden next to Eleanor Pardee Park. andace Simpson, a UC Cooperative Extension master gardener, likes her apples crisp and bountiful. As a lifelong educator, she’s eager to share how to make fruit trees prosper. “Home gardeners don’t maximize what they can get from fruit trees because they don’t give them the water and nutrition they need,” Simpson said recently at the Palo Alto Demonstration Garden next to Eleanor Pardee Park. That’s one of the key learnings she’d like home gardeners to take away from her upcoming series of classes through Palo Alto Adult School: Beauty and Abundance: Year-round Fruit from the Home Garden. Part I deals with pome fruits — apples, pears and quinces, as well as citrus; Part II with stone fruits — apricots, peaches, nectarines, plums, plus a few berries. Simpson, who grew up on an 83-acre fruit farm in Pennsylvania, knows that even an expert can slip up on fruit-tree care. “I had a Valencia orange tree that was healthy for 15 years, then it suddenly was dying,” she said, recalling that a friend
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Thriving in the Palo Alto Demonstration garden are apples, above, a pomegranate, left, and quince. Simpson’s first class series will focus on pome fruits, which include apples, pears and quince.
Gardening teacher shows how to get the most out of fruit trees by Carol Blitzer photographs by Veronica Weber
asked if she’d done everything she was supposed to. Well, actually, no, she admitted. So she turned back to her books, reading up on fertilizer, watering schedules and pest control. Then she started feeding and watering by the book. The next year the “dying” tree boasted dark, dark green leaves and was loaded with fruit. “The tree was able to get by for a long time with neglect,” she said, but re-learning how to care for it inspired Simpson to offer the classes. “Fruit trees are very forgiving, but there will be a moment when they start to decline. The goal is to get ahead of that moment,” she said. In class, Simpson will begin with a general introduction to planting fruit trees, and demonstrate her talk through Power Point slides. The first class of each series is identical, so those signing up for both could skip the intro class the second time around, she said. The classes are aimed at those interested in planting (continued on page 31)
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