March 17, 2020 Pesticide Safety

March 17, 2020 Master Gardener Class 2020

Greetings Master Gardeners,

Great job logging into class today. I hope it all went smoothly on your end. Don’t hesitate to let me know if there’s anything I can do to make this work well for you. The handouts for next Tuesday will be going out in the mail tomorrow.

I just recorded a very short review of the small fruits quiz. I’ll share it along with the class recording from today when they are ready. Zoom is taking a long time to process recordings right now (I’m still waiting for a 3min video that I did last night).

Important recap from the pesticide safety session

Be sure to spend time reading the label of any pesticide product (do not make any assumptions).
Always ask questions if you are unclear about any aspect of a pesticide. You can either call me or the Maine Board of Pesticides Control.
Be sure to never offer verbal pesticide recommendations when serving as a Master Gardener Volunteer. Feel free to direct people to our office or our online resources if they would like pesticide recommendations for specific situations.

Mentioned in class

Pesticide Residue Study https://www.ams.usda.gov/datasets/pdp
Obsolete Pesticide Disposal (mark your calendar to sign up in September)
Browntail moth removal (helpful video)
I’ll eventually share the info that John said he’d research along with the resource on essential oils that he mentioned (I couldn’t find it on their website).

Homework

1) Please read Soil and Plant Nutrition: A Ga r dener ’s Pe rspective and Testing Your Soil.

2) Review the listing of resources in the Soils Chapter and choose at least one other resource in the chapter to read or view. Be ready to let me know what you enjoyed checking out!

No quiz this week.

The technology adventure continues!

If all goes well, I’ll host a Facebook live session on garden planning this Thursday evening around 7:30pm on the Rogers Farm Demonstration Garden FB page. It will be very informal. Questions are welcome in advance via email or during the session. Here’s hoping it will be helpful and fun!