Your County Extension Office As An Information Source

One of the most overlooked - and yet most useful - sources of information for a homeowner can be obtained from their local County Extension Office.

The agents and personnel who work in these offices have basically one mission. That mission is to answer questions and to provide information to the residents of their County pertaining to the plant life in their County. If you live in a rural farming County, your County Extension Office will have lots of information on crops that farmers grow in the County. If, on the other hand, you live in the big city, your local County Extension Office will be able to provide you with extensive information on such things as: lawns, trees and shrubbery, and vegetable as well as flower gardening. Not only are they experts regarding the plant life, they are experts on the type of pests that are commonly found in the County. They are experts on plant pests such as dandelions, crabgrass, poison ivy and many others. They can often supply you with valuable information regarding insect pests such as mosquitoes, gypsy moths, fire ants and many other nuisance insects. Your local County Extension Office would probably be able to help you if you also had problems with animals such as deer eating your roses or moles tunneling through your lawn.

Your local County Extension Office is there to help you. If they can’t answer your question, there’s a good chance they can point you in the right direction. If you find an insect chewing on your tomato plants or your cabbage or your roses (or whatever it is you GROW), you can even take a sample insect to your County agent and ask for help in identifying what the insect is and how best to prevent its damage. And although you can find the phone number and call your agent (look under County Government in your phone book), I highly recommend that you pay a visit to your County’s Extension Office. I say this because most Offices are filled with small booklets and pamphlets regarding dozens and dozens of topics such as local soils, local pest alerts, local climate conditions, and how-to guides that cover everything from growing a beautiful lawn to proper rosebush pruning.

There are a lot of books about lawn and garden care and there is a lot of information that can be had over the internet regarding lawn and garden care. But these two sources will rarely be specific to the place where you grow your lawn or garden. Your local County Extension Office, however, is about as specific as you can get. Again, I highly recommend that you pay them a visit. I know they will be happy to see you and try their best to answer any questions you may have.

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