UC Master Gardeners: Mission Farm Regenerative Tour, Woodside
TL;DR: Explore a working regenerative farm implementing key soil-building practices and community-driven food production.
- Learn regenerative principles and practical soil-building techniques.
- Discover mulching, cover cropping, and diversity planting strategies.
- Observe a successful community farm model for food donation.
- Gain insights into carbon sequestration and water retention.
- Understand how to integrate cover crops without tillage.
Why it matters: This event offers practical, field-tested methods for enhancing soil health and increasing food production in community and home garden settings, crucial for local food security and environmental resilience.
Do this next: Visit a local community garden or farm to observe regenerative practices in action and inquire about volunteer opportunities.
Recommended for: Community gardeners, home-scale growers, and permaculture enthusiasts interested in practical soil regeneration and community food systems.
This UC Master Gardeners event on April 12, 2026, from 1:00pm to 2:30pm, offers a hands-on visit to Mission Farm in Woodside, a working regenerative farm managed by UC Master Gardeners and community volunteers. The farm employs key regenerative practices to build healthy soil: protecting soil with living mulch or cover crops, maintaining living roots in the ground year-round, and planting a diverse array of crops to enhance biodiversity and resilience. Led by experts Lisa Putnam and Kathleen Putnam, participants receive a detailed review of the five core principles of regenerative agriculture, which emphasize minimal soil disturbance, continuous soil cover, living roots, diverse species, and integrated livestock where applicable. A practical hands-on demonstration illustrates how these methods produce healthy soil that supports vigorous plant growth, directly applicable to community gardens aiming for self-sufficiency and permaculture integration. The farm operates through regular volunteer sessions every Monday and Thursday, where teams harvest hundreds of pounds of fruits and vegetables donated to local organizations like St. Francis Center and Samaritan House, showcasing a model for community-driven food production and resilience. This event provides field-tested techniques for home-scale and community implementations, including mulching strategies, cover cropping sequences, and diversity planting plans that sequester carbon, improve water retention, and reduce inputs—ideal for regenerative living contexts. Practitioners can learn specific steps for establishing living mulches, such as selecting appropriate cover crop mixes (e.g., legumes, grasses, brassicas) for year-round soil protection, integrating them into existing plots without tillage, and monitoring soil biology improvements through simple tests like earthworm counts or infiltration rates. The volunteer harvesting model offers replicable logistics for community gardens, including scheduling, tool sharing, and distribution networks to build local food security. By focusing on observable outcomes like increased yields and soil organic matter, attendees gain concrete, expert-driven tools to transition conventional plots to regenerative systems, fostering permaculture principles of closed-loop nutrient cycling and ecosystem mimicry in urban or suburban settings.