Family Horticulture Day planned for April 29

Purple potatoes, red popcorn and giant green caterpillars – horticulture will go Technicolor at Family Horticulture Day on Saturday, April 29.

A variety of indoor and outdoor exhibits, staffed by Dane County master gardeners and Dane County 4-H youth and adult volunteers, will give visitors hands-on experience with horticultural science (but nobody has to handle the giant caterpillars).

The caterpillars (Manduca Tobacco Hornworms) eat tomato leaves and turn into hawkmoths – jumbo moths the size of hummingbirds. Scientists study Manduca as model organisms, a quick way to study the genes involved in how things grow. The purple potatoes, along with their red, pink, yellow, blue and white brethren, will be part of the Rainbow of Potatoes. Visitors can take home seed potatoes to plant. The red popcorn (along with white, yellow, purple and black) is part of the Popcorn Challenge. Take the challenge to figure out which makes the best popcorn.

In addition to giant green worms, purple potatoes and red popcorn, the indoor stations will offer visitors a chance to extract DNA from wheat germ, manipulate a micropipette to move a millionth of a liter of water, and use hydrogen peroxide to investigate the Foam Factor in seeds.

At the outdoor exploration stations, horticultural adventurers can learn about raising chickens in their own backyards, find out more about Dane County Extension’s Junior Gardening Program, tour the demonstration and herb gardens, learn how to use herbs for cooking and potpourri, and get ideas and advice from master gardeners. Visitors will also learn how to transplant tomato seedlings and successfully sow vegetable and flower seeds, and they can take the seedlings home for their own gardens.

The Soil and Plant Analysis Lab will offer an open house, including demonstrations and a question-and-answer session on how to collect soil and plant samples for analyzing lawn and garden soil fertility.

Family Horticulture Day is the finale of Science Expeditions 2006, a month-long series of public science events at the UW–Madison. The event will run from 10 a.m.-2 p.m. on Saturday, April 29, at the West Madison Agricultural Research Station, 8052 Mineral Point Road. The station is located about a mile west of the Beltline.