IF YOUR FINGERS have been itching to get out in the garden, bring them — and your notebooks — to Our Garden.

For the second year, the Bay Area News Group and the Contra Costa Master Gardeners invite gardeners of all abilities and interests to join us at the Contra Costa Times headquarters in Walnut Creek for seven months of gardening classes.

Our Garden was planted last year and now is a fully established, year-round demonstration garden. Every Friday from April 9 through October, you can come out to see what we're growing, hear a lecture from a knowledgeable gardener and find answers for your gardening questions and problems. And just as important, you can join our community

The project was launched last year as a way to teach others how to garden using environmentally sound, practical gardening techniques. We aren't completely organic, but we try to come as close as we can.

Almost all of the seeds and plants were donated, as were the volunteer hours of Master Gardeners who kept the garden growing in sometimes less-than-ideal conditions. The produce grown in Our Garden — as well as fruit and vegetables readers brought in to donate — were given to the Food Bank of Contra Costa and Solano.

Although we were brimming with enthusiasm and expertise, Our Garden was slow to produce because initially most of what we grew was consumed by a nearby colony of ground squirrels that

Donated fencing and an inexpensive battery-operated electrical barrier saved Our Garden and by summer's end, we'd donated almost 500 pounds of produce.

We've continued growing over the winter, harvesting bumper crops of beets, cabbage, kale, turnips, peas, broccoli and cauliflower. We also planted some beds in cover crops of fava beans, rye, vetch and wheat to improve the nitrogen in our soil.

Now, with warmer weather here at last, we're ready to transition into our spring and summer gardens. We've got big plans and we hope you'll be part of them.

Here are the particulars: