Who are Tennessee Master Gardeners?

Tennessee Master Gardeners (TMG's) are trained volunteers that help the Extension Service share the latest and greatest gardening information! All volunteers are trained with 40 hours of horticultural classes and return 40 hours of volunteer community service through their Extension office.

State-wide there are approximately 2,000 active Master Gardeners in 46 counties. Master Gardeners who continue to participate in the program return at least 25 hours of service with a minimum of 8 continued education hours annually.

Nationally, there are approximately 80,500 active Master Gardeners volunteers in US and Canada with an estimated 3,365,870 volunteer hours (2005 statisitcs).

The Master Gardener Program is offered by The University of Tennessee Extension. Its main goal is to increase the availability of horticultural information to improve quality of life with community garden/landscape programs. This could only be possible through the training and utilization of local volunteers. These volunteers, known, as Master Gardeners, aid the Extension Service by running plant clinics; answering phone requests for horticultural information; establishing and maintaining demonstration gardens; working with the handicapped, youth, the elderly, and other special groups in the community; designing and implementing community involvement projects; as well as coordinating Master Gardener training programs.

The purpose of the Master Gardener program is to train citizens as horticultural-educated volunteers of The University of Tennessee Extension and the Tennessee State Cooperative Extension Program to work in partnership with their counties to expand the educational outreach by providing home gardeners with researched-based information.