This is the third time that the Master Gardeners of Greene County will host the statewide conference in Springfield since the formation of their group in 1985.
The event will include tours of local parks and home gardens, a wide array of educational speakers focusing on
gardening topics. The keynote address will be given by Mitch McCulloch. Mitch’s new book “The Seed Hunter” will be available for a signing event before and after the address. This book highlights his time with Baker Creek Seed where he traveled the world searching for new seed varieties. Mitch also has an extensive background in vegetable production from his native English origins as well as culinary farm-to-table cooking with the fresh produce.
Vendors will also be available for on-site shopping. This event is open to both the public and Master Gardeners. For details and pricing information, please visit: https://staging.mggreene.org/2026-missouri-master-gardener-conference
Transcript
Kelly McGowan: Hello, everyone, and welcome to Growing the Ozarks. This is your host, Kelly McGowan with University of Missouri Extension. Today my guest is Angie Hutsell, member of the Master Gardeners of Greene County. Welcome, Angie.
Angie Hutsell: Thank you. It's great to be here.
McGowan: So the Master Gardeners of Greene County have an exciting opportunity coming up that we're going to share with you today, and that is the state Missouri Master Gardener Conference. And Angie is the chair of this conference and this is a conference that even though it is a Master Gardener conference, it is open to the public as well as master gardeners. And we've got a lot of great stuff that people can partake in. So, Angie, tell us a little bit about the keynote speaker for this conference.
Hutsell: Well, the keynote speaker for the conference is Mitch McCulloch. And Mitch McCulloch is a London-born former chef. He's turned into an author and a seed hunter. He's dedicated to preserving rare and endangered heirloom vegetables. And he's widely recognized for his work in regenerative agriculture and efforts to protect global food biodiversity. He's a really cool guy.
McGowan: Yeah, absolutely. And people are more interested than ever in growing their own food. And he focuses a lot on cool season vegetable production and cooking with that. So I'm really excited to hear him speak.
Hutsell: Yeah, he's going to be awesome.
McGowan: Absolutely. So in addition to this, there are some tours that people can partake in. And I'm really excited about these tours and I think others should be too, because these are tours of some of our local parks, but also people's backyards. And can you tell us a little bit about what people might see on some of these tours?
Hutsell: Absolutely. We have three different tours with approximately five to seven stops on each of those tours. One of the tours is going to go to the Baker Creek Seed Warehouse in Seymour. Also going to the Springfield Community Gardens headquarters here in Springfield. There are homes that are full of native plants, shade garden plants, excellent examples of beautiful, easy and more difficult examples that people could get some good inspiration from. And there's a water garden on the tour. We're definitely going to highlight our Master Gardener demonstration gardens. The tours will also go to the city gardens in the center of Springfield And we just want to highlight all of the beauty that we have here in the Ozarks on these tours, right.
McGowan: And the, you know, the purpose of these tours is to give people ideas of things that they can grow in their own backyard and to see some beautiful gardens they might not otherwise get to see. So, yeah, some really good stuff there. So another aspect of this conference is there are a lot of really incredible educational speakers, and this is going to cover a lot of different topics under that gardening umbrella. And you're not going to want to miss some of these speakers. So can you tell us a little bit about what some of those other class options are?
Hutsell: Yeah. We have oh gosh, I can't even count them all. Um, we have vegetable gardening, herb gardening, pollinators, native plants, um, naturescaping, rain scaping, all kinds of, um, different ways to reserve and preserve our resources here in not just the Ozarks, but on this planet. And we have some very good, very smart educators that are going to bring some of that to us and help us learn to be better stewards of our land and our and our resources.
McGowan: Right. And there's going to be a lot of incredible speakers in this one spot during this event. And speakers you might not get to hear in other places. So that in and of itself is going to be a great reason to attend this conference and hear some of these incredible speakers. Now, a couple of other things, kind of notes of interest on this conference. So it is going to be June 4th through seventh in Springfield at the Oasis Convention Center. We will have all of the details and pricing information at ksmu.org. There's also going to be vendors on site, on site for shopping. Um, so there's going to be that available as well. But this is also going to be a good time to network with other gardeners and plant enthusiasts from around the state, make new like minded friends, learn some new things, and hopefully find some things people can do in their own backyards.
Hutsell: Absolutely. The, um, the fact that we have this right here in our own backyard here in Springfield, Missouri, is just incredible. And I hope that as many people who are interested are able to come and, um, and come and learn with us. It'll be great.
McGowan: All right. Angie, thanks for joining us today.
Hutsell: You're welcome. Thanks for having me.
McGowan: And this has been Kelly McGowan, your host with Growing the Ozarks. You can find more information about this episode at ksmu.org or wherever you get your podcasts.
