We are a small organization here in Rockport, Texas. In fact we have two counties for our organization, Aransas/San Patricio County Master Gardener Association.

Anyway, our demonstration garden includes a Children's Discovery Garden which has won state awards for the past few years. The MG that designed and take care of the CDG are retired school teachers which has been a great help.

Many school groups take guided tours of the CDG. We have even had some senior citizen groups that have toured the CDG.

We have a realatively new demonstration garden here in Collier County FL. It is designed one garden at a time, usually by a landscape architect. We are not very happy with the gardens because they have no programs to go with them. Tell me about your programs, please. We want to get the public and children involved but so far have very little response.
Marilyn

To Marilyn:
Our demonstration garden is part of a county-owned preserve that has been developed by the forestry service and the MG's. Besides our demo garden, there is a nature trail with native plants and trees which are identified with markers and other sites including an old schoolhouse, a pioneer farmhouse with gardens and a saw mill. We have Heritage Days when schoolchildren come to the site and and get to see demonstrations in these "old-timey" settings. We offer assistance to local schools with advice for landscape projects and we offer MG courses for teachers in the summer. They earn credit for the MG course. These are SOME of the things we do.

We have an ongoing project here in Victoria County, Texas. Our gardens (called VEG, Victoria Educational Gardens) are just past the first stages. We have put in a vegetable garden and a childrens garden. I was just there this morning, but will have to go back to take pics to show.

This is a big project. About $225,000.00 for the whole thing. Eventually it will include a Rose garden, water and bog garden, natives, shade, etc.,etc. We have done all the design work ourselves, as well as most of the physical labor.

I will post some pictures tomorrow.
Janie

Wow! That is a long answer. I'll just hit the high points. Our gardens surround the extension office on the IUPurdue campus. There are presently several different gardens worked by MGs and Friends of the Garden (people who want to be involved but for one reason or another can't become MGs) . We have a Vegi garden, a childrens garden(done by children in the youth MGs),an herb garden, a butterfly and bee garden, a cottage garden, a prairie, the Pastel Pathway, the trial garden, the woodland fen, the ornamental grass garden, the Everlasting and Cutting garden, the Propagation beds, moonlight garden, the Terrace-Hydrangea garden (which includes a pond and a greenroof)and the patio garden. There are several additional areas planted that don't yet have a particular theme that are cared for by rotation and need. We have at least three public tours each summer and will give group tours on request. We pay for the whole thing with plant sales and seminars with the occasional donation. Many nursries and other vendors donate material too. The gardens are designed by the group responsible or one MG chosen to do the design. Once I did a design for a new garden in 3 minutes flat and it was approved! The plan must be approved by the hortacultural agent. Sometimes he comes up with a project and assigns it to someone. Some gardens change every year. Groups frequently change membership for the usual reasons but some groups have stayed the same from the beginning which I think is very nice. Sandy

No pics on our site right now but I can share our plant list with the map and design

Kimmie

(Map)
http://leon.ifas.ufl.edu/images/Bed%20Locations%20Drawing.jpg

Here is a link that might be useful: Plant List

We maintain two grdens in the Tyler Rose Garden. One is the IDEA garden, which is a demonstration garden of plants that do well in East Texas. I'm not sure what the initial cost of the garden was, except that it ws a considerable amount for hardscaping & the garden shed, composting bins, etc. Half of it was funded by the Tyler Parks Department & the organization raised the other half through a variety of projects.

The other garden is the Heritage Rose garden which features antique & old grden roses. It was initially funded by the Gertrude Windsor Garden Club here in town (very rich people) but the MG group has been doing all he upkeep for about 5 years. Wwe are now about to ompletely re-do this garden with ne hardscaping & plantings & it's going to cost about $300K. Funding at this point is TBD