Guadalupe River Park Conservancy Monthly Update

Adopt-a-Rose For Mother's Day! Give your mother something unique, personal, and truly meaningful this Mother’s Day. Adopt a rose in the San Jose Heritage Rose Garden and present your mom with a very attractive gift package containing potpourri made from rose petals from the Heritage Rose Garden, a chocolate truffle from Schurra’s Fine Confections, and a handmade bar of bee’s wax soap from the Sacred Bee. We’ll package these items for you, along with a card announcing the rose adoption, in an eye-catching gift box with a festive ribbon. This special gift package is available for $50.00, and includes the plaque with your personal message for mom installed by her rose for a full year. Order now and we will have the plaque with your special inscription made and installed in the Heritage Rose Garden by Mother’s Day. That way, Mother’s Day might include a visit to Guadalupe Gardens so she can see “her” rose! Click here to view photos of just some of the roses available for adoption! Call us at 408-298-7657 with questions. You can pay on-line, over the phone, or via check. May is a great month to experience the Heritage Rose Garden in full bloom. The Great Rosarians of the World named the Heritage Rose Garden as their first inductee into their Rose Garden Hall of Fame.  Join us on May 18th  for a ceremony in the garden commemorating the award (time TBD).		Follow Us On   GRPG FlickR Group
Window on the River Park Our eighth annual Window on the River Park fundraiser will be held on Wednesday, May 13th from 5:30 to 7:00 pm at the River Street Historic District Patio. We greatly appreciate Barry Swenson Builders for providing this opportunity to showcase yet another view of the park. We are also grateful for the support of our early sponsors: Gold: Barry Swenson Builder; Cisco Systems; City of San Jose; Kaiser Permanente, and Pacific Gas & Electric. Silver: Adobe Systems, Inc., San Jose Water Company, Service Performance Corporation, and Verde Design. Bronze: Bay Area Geotechnical Group; Boston Properties; Sheila and Dan Breeding; CH2MHill; Cornerstone Earth Group; Focus Business Bank; Garden City Sanitation, Heritage Bank of Commerce; Le Petit Trianon Theatre; Library World; Mineta Transportation Institute; Rotten Robbie; Salas O’Brien Engineers; Santa Clara Valley Water District; Seven Flags Automotive Care Network; and The Schoennauer Company. Sponsorship opportunities are still available, and individual tickets ($125) can be purchased at www.grpg.org or by calling 298-7657.
Bike to Work Day Guadalupe River Park Conservancy will once again host an Energizer Station for Bike to Work Day on May 14th from 6-9:30 am. Look for us on the trail adjacent to the office.
Quilts & Textiles' Exhibition Guadalupe River Park Conservancy is a co-presenter of the San Jose Museum of Quilts & Textiles' exhibition Reservoir: John M. Walsh III Collects. This exhibit is helping to raise awareness about water issues. Of particular interest: May 17, Sunday, 2 – 4pm The Rising Tide – Climate Change and San Francisco Bay Wetlands, a lecture by Adam Parris and Raising Environmental Awareness for Water through Textile Art, a lecture by fiber artist and environmental activist Linda Gass.
Critter Update Someone abandoned a young, healthy rabbit at our office the Monday after Easter.  We’ve named him Patch - he’s now our office mascot and a big hit with the students who come through on field trips and just about anyone else who visits. Guadalupe Grazers will be baaack in the orchard soon.  Some members of the prior flock developed a taste for the trees so they had to be removed prematurely. We’re told the spring lambs will focus on the weeds.
Free Compost The loose compost distributed at our Spring in Guadalupe Gardens event wasn’t up to the usual standards so Green Waste graciously offered to contribute another bin on Saturday, May 16th.  This is a BYOB (bring your own bag or bucket) offering.  Speaking of Spring in Guadalupe Gardens, help us improve the event by taking a brief survey: http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=tMn8aUEjVxudxk4f8XibJg_3d_3d Fill out the survey for a chance to win a $20 Target gift card.

Education
For more information, contact our Education Coordinator, Linda McCabe

How does your garden grow?
Friday, May 8th
3:30 – 5:00pm
$10/ members, $15/ non-members 
Ages: 5-10
Maximize the magic and minimize the chores to bring out the green thumb in your kids! Warm spring days are a perfect time to celebrate the season with Friends of Guadalupe River Park & Gardens and learn how flowers are grown from seeds, soil and the sun.  Decorate your own clay pots and plant flower seeds to take home, and watch them grow.  We will take a nature walk through the Guadalupe Heritage Rose Garden and use our senses to see good bugs and bad bugs and smell beautiful flowers.  See if you can spot wild flowers in the park and learn their names.  Come celebrate this beautiful time of year and inspire the little gardener within your children!

Crazy about Citrus!
Saturday, May 9th
9:30 – 11:30am
$15/ members, $25/ non-members 
Instructor:  Nancy Garrison
Would you like to eat home grown citrus any time of the year? Join Friends of Guadalupe River Park & Gardens as we learn all of the many types of citrus fruits that can be grown in this area. You’ll benefit from Nancy’s many years of experience as she explains how to control the size of various dwarfing rootstocks. Learn about less known citrus’ like citron and kumquats, and those used for drinks such as Bouquet de Fleurs and Calamondin. Nancy directed research trials with the Master Gardeners of Santa Clara County and grew fruit trees at the Rare Fruit Orchard at Prusch Park for years. She will pictorially cover the varieties of our area and have seasonal fruit for tasting, come satisfy your taste buds!

Healthy Soils, Healthy Gardens!
Saturday, May9th
1:00am – 3:30pm
$40/ members, $60/non-members
Instructors:   Theresa Lyngso & Alrie Middlebrook
Down in the ground, hidden from view, is a whole universe of living organisms! Join Friends of Guadalupe River Park & Gardens and speakers Theresa Lyngso and Alrie Middlebrook as they discuss ways to greatly boost your garden's health through increasing biological life. There is essential life you can either support or undo through your gardening practices. Learn how to increase and nurture the aerobic organisms that make fertile soil and how to garden with California native plants to regain soil health. When you have a healthy soil food web the plants in your garden will be much healthier and the food more nutritious for you and your family. 

Theresa Lyngso, president of Lyngso Garden Materials, Inc for over 20 years has come to understand that life in the soil may hold the answers and solutions to current challenging situations. Alrie Middlebrook, of the California Native Garden Foundation and Middlebrook Gardens, has been using native California plants to bring beauty and native habitat to the garden, for over 20 years.

AND COMING UP IN JUNE!!!!
Check it out!
Yoga classes starting in June
Author Amy Stewart is coming June 18th

Don’t forget to register for:

River Day Camp!
June 22 – 25th
9:00am – 1:00pm
$40/ per day
Parents – still looking for something fun for your children to do this summer? Are they ready to build a solar cooker to make a snack, solve an animal crime using detective skills, or explore the Guadalupe River Park by bicycle? Join Friends of Guadalupe River Park & Gardens for River Day Camp the week of June 22-25, where you build a summer camp that is right for you. Open to children ages 5-10. Pre-registration required.

All events will be held at the Guadalupe River Park & Gardens Visitor & Education Center, located at 438 Coleman Avenue, San Jose.  Reservations are required for all programs and space is limited so reserve your spot early by contacting us at education@grpg.org or 408-298-7657.

Volunteering
For more information, contact Volunteer Coordinator, Lucy Perez

We'll be cleaning our adopted section between Coleman and HW 880. If you'd like to join us, just call Phil at 408-298-7657. We can only take 10-15 people for this site, but there are many other sites that could use help. To see a list of other sites, click here!

Water Wizard Festival Volunteers
are needed for several aspects of this festival for 300 local third grade students and their teachers to make it successful. You'll have a great time and will get to be a part of an incredible learning experience for local children about the importance of water on Earth. Positions needed are as follows:

Tuesday, May 19        2:00-5:00 PM                         
Set-up canopies and booth spaces.

Wednesday, May 20    8:00 AM -10:00
Finish set up of canopies, greeting buses, work info booth, and direct schools groups to first activities.  

Wednesday, May 20       8:30 AM – 12:00PM
Help with activity booths, assisting with river tours and lunch area, keeping activities on time, first-aid and info booths at the festival.

Wednesday, May 20          1:30-4:00 PM                            
Clean-up the festival area.

The Water Wizard Festival will be held in the lawn area next to the Visitor Center at 438 Coleman Avenue in San Jose.  If you have any questions, please call Linda McCabe or Lucy Perez at 408-298-7657.

Office Volunteers
A variety of volunteer opportunities exist in our office at the Visitor & Education Center.  Activities include clerical work, answering the phones, organizing the library, preparing materials for educational programs, greeting visitors, etc. We presently have openings Monday and Wednesday afternoon and anytime Thursday and Friday. Please call us to review a convenient schedule for you. Our office hours are Monday-Friday 8:30-5:00.

Volunteer Profiles

Guadalupe River Park Conservancy Board Member: Jim Alves Jim is a third generation Santa Clara/San Jose resident. While working his way through high school and college at the family business, Jim developed a fond interest in automotive repairs and care. He joined his father Tony in 1978 at Hardcastle Brothers Autobody after graduation from Santa Clara University’s School of Business. Together they transitioned their shop to the third generation while diversifying into other associated business ventures. Jim has worked with local vocational training centers through out his career. He currently serves as a member of the Plant Master Plan Community Advisory Group for the San Jose/Santa Clara Water Pollution Control Plant. As a business neighbor, literally “in the Guadalupe Gardens” since the earliest inception, Jim is thrilled to see the growth and ongoing progress of the gardens. Jim hopes to bring his small business management skills as well as his love for the outdoors, especially gardening, to Friends of Guadalupe River Park and Gardens.

Meet Terry Fergus Terry Fergus is one of our newest Education Volunteers. She moved from Greenock, Scotland to San Jose, CA, 26 years ago to get married and she has been volunteering ever since!  Along the way, she and her husband have raised 2 boys...one still in school at West Valley and the other recently graduated with a Biology degree from UC Davis. Terry's love of the outdoors is apparent from her hobbies: birding and photography.  She’s the type of volunteer that quickly understands what needs to happen and jumps in to help.  Her enthusiasm and Scottish accent help captivate the kids.