By Bill Ward
Published in The Boerne Star on May 13, 2003
The Boerne Chapter of the Native Plant Society of Texas (NPSOT) is a diverse group of people of all ages and from several walks of life who seem to have one thing in common. They all have a special curiosity about native plants of this area.
Some members know very little about native plants, and some others are “experts, but all enjoying learning more.
Some members appreciate native plants simply because they are part of the natural beauty of the Hill Country.
Most of us also are enthusiastic about the fact that using natives in landscaping requires less water and fertilizer than in growing many of the traditional exotic plants, thus saving money, natural resources, and the environment. In addition, planting natives helps maintain the natural ecological diversity, not only among plants, but also among all critters from microbes to birds and mammals. The health of many ecosystems relates directly to how well the native flora has been preserved. Sometimes, failure to protect natural vegetation requires unnecessary and expensive maintenance, such as flood-control structures.
Joining NPSOT is a good way to educate yourself about native plants and, in turn, to help educate others.
A major goal of our chapter is to raise public awareness of the virtues of native vegetation. Our chapter has devised some creative ways to do this.
One Boerne Chapter program aimed at educating the public is Operation NICE! (Natives Instead of the Common Exotics!), which has raised wide interest among other NPSOT chapters aroun the state.
With the generous cooperation of several local nurseries and the Boerne newspapers, this program is attempting to make homeowners aware of the variety of native plants which can be used effectively in landscaping. This program is promoting good land stewardship on the backyard scale.
Another public service our chapter has undertaken is to build a collection of books or native plants in the Boerne Public Library. Each month the chapter presents a book to the library in honor of our guest speaker. Commonly the book is authored by the speaker for whom it is presented. The speakers seem to appreciate this more than some other token gift, and the public benefits.
Several NPSOT chapters have established public demonstration gardens in their communities to show the use of native plants in landscaping. Our chapter is planning such a garden to be created at the Cibolo Nature Center when construction of its new facilities is completed.
In addition, our chapter plans to participate in creating a pioneer garden at the Shumard farm off of South Main. A committee is now doing research to determine what plants were grown in Kendall County gardens of the late 19th century. We hope to use the native plants as well as the early imported plants that were favored in this area at the time the Shumard house was built. Our committee is seeking old photographs of pioneer yards in this area.
The city’s new Keep Boerne Beautiful program fits very well with a project the Boerne Chapter of NPSOT started planning last year. Our plan was to propose to the city that our chapter plant native trees to enhance the beauty of city streets.
Now we can implement our project through cooperation with the city program.
Rebecca Rogers, former president of the Boerne Chap-ter, is on the Keep Boerne Beautiful Committee. Over a period of a few years, we will donate many bigtooth maple trees for fall color and western redbuds for spring color.
Remember, in some future fall when you are admiring the streets of Boeme ablaze with red, orange, and gold, that it was your Boerne Chapter of NPSOT at work.
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