NATIVE PLANT SOCIETY OF TEXAS
KerrvilleChapter
APRIL
NEWSLETTER
NATIVES
ON THE GROW
Dedicated
to the understanding, preservation and enjoyment of the native flora of the
Hill Country
April Program:
Top 10 Questions Related to Forest Health Issues
Mark Duff of the Texas Forest Service in Kerrville will speak on “The Top Ten Questions Related to Forest Health in the Hill Country” at our April 1st meeting at Riverside Nature Center beginning at 2 pm. Duff has compiled this list of frequently asked questions from the roughly 500 presentations he has given to groups in this area in his 12 years of work as a Staff Forester in Kerrville. He considers the four major forest health issues in Hill Country to be oak wilt, cedar, deer and exotic plants. Duff also welcomes inquiries from the meeting participants on tree and forestry issues.
Duff holds a Bachelors degree in Natural Resource Management, with a concentration in Forestry, from Colorado State University-Ft. Collins and a Masters degree in Public Administration from the University of Arkansas-Little Rock. Prior to joining the Texas Forest Service, Duff had extensive experience in various aspects of forestry including serving as a private forestry consultant, a research forester in Puerto Rico, a Project Coordinator in Paraguay, a Park Maintenance Supervisor directing trail construction in Colorado, in the timber industry and forest fire fighting in South Dakota, and for the Bureau of Land Management in Alaska. Duff has several publications, with his most recent being “Opportunities for Forest and Range Restoration in the Texas Hill Country”. See you there!
Calendar
Tuesday, March 25 at 7 PM “Native Grasses” by Dr. Lew Hunnicutt of the Bamberger Ranch at NPSOT – Fredericksburg at the Gillespie County Agriculture Building, 1906 N. Llano St., Fredericksburg.
Saturday, March 29 9 AM – 3 PM Monarch Larval Monitoring Training Day at Cibolo Nature Center, Boerne, Mary Kennedy, 210-698-7175 x267
Tuesday, April 1 at 2 PM “The Top 10 Questions Relating to Forest Health Issues in the Hill Country” by Mark Duff of the Texas Forest Service at NPSOT-Kerrville meeting held at Riverside Nature Center
Wednesday, April 2 at 9 AM: Garden maintenance at the Kerrville Library Native Plant Garden, call John Quinby at 367-4612 for more information.
Friday April 25 5:00-6:30 PM - “Members Only” Plant Sale at Riverside Nature Center (for NPSOT and Riverside Nature Center members)
Saturday April 26 8 AM – 3 PM - EARTH DAY CELEBRATION & PLANT SALE –Riverside NatureCenter
Saturday, April 26 10 AM – 4 PM Nativescapes Garden Tour in Fredericksburg by NPSOT – Fredericksburg Chapter
EARTH
DAY CELEBRATION
& MOSTLY NATIVE PLANT SALE
MEMBERS ONLY Pre-SALE Friday, April 25 5:00 - 6:30 PM
Saturday, April 26 8:00 AM – 3:00 PM
The Earth Day Celebration is co-sponsored by the Kerrville Chapter of the Native Plant Society of Texas and the Riverside Nature Center. This year’s featured speaker is Deborah Payne, the owner of the Fredericksburg Butterfly Ranch and Habitat. She will speak in the Visitor Center at 10:00 on Butterfly Gardening: Secrets of Attracting the Fluttering Beauties. Ms. Payne has had years of experience raising butterflies, the plants that they need for nectar, and the special plants each butterfly species needs to raise its young.
At 9:00 Larry Fagarason will present a program on Xeriscape for Hill Country. Fagarason is the founder and former President of the Kerr County Cactus & Succulent Society. At 11:15 Bruce Deuley will present Recipes that Betty Crocker Never Gave You on organic gardening. Deuley will explain how you can improve your plants by first improving your soil. At 1:30 Sandy and Raul Pena will present their program on The ABC’s of Rainwater Harvesting. The Penas practice what they preach; they live in the country without a water well, since all their water needs are met by their rain water harvesting. At 2:00 Marilyn Butcher will present Lasagna Gardening, a technique of building a garden with layers of different materials, as practiced by the Hunt school children.
A highlight of the Earth Day Celebration will be an enormous “Mostly Native Plant Sale”, which will sell many different types of plants native to the Hill Country, including some less common species, that will thrive in our heat with less water than most other plants require. There will also be some “adaptive plants”, including herbs, from areas other than Hill Country, such as the southwestern U.S. and Mexico, that will grow readily here. Native Plant Society of Texas and Riverside Nature Center members will have a “Members Only Pre-Sale” on Friday, April 25th from 5:00 to 6:30 pm
The day will also feature, children’s activities, the awarding of prizes in the middle school student Earth Day poster contest, and the display of a hybrid electric Toyota that runs on it’s own non-polluting batteries that are re-charged by its gasoline engine
Composting grass and yard waste can save valuable space in landfills. A compost-maker, donated by the City of Kerrville, will be raffled. You do not have to be present to win. The Earth Day Celebration has activities to interest every member of your family. Please join us for a day filled with fun and learning! See you there!
Fredericksburg Nativescapes Garden Tour
The
Fredericksburg NPSOT is sponsoring a garden tour of six residential landscapes
in the Fredericksburg area on Saturday,
April 26 from 10:00
a.m. - 4:00 p.m.
Admission will be $5.00 per person; 17 and under will be admitted free.
The featured gardens will show how our beautiful, climate-adapted native
plants can be used in our landscapes. Some landscapes were designed by
professional landscape architects, and some by the homeowners themselves.
All are beautiful and unique.
If you shop at our Members Only Plant Sale on Friday, you will have plenty of time to enjoy the Nativescapes Garden Tour in Fredericksburg!. For more information contact Mike McBride at mikemc@ktc.com.
THANKS
for your donations to our Plant Raffle,
Refreshments & Plant Sale Supplies
Natives of Texas of Kerrville donated a Blackfoot daisy, Texas betony, Foxglove & a Standing cypress. Alice Bulechek donated an Agarita, 4 White yarrow, 2 Maximillian sunflowers, and a Giant spiderwort.
Thanks also go to Melinda Wasson and Lillian Lewis for our wonderful refreshments.
Thanks go to Art Stokes and our sponsor, Golden Eagle Landscape, for contributing pots for the plants members are growing for our Earth Day Celebration Plant Sale.
NOW BLOOMING
MILKWEED, THE LARVAL PLANTS OF MONARCH BUTTERFLIES
Monarch butterflies lay their eggs on milkweed plants. At least 26 of the 108 species of milkweeds found north of the Mexican border serve as larval host plants. In our area, a common milkweed plant is the Antelope-Horns (Asclepias asperula). Antelope-horns grow in clumps in open grassy areas, and bloom from March to May. Learn more about monarch butterflies by attending the Monarch Larval Monitoring Training Day at Cibolo Nature Center on Saturday, March 29 (see Calendar information). For more information about Antelope-horns, see M. Enquist, Wildflowers of the Texas Hill Country, p. 135
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by Raúl
Peña ANTELOPE-HORNS MILKWEED Asclepias asperula |
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Photo
by Raúl
Peña |
Giant Spiderwort is 1 – 3 feet tall and grows in limestone soils at the edges of woods and roadsides. The flower color may vary from lavender-blue to pink. This perennial adapts well to growing in Hill Country landscapes. It blooms from March through April. It can currently be seen in bloom in many locations, including Riverside Nature Center. Look for it when you come to our meeting on April 1st (This is not an April Fool joke, it really grows well at Riverside!) See Enquist, p. 4.
Please send any suggestions or comments on this newsletter to the Editor: Priscilla Stanley at jpbstan@ktc.com