Home gardeners — either novice or expert — will have a chance to get up-to-date gardening information to make the 2007 gardening season a success in a Spring Gardening Clinic on March 31 at the University of Arkansas - Fort Smith.

The free clinic will be held from 8 a.m. until 11:30 a.m. in the Latture Conference Center of the Business and Industrial Institute Building. Registration begins at 7:45 a.m.

In addition to the four scheduled speakers, the clinic will also feature displays of interest to gardeners. Refreshments and door prizes will also be provided.

Speakers include:

* Dustin Blakey will speak on “Gear Up for Gardening.” Blakey is county extension agent-agriculture, University of Arkansas Division of Agriculture. Blakey, who is located in Fort Smith, will give ideas and tips on growing the best vegetable and flower gardens. Blakey specializes in horticulture and answers questions of a biological nature. He also acts as an adviser to the Master Gardeners and other groups and dishes out garden wisdom in a monthly column in Entertainment Fort Smith magazine.

* Steve Owens will speak on “Top Ten Annuals and Perennials for Your Landscape.” Owens, an Oklahoma horticulturist with more than 20 years of professional horticulture experience, has been writer, producer and host of “Oklahoma Gardening” on OETA (Oklahoma Educational Television Authority) since 2001. The program reaches an estimated 175,000 viewers throughout Oklahoma and neighboring states. After the 2007 season, Owens will leave the show to further develop his specialty plant nursery, Bustani Plant Farm in Stillwater, Okla.

* Lacey Jennen, UA Fort Smith urban forester and arboretum director, will speak on “Tree Care.” Jennen started with UA Fort Smith in 2005 and manages the day-to-day care of the university’s urban forest, as well as the Arboretum master plan and Web site www.uafortsmith.edu/Arboretum. Jennen is involved in the Arkansas Urban Forestry Association and works part time with the City of Fort Smith Parks Department.

* Steve Dobbs, UA Fort Smith plant operations director and landscape coordinator, will speak on “Container Gardening Design.” Dobbs, who came to UA Fort Smith in 2002, has written 12 books and worked in a wide variety of horticulture-related fields, including the retail and wholesale nursery trade; landscape design, installation and maintenance; and in education as an extension horticulturist in both Oklahoma and Florida. He is also a previous host of the “Oklahoma Gardening” television program and currently serves as president of the Garden Writers Association.

Dobbs said the clinic, a public service offered by the university, is one that should be very helpful to area home gardeners.

“Our campus grounds are not only beautiful,” said Dobbs, “but they also support the educational mission of our campus. The many garden displays are great ways for gardening enthusiasts to get landscape ideas year round, and the clinics provide a more personal classroom setting to share ideas on practices that we use here on campus.”

For more information, call Dobbs at 788-7170.

source : www.uafortsmith.edu