Green Thumb Times – September 2025

Greetings readers—what an exciting month we’ve had! The gardens are bursting with bounty right now: the corn has grown over seven feet tall, the Burbank Stringless green beans are producing almost daily (we’ve even managed to keep a few…though many mysteriously vanish overnight), and the apples and Burbank plums are ripening beautifully.

Each month I could easily fill pages with everything our gardening team accomplishes—but here are just a few highlights to share, along with photos that capture their work

New Hose Reel Installed

A longtime gardener we affectionately call MacGyver creatively built a sturdy mounting board for an old wall-mounted hose reel we discovered in the maintenance yard. Now, instead of dragging and coiling a heavy hose, gardeners can easily roll it up after watering. A small change, but a big improvement—thank you!

Courtyard Glow-Up In Progress

One of the loveliest spaces in our garden is the Courtyard, once a favorite spot for quiet reflection by Elizabeth Waters Burbank. We’ve been wanting to refresh and beautify this area for some time, and one of our gardeners has begun leading the effort. A full feature will come in a future issue—but for now, enjoy this stunning succulent bowl he created for the space.

A Golden Path Forward

Since stepping into the Garden Coordinator role in January 2024, I’ve set some ambitious goals for upgrading this special place. We began with the rose garden in 2024, added a meandering path in spring 2025, and last month—on August 8, 2025—two major dreams came true.

We are honored to share that Burbank Gardens was chosen as the 2025 California Landscape Contractors Association (CLCA) Community Improvement Project Recipient! Thanks to the CLCA North Coast Chapter and many generous donors, the pathways in our Northern and Southern Demonstration Beds were completely renewed with beautiful golden decomposed granite (“DG”).

This project was truly a community effort. Dibble Landscape Director of Operations—and CLCA board Secretary—Taylor Brown has a longtime connection to our gardens. Taylor and I first worked together during our SRJC Landscape Design program on a site improvement project here. So when she later approached me with the news that Burbank Gardens was on the shortlist for this year’s CLCA project, I was thrilled.

Our original DG pathways hadn’t been refreshed in decades, and keeping them neat and weed-free was always a challenge. As the saying goes, a picture is worth a thousand words—so be sure to check out the before-and-after photos of this landmark project.*

*Before and after photos in this section by our very own gardener, Andy.

Irrigation Upgrade – A Great Start

In addition to new pathways, our irrigation system received a major upgrade thanks to Hunter Irrigation, who donated a brand-new programmable, weather-sensor controller. Our previous system, more than 30 years old, required frequent manual operation. The new controller is such a leap forward it deserves its own featured story—which you’ll see in our next edition. For now, enjoy these before-and-after photos!

Thank You!

We are deeply grateful for everyone who contributed: our sponsors, donors, and volunteers—including a few of our own volunteers, Louie and Andy.  They delivered lasting improvements to our gardens.

In all, our sponsors contributed nine yards of DG, all the equipment and installers, many volunteers, a new Irrigation Controller and Wifi Extender, and even provided breakfast and lunch for everyone! 

Special thanks to our generous supporters who made it all possible:

✨ The gardens continue to grow and shine, thanks to this incredible community effort.