Describe the Issue or Situation.

ANR and Hort agents across the state provide grafting and pruning of fruit crops as part of their consumer horticultural program. These are both issues that are very popular with local clientele. In the past, the former fruit specialist would travel the state doing these demos in concert with agents at their events. With the changes in responsibilities of the new fruit specialist role, a gap exists for agents who might want to do this type of programing, therefore the goal of this work is to empower agents with the skills necessary to lead these programs in their counties and help them answer client inquiries on these topics.

Describe the Outreach or Educational Program Response (and Partners, if applicable).

in February of 2024 we conducted day long regional in-services on grafting in Fayette, Daviess, and Laurel county, in collaboration with the Horticulture Agents in those counties. This included roughly 4 hours of lecture and hands on practice and demonstration to train agents the technical skills around fruit grafting required to teach these techniques. In spring of 2025 we are offering a similar series, but this time focus on pruning rather than grafting.

Provide the Number and Description(s) of Participants/Target Audience.

We had 46 agents attend these trainings.

Provide a Statement of Outcomes or Program Impact. Please note that the outcomes statement must use evaluation data to describe the change(s) that occurred in individuals, groups, families, businesses, or in the community because of the program/outreach.

As a result of these in-services, we provided 46 agents across the state the skills and knowledge need to lead grafting demonstrations in their counties, and to help answer homeowner inquiries around grafting. This will increase the ability of these agents to increase the impact and reach of their home horticulture programming, and fill the gap created by these demos no longer being done at the county level by the fruit specialist.