Rating the gardening sections found in San Francisco Bay Area and Northern California newspapers.

by James K. Sayre

As a gardener, a reader and a writer, I have summarized below my views of the gardening sections found in San Francisco Bay Area and Northern California newspapers:

The San Francisco Chronicle's Home and Garden section appears two days per week on Wednesday and Saturday. Recently, in what was probably an attempt to be more in touch with they perceived to be the needs of the readers, the Chron shrank the font size of the section title "Garden" into a much smaller size when compared to "Home." I have not noticed any difference in the subjects of the articles published. The San Francisco Chronicle's Home and Garden section publishes mostly local-origin articles of interest to Bay Area gardeners. It also features a small letters-to-the-editor section, usually published on Saturday. Its Events calendar tends to mostly cover San Francisco events.

Overall rating: B-

The San Jose Mercury News publishes its Garden section on Friday. It is pretty skimpy in content, but occasionally publishes an interesting article. In the last several months, it has been featuring a dismal tie-in with the very corporate Sunset magazine. Of course, Sunset magazine lost its soul some fifteen or twenty years ago when the Lane family of Menlo Park sold it to some giant corporate interest. Since then, to me, the new Sunset magazine is so glossy and full of puffery that it is hardly worth reading, except for when I am sitting, waiting, trapped in an office, waiting for a dental appointment. The San Jose Mercury News does not seem to want to pay much to hire local gardening writing talent. No letters-to-the-editor here.

Overall rating: C-

The Contra Costa Times, a corporate sister publication of the San Jose Mercury News, produces a Gardening Section on Saturdays. This is definitely the worst Bay Area Gardening Section in terms of reprinting nearly useless horticultural columns from the East, the Midwest and the South. Dateline Dayton! (hmm, how does Zone 6 gardening in southwestern Ohio (where the temperature typically drops below zero every winter) differ from virtually frost-free Zone 10 gardening in coastal California? let me count the ways...). Every few issues, there is a column haranguing against clutter... Another tiresome subject. We pack-rats will happily continuing our collecting, gathering and packing, thank you very much... It does feature a comprehensive week listings of gardening shows, sales and special events. Even here, it sometimes suffers from sloppy or non-existent copy editing or proofreading: For example, in the 2/18/05 issue, it talked of a plant sale in November. It was not clear if it was referring to next November or last November... Maybe they are just giving us lots of advance notice... They also feature a weekly local house/front yard makeover with street shots of Before and After; unfortunately, for me, I guess, I usually much prefer the Before picture... Again, no feedback from the peanut gallery: no letters-to-the-editor published here.

Overall rating: D+

The Oakland Tribune has a small home and garden section called Inside Out, published on Saturdays. It features a column by Bert Bertolero called, The Dirt Gardener. Again, no feedback from the peanut gallery: no letters-to-the-editor published here.

Overall rating: D

The Sacramento Bee, which is inland from the coastal climate of the San Francisco Bay Area, produces its California Life Home & Garden section on Saturdays. This twenty-eight page weekly insert in the Bee is probably the best gardening section in northern California. It produces several interesting articles each week written by talented local writers. Although it is aimed at the inland Sacramento area climate, its articles are often highly useful for Bay Area gardeners. In addition, it has a weekly Garden Events calendar which lists garden events, pruning clinics, antiques shows, nature walks, clubs and classes. It also has a Letters-to-the-Editor section.

Overall rating: A-

These garden section grades (with a A- counting 3.7, a B- counting 2.7, a C- counting 1.7, a D+ counting 1.3, a D counting 1), the averaged out to grade is 2.08, or a little above C. This is close to the average grade point of 2.2 which science and engineering majors received in their freshman year, many years ago, at Carnegie Institute of Technology (now Carnegie-Mellon University) in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. This low average grade point had at least two useful functions: it kept the smarter freshmen from getting swelled heads and it discouraged marginal engineering and science majors to drop out of technical fields or to switch to easier schools. Maybe these low grades on the newspaper garden sections will spur them to produce a higher quality product. (Or not).

End.

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Web page last updated on 16 March 2005.