Boston Flora

Tag: Ecological Plant Conference

Friday, December 3, 8:30 am – 4:30 pm – Ecological Plant Conference 2021, Online

Again in this fall, ELA will host the Ecological Plant Conference online. Innovative tools and interactive collaborations will ensure that this online conference provides participants with an engaging and inspiring experience – with no travel time or transportation required.

The benefits of human proximity to plants is well documented and is just one of the many reasons that we all design, propagate, install, maintain, discuss, and enjoy plants. This year, the Ecological Plant Conference (EPC) will delve into five plant-centric topics to educate, entertain, and inspire you. Join us for the sixth annual EPC deep dive into plants old and new.

The Garden Base Layer: Native Groundcovers
Duncan Himmelman

Kick mulch to the curb! Replace it with texturally interesting native plants that help to unify your landscape and provide important ecological services.

In his presentation, Duncan will highlight a selection of herbaceous and woody plants to use as groundcovers in a variety of growing conditions. Gardeners of all levels will be inspired to make the switch from vinca and Japanese pachysandra to smarter choices: native groundcovers!

Biodiversity Here and Now: Creating Urban Habitats
Veronica Tyson-Strait

Many urban dwellers share a desire to garden. For the immigrant gardener there is an urgent need to adopt the new alien landscape and adapt it into a new home. Often that goal includes growing ornamental plants and food crops with ties to a cultural past, even if this home is on the 26th floor. Yet, we must acknowledge the environmental benefits of growing plants native to the region we inhabit.

Veronica will showcase the diverse ecosystems of her country of birth and their influence in the evolution of her passion for plants native to North America. She will make connections between pollinators and birds in her New York gardens, highlight a few of her favorite native plants, and explain how she utilizes limited space and incorporates habitats into her garden designs.

New Naturalism: Lessons from Wild Plant Communities
Kelly Norris

Drawing on his many years of horticulture experience, Kelly Norris will share in-depth lessons learned from plant communities, both natural plant communities in the wild and designed communities in the built landscape. Kelly explores plant ecology and provides invaluable strategies for landscape designers and land managers. Kelly’s love for native plants and his experiences with wild plant communities have shaped his career in profound ways. As a so-called hort-ecologist, Kelly strives to interpret native ecosystems into beautiful, functional landscapes in the urban context. Too often, professional horticulturists appropriate plants as if they were inanimate objects, instead of truly understanding how plants interact and function within the landscape environment. Join us for an exploration of wild plant communities and their constituents from across North America that will inspire and inform your professional practice whether as a grower, retailer or designer.

Plants that Sustained a Broken World: Enslaved African Contributions to Medicine and Botany
Dr. Carolyn Roberts

In the midst of the violence and brutality of the Atlantic slave trade, enslaved Africans became known for their valuable medical and botanical knowledge. Their expertise contributed to early modern medicine and science.

In this presentation, Yale Professor Carolyn Roberts will discuss this little-known botanical history. She will explore the plants enslaved Africans used, how they made medicines, and what present-day phyto-chemical research reveals about why these medicines were so effective.

Panel Discussion
Good Communication and Respect:
Keystones for Team Building on Landscape Crews
Rebecca McMackin, Panel Moderator
At the end of the workday, we all want to feel a sense of accomplishment and contentment about the day’s efforts. How well we relate to colleagues and members of our landscape crews has a profound influence on whether it has been a good day or a frustrating one. Effective communication and teamwork will help a crew (or any other project team) maintain a positive work environment. Effective communication also permeates throughout all areas of business operations; a positive workplace means happier employees are interacting with one another, contractors, and with clients (whether homeowners or public park guests) in a pleasant and positive manner.

Businesses of all sizes need dedicated employees that understand the importance of teamwork in achieving goals and requires that employees communicate in ways that promote team cohesion – not division. On diverse teams, where there is not a shared cultural background or language, the challenges of team building are more complex though equally or more important. Join panel moderator, Rebecca McMackin to learn some of the team building and communication strategies used among the diverse crew members at Brooklyn Bridge Park. You are sure to learn techniques that you can bring back to your workplace.

$139. For complete speaker biographies, and to register, visit https://www.ecolandscaping.org/event/ecological-plant-conference-2021/

November 16, 2021
Friday, December 4, 8:00 am – 4:00 pm – ELA Virtual Ecological Plant Conference

As greenery unfurls in spring, our deep relationship with nature renews us and lifts our spirits. But this spring with COVID threats and uncertainties, reconnecting with nature took on more significance than ever.

On the most basic level, plants nurture our bodies and souls. Our relationship with plants, however, is more complex than simply food and survival. For millennia, plant-based medicines have been used for healing and time spent in the forest or garden has been recognized for its ability to reduce stress while improving health and well-being.

On December 4^th, The Ecological Landscape Alliance invites you to spend a day reconnecting with familiar plants, learning about new plant options, exploring garden insects, and reconsidering our relationship to plants. Five experts will invite us to examine different attributes, uses, and values of plants and the insects that inhabit our gardens.

Innovative tools and interactive collaborations will ensure that this online conference provides participants with an engaging and inspiring experience. Dan Jaffe Wilder will speak on How To Grow Food Anywhere, Nadia Ruffin will present Garden Insects: Good Bug? Bad Bug? Who’s Who and What Do They Do?, Uli Lorimer will discuss Native Species, Hybrids, Selections and Cultivars, Abra Lee’s lecture is entitled Power to the Trees, and finally, Rebecca McMackin presents Pollinator Ecology. Full descriptions and biographies, and registration links, are found at https://www.ecolandscaping.org/event/ela-ecological-plant-conference-2020/ $139 for nonmembers.

November 19, 2020
Friday, December 7, 8:00 am – 5:00 pm – 2018 Ecological Plant Conference

Brooklyn Botanic Garden is host to the Ecological Landscape Alliance (ELA) third annual Ecological Plant Conference at Brooklyn Botanic Garden, Brooklyn, New York. Join us on December 7 from 8 – 5 as five plant masters discuss a few valuable plants at length, from native perennials to under-story heroes to top performing trees. Cultivation, propagation, behavior, and ecological function will be highlighted, with an emphasis on plant communities. Presenters will delve into the interactions between individual plants and the complex interactions among plant communities, as well as interactions with the plant’s environment.

Noted plant masters Carol Gracie, Andi Pettis, Laura Hansplant, Bill Logan, and Don Leopold will lead this rare opportunity to delve into the world of plants.

This conference is an opportunity for professional gardeners, horticulturists, landscape architects, and designers to explore deeply the cultivation of the plants professionals in the Northeast work with every day. Speakers will share their expertise with plant selection, pruning techniques, and long-term plant care, offering the necessary information to grow and create healthy, dynamic, and beautiful plant communities. Morning coffee and catered lunch are included with registration. $119 for ELA members, $139 for nonmembers. Register at http://www.ecolandscaping.org.

The High Line’s Urban Nature: Tenacious Plants for Tough Places
~Andi Pettis

The High Line’s renowned plantings are inspired by the natural landscape that grew wild there, before the elevated rail line was transformed into a New York City public park.
In this talk, Andi Pettis will present some of the toughest plants growing on the High Line, both the cultivated species and some of the plants that grew wild on the rail tracks, spontaneously and without any care or thought from human beings. She will explore how we can study the spontaneous nature in urban environments in order to glean lessons about the tenacity of plants, and how we can apply those lessons to our ecological landscapes.

Pioneering Higher Ground – Explorations in Designing Rooftop Habitats
~Laura Hansplant

Why can native volunteer plants thrive on green roofs while the same intentional plantings fail? How can rooftop landscapes support urban habitat with the same resilience as sedum roofs? What lessons can we learn for on-ground landscapes? Rooftop environments offer unique opportunities for urban habitat. The ecology of these plant communities parallels natural, thin-soil environments but also presents some important functional differences. In this session, Laura Hansplant compares alternative design approaches to establishing meadows on green roofs based on observations of plant community dynamics and tracking plant performance at pilot projects over the past fiver years.

The Thousand Year Wood: Past, Present and Future of People and Oaks
~William (Bill) Bryant Logan

Oaks and people have been intimately related since the Mesolithic, at the latest. Bill will sketch the long history of that relationship, including the many things that oak taught us. We will look from Japan, to Europe, to California, considering the intimate relationship between people and oaks. He will look at the present possibilities for planting and maintaining oaks in the landscape, considering the preferences of different species and where they are best placed in the landscape. Finally, Bill will examine the current threats to oak trees from newly-arrived pathogens and discuss how these potential problems should adjust the way we plant and care for oaks.

Native Wildflowers – Beyond Their Beauty: How They Integrate into the Environment
Carol Gracie

Although the beauty of local wildflowers enhances our enjoyment of the outdoors in summer, a look behind the flowers’ beauty reveals the important roles that they play in the ecology of our northeastern environment. Carol Gracie look at how the plants have adapted to their habitats, their role as a food resource for insects, their methods of dispersal, and some of their uses by humans as medicines, foods, and dyes. Our native wildflowers also provide easy-care beauty in our home gardens.

Native Plants and Natural Plant Communities for Difficult Sites
~Donald (Don) J. Leopold

An expert on native species, Don Leopold will go into depth of native herbaceous and woody species that are no maintenance, long-lived, adapted to extreme conditions (e.g., salinity, alkalinity, drought, shade), attract wildlife (especially birds and butterflies), are deer-proof, and/or produce food for people. Native species for the most challenging sites will be highlighted. The ecological role of these species in their natural communities and how these assemblages of species can be used for home gardens as well as urban projects and larger scale restoration of degraded industrial landscapes will also be covered.

November 7, 2018