{"id":1719,"date":"2025-07-25T09:11:47","date_gmt":"2025-07-25T16:11:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/extintern\/?p=1719"},"modified":"2025-07-25T09:11:47","modified_gmt":"2025-07-25T16:11:47","slug":"osu-extension-intern-enhances-demo-garden-with-educational-signage","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/extintern\/2025\/07\/25\/osu-extension-intern-enhances-demo-garden-with-educational-signage\/","title":{"rendered":"OSU Extension intern enhances demo garden with educational signage"},"content":{"rendered":"

Hi, my name is Ashton Rask, and I am excited to introduce myself and be a part of the
\nOSU Extension services internship program. I am located in Columbia County, where I currently
\nreside. Though I am originally from the central valley of California, where agricultural roots run
\ndeep. I have always been involved in some form of agriculture; I am a huge advocate for
\nagricultural education and take pride in being a part of a larger community. I was an active
\nmember of 4H and FFA throughout my youth. I am entering my last year at Colorado State
\nUniversity online, finishing my bachelor’s degree in Agricultural Business. From here I hope to
\ncontinue to be an advocate for agriculture and move forward in a career that is rewarding and
\nimpactful.<\/p>\n

\n \"\"\n
Garden sign displaying the Luffa in Columbia County’s demo garden. Photo: Ashton Rask<\/figcaption>\n <\/figure>\n

As I enter the 6th week of my internship here at OSU Extension, I have experienced a
\nnumber of exciting events. Including WIC\/Snap-ED programming, Master Gardener events
\nalong with viewing and lending a hand in our community & demo gardens. One of my recent
\nprojects has been creating new signs to label our demo garden beds. This is a project that we
\nwanted to get done before our county fair, which is a goal we accomplished. I also had the
\nopportunity to sneak out of the office and get my hands dirty doing some weeding in our
\nexperimental gardens located at the demo garden here in St. Helens.<\/p>\n

I saw a need for signs to be made and placed in our demo garden. With the help of both
\nour agriculture Extension agent, Janhvi Pandey and A few of our master gardeners, who were
\nso kind to help me through this process, I was able to head out to the demo garden and learn
\nabout all the things we are growing and showcasing. Our demo garden is flourishing, so having
\nproper signage to address people’s questions and celebrate the hard work of our community
\nmembers was important! Our demo garden has been a joy to work in over the past few weeks.
\nWatching all our unique plants and garden beds bloom and start to produce fruit has been
\nexciting. I am fortunate enough to be a small piece of this bigger puzzle and cannot wait to see
\nhow our community members react throughout the fair and its showcasing.<\/p>\n

These signs highlighted companion planting, our pollinator garden and our three sisters’
\ngarden bed. Along with a really unique plant that has been introduced this year by a master
\ngardener, the Lofa plant! The Luffa plant is edible, but we often see it used in its sponge form!
\nSome signs needed to be created from scratch, whereas some just needed an updated look. I
\nspent about a week and a half creating these, printing and laminating them to help limit some
\nof the exposure from the elements, to hopefully make them last a while. From there I was able
\nto go out and place them on each plaque.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Hi, my name is Ashton Rask, and I am excited to introduce myself and be a part of the OSU Extension services internship program. I am located in Columbia County, where I currently reside. Though I am originally from the central valley of California, where agricultural roots run deep. I have always been involved in… Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14884,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26,300,148,38,21],"tags":[303],"class_list":["post-1719","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ag-and-natural-resources","category-columbia-county","category-horticulture","category-master-gardener","category-snap-ed","tag-ashton-rask"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/extintern\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1719","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/extintern\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/extintern\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/extintern\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/14884"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/extintern\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1719"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/extintern\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1719\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1721,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/extintern\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1719\/revisions\/1721"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/extintern\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1719"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/extintern\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1719"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/extintern\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1719"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}