Spring has to be the favorite time of year for gardeners. It’s a time when a lot of the things we love about being gardeners converge; being outside, prepping our garden, planning our garden, planting our new annuals, and watching our perennial favorites come back to life. But as gardeners, we are always on the lookout for something new of interesting for our garden, or something new to replace those plants that didn’t come back this year.

Shopping in the local garden center is a great way to see what’s out there and available, but what will that look like in our garden? It’s oftentimes hard to tell how that little, baby plant will look once it’s fully grown and established in the garden. To help answer those questions and hopefully give you some ideas, you need look no further than the annual Tulsa Master Gardeners Garden Tour.

This year’s theme is Landscapes of Love, and I’m sure each of this year’s five highlighted homes will reveal the reason for that theme. The tour homes are the homes of Tulsa Master Gardeners who have graciously agreed to open their landscapes and let you have a look. While these are the private gardens of Tulsa Master Gardeners, fellow Master Gardeners have been helping them get these gardens ready for you for several weeks now. As you can imagine, it’s quite a bit of work getting your garden ready for several hundred people to view.

One of the good things about participating in our garden tour is that you will come away with a variety of ideas for plants or strategies you might want to try in you home garden. These homes will not only have spaces that feature a variety of landscaping strategies, but you’ll see how these homeowners approach their sun and shade gardens, as well their herb and vegetable gardens. There is a place for everything and everything is in its place.

Many homeowners are doing their best to migrate their turf lawns to more natural landscapes using Native grasses and flowers. On this year’s tour, one of the homes features a prairie style of landscaping which includes Bluestem, Switchgrass and Dropseed grasses, select milkweeds, lavender and liatris.

Whatever your style of gardening or if you’re still working out your style, there’s something for everyone at this year’s tour homes. In addition, Master Gardeners will be at each location to answer any of your gardening questions.

This year’s tour will be next Saturday and Sunday on June 8^th and 9^th. The hours will be from 9:00 am until 5:00 pm on Saturday and then from noon until 5:00 pm on Sunday. Most of the homes are in the mid-town area so you won’t have far to drive to navigate between the homes.

You can purchase $10 advance tickets on our website (www.tulsamastergardeners.org) or at our office (4116 E. 15^th Street). During the Garden Tour you can purchase tickets at any of the tour homes for $15. Addresses will be posted on our website that weekend. Remember, this is a rain or shine event. We hope to see you there.

You can get answers to all your gardening questions by calling the Tulsa Master Gardeners Help Line at 918-746-3701, dropping by our Diagnostic Center at 4116 E. 15th Street, or by emailing us at mg@tulsamastergardeners.org. Photo: Steven Hall