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Loomis celebrates agricultural heritage with Fruit Shed Fest, formerly Eggplant Festival

Placer master gardeners present Fall Open House in sync with community event

Sacramento Digs Gardening
BY Kathy Morrison PUBLISHED OCT 3, 2024

Loomis, long known as a fruit-packing center, celebrates that tradition this Saturday with the Fruit Shed Fest. This mural in town depicts one of the many fruit crate labels used back in the day. Kathy Morrison

Loomis, a town with a rich agriculture tradition, will pull out all the stops Saturday, Oct. 5, to celebrate the harvest and the history in Placer County.

The Fruit Shed Fest takes over from the former Eggplant Festival as Loomis' big community event. Music, contests, food, vendors and more will be part of the fest.

Here's how the Loomis Chamber of Commerce explains the change:

"Formally known as the Loomis Eggplant festival, this event has always been about celebrating our community’s agricultural roots and promote a community focused on health and wellness, and the Fruit Shed Fest allows us to broaden that celebration.

"This rebranding not only honors our Town’s history but also embraces the future, welcoming a more inclusive and diverse representation of our local produce, our beloved fruit sheds, and downtown district. It will allow for a unique opportunity to revitalize interest and attract a larger, regional audience."

Built in 1926, the Historic High-Hand Fruit Shed is at the center of town, now the site of shops selling jewelry, olive oil, flowers and garden decor, artwork and the like. In the High-Hand complex there also are a brewery, a cafe and a nursery.

The festival runs from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., centered at Loomis' historic Train Depot, 5775 Horseshoe Bar Road. In between those hours, the festival will include a chalk art contest, an apple pie baking contest, music by bands including the Sierra College Jazz Band, a kids activity zone and plenty of food trucks and vendors. Admission and parking are free.

Just up the street, on the Loomis Library grounds, the Placer County master gardeners will hold their Fall Open House in their Demonstration Garden from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Admission is free.

The Fall Open House will feature two live presentations by master gardeners: at 10:30 a.m., a look at container gardening with California native plants; and at 11:30 a.m., a discussion of California native seed saving and sowing.

There will be activities for children, plus the Miridae Mobile Nursery will be on site for sales of California native plants. The California Native Plant Society's local chapter will have a booth, as will Delta Blue Grass, with information on no-mow native grasses. (The master gardeners have a planting of no-mow grasses in their garden.)

The Loomis Library is at 6050 Library Drive, just off Horseshoe Bar Road in Loomis. For information on the Fall Open House or other Placer master gardener events, go to https://ucanr.edu/sites/ucmgplacer/?calitem=597883&g=131834

The Fruit Shed Fest Facebook page is here.

And by the way, eggplant fans, eggplant IS a fruit, so it will still be in evidence, just sharing the spotlight now.

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Keywords:

weekend event free event fall October Fruit Shed Fest UC master gardeners Placer County Loomis demonstration garden native plants music food trucks family event seed saving container gardening Sacramento gardening eggplant

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Garden checklist for week of Aug. 16

During this break in the heat, feed your garden. Make sure to water before and after applying fertilizer.

* In the garden, direct seed beets, carrots, leaf lettuce and turnips.

* Plant potatoes.

* Harvest tomatoes, beans, squash, pepper and eggplants to prompt plants to keep producing. Give your plants a deep watering twice a week, more if planted in containers. Also, give them a boost with phosphate-rich fertilizer to help fruiting.

* Watch out for caterpillars and hornworms in the vegetable garden. They can strip a plant bare in one day. Pick them off plants by hand in early morning or late afternoon.

* Feed citrus trees their last round of fertilizer for the year. This will give a boost to the fruit that’s still small.

* Mulch can be your garden’s best friend – it conserves moisture while blocking out weeds. But don't let mulch mound around stalks, stems or trunks. That can promote rot.

* Camellia leaves looking a little yellow? Give them some chelated iron. That goes for azaleas and gardenias, too.

* Pick up after your fruit trees. Clean up debris and dropped fruit; this cuts down on insects and prevents the spread of brown rot. Then feed fruit trees with slow-release fertilizer for better production for next year.

* To prolong bloom into fall, feed begonias, fuchsias and container plants. Always water before fertilizing.

* Fertilize fall-blooming perennials, too. Chrysanthemums can be fed until the buds start to open.

* Prepare for a fall full of flowers by paying a little extra attention to your garden. Cut off spent blooms from roses, annuals and perennials, then give them a boost of fertilizer. Make sure to water plants before feeding. Roses will rebloom about six to eight weeks after deadheading.

* Indoors, start seedlings for fall vegetable planting, including bunching onion, cabbage, broccoli, cauliflower, kale, radicchio and lettuce.

* Sow seeds of perennials in pots for fall planting including yarrow, coneflower and salvia.

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