Master Gardener 1997 – 2004
Earl completed his Master Gardener training in December, 1997. He received his certification in 1998. He retired as a Master Gardener in 2004. During this time Earl was extremely active in volunteer activities on behalf of the Guadalupe County Master Gardeners. Earl spent four hours on Thursday afternoons on the Master Gardener phone line until the program was replaced by a live Radio Lawn & Garden Show in September of 2000. Earl was instrumental in the development of the community garden maintained by the Juvenile Detention Department. He spent several cold Saturday mornings in 2002 helping to con- struct the raised beds utilized by this program. As a conse- quence of the work of Earl and other Master Gardeners with the youth in the detention center, the garden produced over 2,000 pounds of fresh vegetables during the first year of production. These vegetables were donated to the Seguin Food Bank.
During Earl’s tenure as a certified Master Gardener, he volunteered at the Seguin/Guadalupe County Library to improve their landscape. He was responsible for getting the Library’s mainte- nance company to stop “Crape Myrtle Murder” on the trees along the perimeter of the site. He also was active in the renovation and maintenance of the landscape beds at Max Starke Park until the city took over maintenance of those beds. Earl was an active director of TMGA from 2001 – 2004.