(Dallas)—Dr. Kevin Ong, Texas Cooperative Extension plant pathologist, has a passion for plants, especially sick ones. His mission is to identify what makes them sick and develop treatments to not only make them well, but prevent them from getting sick in the first place.
In order to share his findings with others, Ong created the Urban Plant Detectives program last year.
"The goal is to train Master Gardeners on a variety of procedures and techniques used to diagnose plant problems, so they can perform their own credible research," Ong said. "What they're learning in this course is how to design an experiment and how to interpret the results they get in a statistically sound fashion and reliable manner."
This year, the program has expanded to Kaufman County. Last year it was offered in Collin, Cooke, Dallas, Denton and Tarrant counties. In each county, the training is focused around a local plant problem.
The 18 participants in the Kaufman County training program are researching how to control powdery mildew on crape myrtles.
They began planting the crape myrtles this month. In September, the research training will begin. Each participant will receive 10 hours of training and will work on the research project an additional 10–15 hours. At the end they each will receive a pin, certificate and recognition as an urban plant detective.
Participants learn scientifically based experimental design, statistical analysis, sampling and data collection, which includes how to identify and rate the plant disease and how to draw conclusions.
One of the biggest misconceptions beginners have is how research is actually done, Ong said.
"Typically, people think if you have five different potential treatments for the problem, then you put out five plants and try each one to see how it works," he said. "That's an anecdotal approach, but it's not statistically sound research.
"To make it a real scientific experiment, they learn how to do repetitions of the treatments and also how to be consistent with their data collections and observations. Then they have information to work with to do analysis and come up with true statistical methods, which ultimately give the whole research effort credibility."
Michelle Shook, who is a Master Gardener in Collin County, said one of the things she liked most about the program was learning alternatives to off-the-shelf chemical controls.
"Dr. Ong was a good teacher," she said. "He makes you think, he doesn't just give you the answers. He encourages problem solving and thinking through the problem and coming up with your own hypothesis and conclusions. It was a really rewarding experience to work on a research project with other Master Gardeners and Texas A&M (University). Since then, I've shared what I learned from this research with people in the public at community events or even just neighbors in my own neighborhood."