The Eisenhower National Historic Site includes a vegetable garden and greenhouses kept much as they were when President Dwight D. Eisenhower was in residence. Volunteers from the Senior Ranger Volunteer Corps and Adams County Penn State Master Gardeners plant and cultivate the Eisenhower vegetable garden. This year the Master Gardeners are offering three educational tours of the garden. They will be held at 9 a.m. the fourth Saturday in July, August, and September when the garden vegetables will be in or near a mature state.

Members of the public may arrange to participate in one of these tours by prior arrangement by emailing Bill Devlin, Master Gardener, at devlinw1@aol.com or by calling him at 717-642-9260. The group size will be limited to 12 per tour and participants will receive directions to the site by mail or e-mail. Please indicate in which newspaper you learned of this tour. Requests will be honored in the order received in two lists, given the different publishing dates of the two newspapers that print our Master Gardener articles.

The garden tour will focus on the role pH plays in gardening success, how to take soil samples, and where to obtain the Penn State soil test kits. A table of recommended pH levels for a variety of vegetables will be available in a handout. Also, test strips and pH meters will be demonstrated since these can be used to fine tune pH around particular vegetables. An example of this is Potato which needs a lower pH (4.5 – 6) and Asparagus which likes a higher pH (6.0 – 8.0). Please note that this garden tour does not include a tour of the Eisenhower home and farm.

Bill Devlin is a Penn State Master Gardner. Penn State in Adams County is located at 670 Old Harrisburg Road, Gettysburg, PA 17325; phone 334-6271.