Tuesday, November 4, 2025
7:00 - 8:00 PM PDT - Free Webinar, Open to All
Registration Required
8:00-9:00 PM PDT - Members Meeting
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Washington County Master Gardeners invite you to explore the current state of forest and tree health in NW Oregon. We will discuss tree species that are in decline and the ecological, economic, and social impacts of changing forests. We will also explore tree species that are thriving, including native species like Willamette Valley Ponderosa pine and incense cedar. Updates on pests and pathogens, including emerald ash borer and Mediterranean oak borer, will be provided. We will discuss resources and best practices for maintaining tree health.
This webinar will be presented by Sarah Low and Jake Barker, colleagues at OSU. Sarah is an Asst. Professor of Practice in the Dept. of Forest Ecosystems & Society and an Urban Forest Ext. Specialist for OSU Ext. Service. Jake Barker is the OSU Ext. Forester for Columbia, Washington, and Yamhill counties.
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The Tri-County Study Group had its Best Practices session last month. My contribution was that I have painted all my hand tool handles red. This is my solution to the lost-trowel-in-the-wood-chips problem. I just painted them this fall so they’ll have to go through a season before I know how well the paint wears.
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In terms of Chapter business – this month we vote on the Board positions that are turning over and in December we vote on the proposed budget for 2026 which you can review below.
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Things are already ramping up for 2026: Grow 1 Give 1 and the Gardenfest team are holding their first meetings. Please start thinking of where you’d like to be involved next year – and remember to pay your dues.
On a somber note, Jean Natter, a stalwart Master Gardener for many years, and mentor to many of us, died in September at age 91. An article about her many contributions will be coming out soon. In the meantime, you may leave a message for her family here: https://www.dignitymemorial.com/obituaries/portland-or/jean-natter-12549333
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Return Blue BottleDrop bags with the WCMGA label during that time and we will earn an extra 20% matching from BottleDrop. More information is available on their website. If you want some blue bags please reach out to Lisa Barnhart or visit the OSU Extension office.
Other ways you can help your Master Gardener association is by purchasing seeds from Renee’s Garden Seeds and signing up for Fred Meyer Community Rewards. Please see our donor page to support WCMGA
Thank you!
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View of future vegetable garden area
Creating a new Vegetable Garden at PCC Rock Creek
We plan to start the creation of a new garden space within the Education Garden at PCC Rock Creek, for growing vegetables. Our goal is to showcase edibles which our members consider significant, interesting, and/or lesser known. So if there is a vegetable you grow and have thought "why doesn't everyone grow this??", or there is an herb or vegetable you have always wanted to try growing, join us in planning, preparing and starting this new garden. The piece of land is about 8'x80', a berm on the south-east edge of the Ed Garden, shown in the picture above.
Our first meeting will be sometime in November, on Zoom. Contact Helen Dorbolo if you are interested, and to receive the zoom links and meeting details. We will discuss: Site conditions, Preparation needed, Timeline, and Budget.
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Blanket flower enjoyed by pollinators
New Fall Plantings Focus on Natives
Fall is an excellent time for planting and transplanting. Education Garden team members Susan Albright and Lisa Hansen were excited to receive the Ed Garden native plant order and start digging! Team members Lisa Barnhart, Elizabeth Price, Sue Ryburn, and Jack Shorr joined in the planting. Native perennials and bulbs, such as blanket flower (Galliardia arista) sea daisy (Erigeron glaucus), and Tolmie’s Mariposa lily (Calochortus tolmiei) were added to the Education Garden’s Pacific Northwest hedgerow and hedgerow extension in October.
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Salal and wild ginger were settled in a shady area of the Waterwise Garden
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Helen Dorbolo, shown here with healthy ornamental oregano
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Propagation wizard, Helen Dorbolo, will be starting annual seedlings of native Farewell-to-Spring (Clarkia spp.) for spring transplanting. Next year’s PNW Hedgerow will be bursting with colorful blooms that offer needed sustenance to local pollinators.
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Srinivasan donated this solar panel to the Education Garden
Education Garden Goes Solar
Thanks to the generosity and ingenuity of MG Lakshmi Srinivasan, and the visionary championship, patient diligence and coordination of Sue Ryburn, the Education Garden now has a functioning solar panel for charging our battery-powered garden tools. After careful planning and the approval of PCC Rock Creek staff, the solar panel was installed behind the Event Shed. Outlets for charging tools are in the back wall of the shed. It will be very convenient to recharge our batteries on site. Thank you Lakshmi!
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Unauthorized pruning in Education Garden
Mystery Pruner Inflicts Damage in Education Garden
It was a cool fall morning when MG Lisa Hansen arrived at the Ed Garden to a huge cart overflowing with branches. Strange. There were multiple branches from a ninebark, strawberry tree, and the bright blue branches of the Arizona cypress piled up.
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Note outer branches of ninebark have been cut
Upon locating their source, she found the previously vase-shaped form of the ninebark ruined, with its outer branches randomly hacked off. The adjacent strawberry tree (having been aesthetically pruned earlier in the year by pruning committee members) suffered multiple improper cuts to the west side branch structure.
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Arizona cypress branch stubs
Some large lower branches of the Arizona cypress were cut off, snow-in-summer ground cover had been removed, and branches of the Pacific wax myrtle were cut to create a “path” of sorts into the southwest Waterwise bed.
In-depth investigation ensued, and the evidence indicated the rogue pruner did their damage sometime between Saturday October 11 in the pm to Sunday October 12. Sue Ryburn notified multiple PCC Rock Creek staff involved in campus grounds oversight and maintenance. Although we knew a master gardener would not have done this unauthorized, improper pruning, we checked the logs, and no one had been working at the garden during the timeframe of the incident. Unfortunately, the investigation hit a dead end. The immediate remedy included removing the “stubs” from improper pruning cuts and hauling the organic waste to the PCC compost pile. New signage will be posted at the garden perimeter to instruct visitors to refrain from cutting or removing plants in the Education Garden.
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Bottle gourd thriving in the Moon and Moth Garden
Bottle Gourd Grows in Leaps and Bounds
The bottle gourd vines are ornamental and functional, providing shade when trained on arbors or trellises. Larina and Badri built a great trellis, and the gourd used it to climb onto the tree and spread its glory. It also produced quite a bit of fruit that was enjoyed by MGs and their families.
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Other Happenings
- In the Garden Series Plant Propagation by Hardwood and Softwood Stem Cuttings, Saturday November 15, 10 a.m. - Noon at PCC Rock Creek Building 4, Room 104, presented by Master Gardeners Helen Dorbolo, Karen Anderson and Cindy Muir.
- The next monthly Education Team Meeting will be held Wednesday November 19th from 6:00 – 7:00 pm. Watch your email for the agenda and Zoom link
If you’d like to join the Education Garden email list, contact Susan Albright albright.becker@gmail.com or Sue Ryburn sue@sueryburn.com
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The Learning Garden team has been working hard preparing for winter. Their efforts have included harvesting, planting, mulching with wood chips, and pruning throughout the space. With the beds now planted with a mix of fall crops and cover varieties, both the garden and Master Gardeners are gearing up for the colder months.
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Fall colors in the Carnivorous Plants bed. Photo courtesy of Anna Stubbs.
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Learning Garden Volunteers enjoying the garden during the end of season potluck. Photo courtesy of Anna Stubbs.
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With the help of a group of community volunteers organized through THPRD, ten cubic yards of fresh gravel were spread on the garden pathways in October. This will provide a more stable walkway for visitors in the garden and help with weed control. Thank you to Marilyn Berti for arranging for the gravel and volunteers and to Bob Campbell and Joe Porter for their expert advice on the material and process.
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Marilyn Berti (right) coordinating community volunteers hauling gravel. Photo courtesy of Anna Stubbs.
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Bob Campbell takes a quick break from spreading gravel. Photo courtesy of Anna Stubbs.
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Joe Porter compacting the gravel on the paths. Photo courtesy of Anna Stubbs.
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Planning is underway for the In-the-Garden classes and Intern workshops for 2026. Thank you to Annette Bell for coordinating and supporting the In-the-Garden classes every year and to all the volunteers who have offered to teach classes and workshops in 2026.
Regular work parties on Thursday mornings, 9 a.m. – 1 p.m. will be wrapping up for the season in November. For information about remaining work parties or work parties in the spring contact Steve Kister kansammy@yahoo.com or Robin Burnham robin.e.burnham@aol.com.
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Plant Propagation Work Group — PCC-Rock Creek Greenhouse
Raindrops keep falling on our heads, unless you’re in the greenhouse!
What’s not to like? While our plant propagation team works year-round, now that it’s the rainy season, we are grateful to work inside the PCC-RC greenhouse!
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With the seasonal change to cooler temperatures, we’ve moved many of our “tender” plants inside to overwinter.
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Wendy Whitebirch caring for an elderberry
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If plants could talk in the donation on a rainy Friday afternoon. greenhouse: “we’re back!”
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Many of the newly propagated plants-to-be will remain indoors until spring. We’ll continue propagating throughout the rainy season.
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Rick Johnson sets up leaf cuttings from a pineapple lily.
Why do we do gather at the greenhouse? Well, as mentioned, we can work inside during inclement weather. As a community, we share our passion about plants and learn new techniques for cloning plants. Since we added a slow release fertilizer to our leftover Gardenfest25 plants, we’ll continue repotting and caring for these plants over the next 4 months.
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Karen Johnson shows that our fertilized plants have gone wild and are in need a bit of root therapy!
Interested in joining our group to earn partner volunteer hours or as a community member? Contact Karen Anderson for details: worthog42@gmail.com
We need your help! We are still looking for a few hearty souls to help with our wholesale plant orders from local nurseries for Gardenfest. If you have an interest in working with a small experienced team to order these plants, please email Karen Anderson, worthog42@gmail.com
Propagation Class in November:
Helen Dorbolo, Cindy Muir and Karen Anderson will teach an In-the-Garden series class Saturday, November 15th at PCC-RC: PLANT PROPAGATION BY HARDWOOD AND SOFTWOOD STEM CUTTINGS Come join us to learn about “stick cuttings” and more. Click on this link for details: https://washingtoncountymastergardeners.org/event/plant-propagation-by-hardwood-and-softwood-stem-cuttings-2/
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Washington County Master Gardener Association invites you to the third of three classes on mason bees led by Ron Spendal. In this hands-on workshop, you will learn how to extract, clean, and store mason bees. If you have cocoons ready for cleaning, bring them along. If you don’t have cocoons, we have plenty for you to practice with. Attendance at the previous Mason Bee classes is not necessary to attend this class. No registration needed.
Ron Spendal is an OSU Master Gardener who has been researching and educating on mason bees for over 15 years. He operates educational mason bee displays across Washington County, Oregon and runs highly sought-after courses on mason bee management through the Washington County Master Gardener Association. Ron designs and builds his own equipment. He conducts research in conjunction with Oregon State University and Montana State University. His work with mason bees has been featured on the Oregon Field Guide program on OPB. Ron has invented a cocoon cleaning device that uses dry sand and can clean up to 100 cocoons in 3 minutes.
For more information:
https://washingtoncountymastergardeners.org/event/mason-bee-cocoon-cleaning-workshop-2/
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This month we’d like to recognize Sumathy Thandri, Jonina Weisz, and Mary Hewitt as Master Gardeners of Note for their work on the WCMGA Monthly Speakers Committee. The members of the Monthly Speakers Committee meet each year in late summer to schedule the following year’s speakers, who provide us with educational presentations before each of our ten chapter meetings (~monthly). After contacting, scheduling, and gathering information about the speakers and their presentations, Sumathy, Jonina, and Mary also provide support for each speaker as their presentation approaches as well as following up with them afterwards.
The Zoom presentations before our monthly chapter meetings routinely attract between 50 and 200 attendees, a mixture of Master Gardeners and members of the general public. Many of them count as Continuing Education credits towards Master Gardener certification, and cover a wide range of topics from OSU Extension initiatives and partner organizations, to soil health, landscaping, pest identification and control, growing edible plants in the home garden, and more. Past presentations are available on the WCMGA Youtube channel, where they continue to reach the public as well as being valuable resources for our Master Gardeners.
Thank you, Sumathy, Jonina, and Mary for your years of work on the WCMGA Monthly Speakers Committee!
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When: Monday Nov 17, meet at 10am
Where: Learning Garden at Jenkins Estate: 8005 SW Grabhorn Rd., Beaverton OR 97007
Opportunity
Come, help and learn how to take care of garden tools. Enjoy the camaraderie of fellow Master Gardeners at the beautiful Jenkins Estate.
What to wear and bring?
Dress according to the weather as you will be outdoors.
Hope to see you!
Our last event…was a a visit to the Plumper Farms Pumpkin Patch
Here is a photo of Lisa Barnhart’s grandson at the Plumpers Farm pumpkin patch
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Merrill Peterson has successfully taken on the monumental task of providing a comprehensive guide for more than 3,000 of the most common, interesting, and spectacular of the insect species in the Pacific Northwest. There are more than 1,225 wonderfully illustrative photographs of insects in the 10 divisions insect orders. He also uses anatomical drawings throughout his book. His descriptions of each species are enhanced by his essays which describe body, diet, development, reproduction, and estimates of their numbers in the world, North America and the Pacific Northwest. Where species might be confused with each other, Peterson provides tips for distinguishing them.
The color-coded sections are helpful guides for finding the information the reader is searching for. In addition to including all the identifying information, Peterson provides interesting and fascinating information for the reader. For instance, moths are a significant food source for grizzly bears in the Rocky Mountains to fatten them for their winter hibernation!
This book is newly available for reference in the library in the Master Gardener office at the Extension office.
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