Cooper County, MO - Environment

Our experience working with the Master Gardeners in Boonville was nothing less than wonderful and fantastic! As we arrived to Boonville and met out service coordinator, Jackie, she began to show us around our service site. Our service site was at the historic Cooper county jail house. Our job was to restore the garden behind the jail. Not only was the garden beautiful, but the maple trees were stunning due to their red and yellow leaves. After we met the rest of the gardeners, we began to work!
Many of us on the trip had little gardening experience prior, and it was incredibly fun and interesting to learn all about gardening and landscaping from the Master Gardeners. We planted new bushes, restructured the edging and raked up old leaves and weeds. After we completed our service Saturday afternoon, the garden looked totally different!

That night, our group received the opportunity to eat dinner with the Master Gardeners as well as other friends in the community. Jackie cooked us a delicious lasagna meal, and another friend made an apple crisp pie which was too good to imagine.

Sunday morning we were lucky enough to receive another home cooked meal for breakfast. After breakfast we ventured out to a huge garden nursery where we got to look and learn about various flowers, tress and plants. The man who owned the nursery also gave us a tour of his horse farm. A few of us were so fascinated by the plants and the nursery that we bought a little souvenir for ourselves to bring home and grow. 

After the nursery we returned back to the jail house garden and finished cleaning up the garden beds. After we were done, we were amazed by our progress and how much we learned in just two days. Our group was sad to leave. After making so many new friends with the Master Gardeners, learning new things and exploring Boonville, we felt as though we had been there forever. We are so lucky to have had this amazing experience in Cooper county, and we definitely plan to visit Boonville in the future!