Hello from Hamilton, Ontario: the Report from the American Public Gardens Association Annual Conference

Amanda Wilkins, Curator of Collection, Mobile Botanical Gardens

June 19-23, 2017

Butterfly in the Niagara Parks Butterfly Conservatory

Summary
I attended the American Public Gardens Association’s Annual Conference in Hamilton, Ontario (final day photos). More than 500 people from gardens, nurseries, non-profits, and governments from across North America attended. I mainly followed the Plant Collections Development Professional Track during the conference. Evenings were spent either getting dinner with colleagues or at networking receptions. Please see the hyperlinks for more photos.


Take-aways from the Conference
• It was great to meet and catch-up with colleagues in the American Public Gardens Community. I believe it is especially important to physically meet people beyond emails. It makes getting started on projects with people much more visceral.
• Many conference attendees were interested in including the Mobile Botanical Gardens in upcoming garden trips. This is a huge step for us as a garden, as these are the people who will spread the word about us.
• I had offers to write articles for the APGA’s journal. I intend to follow through with this, especially regarding our major collections.
• There are many ways we can play a role on a national level with on-going projects in research, conservation and horticulture. I am excited for these opportunities for the Gardens.
• I learned a lot about the Plant Collections Professional Section and the National Plant Collections Network, which will help aid the Gardens as we move towards getting our Camellia and Rhododendron collections certified. Leaders in the sections have offered to help me as I get started on this project.

Touring the Kayanase Greenhouse

Monday, June 19
• Indigenous Plants and Traditions in the Heart of Ontario Tour
We spent the day touring culturally-relevant sites to the Six-Nations Mohawk Native Americans. Sites included: Kayanase, a Native American-led Community Initiative that teaches the community about culturally-relevant plants, and collects and grows native plants to central and southern Ontario and sells them to community members and for ecological restoration projects in and around the reservation; and a community-initiated agricultural project that includes a farmers market, a cooking and preservation class, a 24-hour fresh-food market, and a turtle garden full of culturally-significant plants.

• International Session and Dinner
The opening panel session featured a series of short talks about “Who is your community? People? Plants? Habitats?” and a panel discussion featuring several panelists that included the secretary general of the Botanic Garden Conservation International, the director of the American Public Gardens Association, a representative of the horticulture industry lobbying group AmericanHort, a visitor from New Zealand, the president from the Portland Japanese Garden, and the one and only Dr. Peter Raven. It was a great discussion that lead to great talks over dinner.


Tuesday, June 20
• First-time Attendees Orientation
We got the run-down of how to make the most of the conference and had a chance to do some networking with other new attendees. I saw some familiar faces from N.C. State, but also met a gentleman from Denver Botanic Garden and the director of The Mermaid in California.

• The Plant Requisition System: Automating Data Entry for Plant Records Database
We learned about the system the Chicago Botanic Garden uses to track and accession new plants.

• Sustainable International Collaborations: American Case Studies
Three speakers talked about three different international partnerships they were participating in in regard to research, conservation, and plant trialing. The North American-China Plant Exploration Consortium is a multi-institutional partnership that coordinates and funds trips to the wilds of China to collect and catalogue the Chinese flora. Andrew Bunting talks about how other consortiums he was involved with used NACPEC’s model. Finally, Patrick Griffith, the director of the Montgomery Botanical Center in Miami, FL, talked about his work with three projects in the Bahamas, Belize, and the Dominican Republic. I especially appreciated his method of: Sharing resources, sharing credit, and sharing outcomes.

• Plant Collections Section Meeting
The discussion at the section meeting involved the release of the curatorial ethics policy, the upcoming Plant Collections Symposium in Vancouver, BC in 2018, core documents needed for plant collections professionals, and how we can better share what we’re doing. I had a chance to talk about our work with Rhododendrons and Camellias, and had folks talk to me afterward about this.

• What is a Beacon and Why Does My Gardens Need One?
The gardening social media phone app GrowIt! conducted the session to talk about what the app does and focused on the capabilities of targeted tours using beacon technology. There is potential with this technology for MBG. It alerts people who use the app when they are near the beacons and can help the garden collect demographic information about its visitors. Additionally, people can use the app to go on a guided tour of the garden.

• Opening Reception
It was an opportunity to socialize and network with other attendees. I coordinated with other Polly Hill Arboretum interns to meet up for dinner. We had six interns come, including five of the past seven curatorial interns. It was very exciting.

Polly Hill Arboretum Intern Reunion Dinner! Pictured: Matt Lobdell, Emily Ellingson, Cat Meholic, Tory Stewart, Jaime Morin, and myself.

Wednesday, June 21
• Magnolia Curatorial Meeting
I sat in on the meeting to see when other gardens were doing and what the capabilities are within the group. I believe there is potential for MBG to get involved with growing some of these plants and helping with conservation of sub-tropical and tropical Magnolias.

• A Compass for Progress in Plant Collections Section Meeting
This is one of the most exciting sessions of the conference! Section leaders released a preliminary report of a self-assessment tool the Plant Collections Network has been developing to help gardens benchmark their collections and hopefully better prepare for gaining a Nationally-Accredited Plant Collection. I found this to beneficial to helping me start thinking about accrediting our Camellia and Rhododendron collections.

• Keynote Speaker: Colonel Chris Hadfield
I had my reservations about having a retired astronaut as the keynote speaker of a public gardens conference, because what could he have to say to a room full of garden folks. But, Colonel Hadfield turned out to be one of the most relevant speakers. He told a story of how we’re all a part of a world-wide garden, all floating in the same bubble of air and water. It was a fascinating perspective and a hopeful message.

• Introduction to IrisBG
IrisBG is one of the two dominant plant records systems available in the industry today. I am considering this as the system we should adopt moving forward, although I have not formalized this. This session was an introduction to how the system works, and was especially helpful as it was full of folks who mainly use BGBase, which is probably the dominant system available, so there was a great discussion of how the systems compare. I was trained on BGBase, so I know the pros and cons of its usage. IrisBG and the staff have done a great job of responding to feedback from their community.

• Rapid-fire Presentations
I sat in on the first round of presentations to see how it ran. It was a lot of fun and full of presenters and attendees. They covered a lot of ground, but it was interesting. I was especially struck by the news that none of the 7th and 8th graders one of the presenters interviewed knew what a ‘horticulturist’ was.

• Poster Session and Drinks
Several folks stopped by my poster to hear about what my findings were and there was a lot of interest in my topic: “What are Trees in a Botanic Garden Worth?”

Me with my poster.

Thursday, June 22
• Plant Collections Network Forum
This session was focused on folks who have a nationally-accredited collection, but, again, I hope to help MBG join their ranks with our Camellia and Rhododendron. The session centered around discussions. There is potential for partnering with the USDA to help grow species or genus-specific collections for conservation and horticulture.

• Leading Audiences to Take Action: A New Approach from the Field of Conservation Psychology
This was a brief session that focused mainly on a structured exercise analyzing how to help engage and inspire garden visitors to become active in conservation efforts.

• Plant Nomenclature and Taxonomy Section
I sat in on this group to see what work the section was doing. They’d compiled a list of Viburnum cultivars and were looking at other groups to engage with. It was a good group discussion, and there is potential to help the horticulture industry.

• Niagara Parks Tour and Reception
There were many options to tour the park and I chose to tour the Niagara Botanical Gardens. The director of the Horticulture School gave us a tour of the major sites and talked to us about the history of the gardens. The tour ended with a stop in the Butterfly House (!!!) and their restored prairie. After our tour of the garden we got to walk along the Niagara River and then along the rim of the falls.

Friday, June 23
• What Botanical Gardens Can Learn from New, Innovative Urban Parks to Build New Audiences
The session looked at many new parks across the United States and discussed ideas that had proven to be successful for bringing more people into the garden in downtown Oklahoma City.

• Rapid-fire Presentations- This is when I presented
My presentation about the longleaf pine forest at MBG was well-received despite some technical difficulties. Attendees were impressed that we were able to burn, but also the progress that has been made.

• Networking Lunch
I have to admit, I was a little tired by this point, and I wasn’t networking effectively. Even still, I met a lady from North Carolina who’s at a garden I haven’t been to yet.

• Plant Jeopardy!
Of course, since we had all the plant nerds in one place there had to be Plant Jeopardy.

• An Afternoon in Paradise: Royal Botanic Garden
The afternoon culminated in self-led tours of the main garden and the newly-renovated rock garden of RBG. I had a chance to catch up with folks for a final good-bye and had the great fortune of walking around the rock garden with the gentleman from The Mermaid I’d met the first morning. A great way to finish off the week.

Fire on the Hill: Burning the Longleaf Pine Forest at the Mobile Botanical Garden

It was an early morning on Tuesday, but well worth it for the electric anticipation of what was going to happen: eight acres of the forest was going up in flames this day. The sun rose over the 35 acres of the treasure forest. The way it lit up the trunks and made the needle glow seemed to foretell what was coming.

Burning the longleaf forest, June 16, 2015

 (Click for more photos of the burn and other scenes of the Longleaf Pine Forest through the spring)

A crowd gathered as time got closer to when the fire crew would light the first part of the fire. Volunteers had their tasks and news crews stood ready with cameras as the fire crew came riding down Pat Ryan Drive. After Andrew said a few words, the first stream of flames were released and a defining line of fire licked away at the duff. The tell-tale smell of a campfire filled the air and smoke billowed into the morning.

Part of the fire crew watched as the fire line moved down the main drive and south through the forest. Other members of the crew went to other parts of the perimeter to set more fires. Volunteers and bystanders moved to get a better view of the expanding fire. People driving down the street slowed down to look at the flames eating away at the brush in the forest. The wind played with the smoke, blowing it this way and that; giving the scene an otherworldly appearance.

As the morning moved on, I took a moment to go closer to the smoking line to see how the Sabal palms bent beneath the touch of the fire. I then spotted a couple of ground bees flying lazily around a small opening in the fire break. Lucky, the brush had been raked away and their home wasn’t in the line of fire. The bees themselves seemed pretty confused as to what was going on as they flew in circles around the opening. Amazing luck.

I was taking a photo of them when the burn master came down from the hill and asked if I’d been to the top of the hill yet. I hadn’t because of my knee, but the tempting view helped me overcome that. 

My slow footsteps were warmed by the smoldering brush as I passed over the fire line and into the center of the burn. Spot fires were growing in front of me and the comforting crackle of fire sage and other brush catching called out from them. A large fire rose higher into the canopy as the flames reached a particularly willing patch of brush. It was a large tongue, licking the lower branches of the longleaf pine full of glistening needles. It soon calmed down and coalesced with the rest of the fire. 

A stand of longleaf pines as old as me stood in a cluster along the road, living remnants of a good seed year, much like the one we’d had this past year. I made my way through the brush towards the trail to join up with the rest of the burn crew and to see my tree cohorts wrapped in the fire. They looked good in their state of transformation, through the smoke and flashes of orange and red. 

"A Pine that Fire Built", the title of a pamphlet  in the office rang true. As I stood there watching, fire creeping along the ground and smoke filling the air, I knew the next year was going to bring new life to the forest. Fire, although seemingly impatient and all-consuming, can teach us a lesson about time and temperance. Change seems to happen in almost an instant, but real change is slow, patient and accumulates over time. This fire is just one of many that will happen, and without this one the next would not be as effective. Time is a continuum and fire is just a part of it.

Adventures in the Polly Mobile 2: University of Delaware and Driving to Washington, D.C.

It was sad to say good bye to Barb and the wonderful gardens of Delaware, but I had to keep moving on. I was on my way to Washington, D.C.

Herbaceous Garden at University of Delaware Botanic Gardens.

But before my epic leg down the Delmarva Peninsula, I made arrangements with my dear friend Jason Veil to visit the University of Delaware Botanic Garden and to talk about the curatorial assistantship program there.

How Jason and I met is just another testament to how serendipitous horticulture really is. We met by chance as we rode the final bus back to the parking lot after the Woody Plant Conference at Swarthmore College this summer. I think we were talking about the Longwood Graduate Program when he put the bug in my ear about UDel's plant curation program. Little did I know that chance meeting would lead me back around to the university.

So, fast forward to this morning. I got a few extra minutes of sleep, thankfully, and had enough time to say my last goodbyes to the Stremples. I drove down to the garden, checking in with Jason to make sure we were both still undeterred by the cool, grey drizzle. Nothing keeps plant people out of the garden. Jason met me in the parking lot outside of the botanic garden's office with a parking pass, reminding me of the joys nightmares of university parking. After a brief stop in the office, we headed over to see Dr. Frett before he left for the day.

Next was the tour of the garden. It surrounds the agriculture buildings and abuts the dairy, displaying a menagerie of old landscape favorites from the 70s and 80s. There were some impressive specimens, including a maturing Acer griseum, as well as a few who needed some TLC. Overall, there was an interesting story about the fairly recent history of the grounds and how the collections were rooted in teaching plant ID classes. Throughout Jason's fantastic tour, he answered all of my probing questions, and dealt out a couple of jabs at my anti-invasive species comments. There were also some new additions to the gardens, including an impressive removal of some huge hollies and exciting new plantings going in, per Jason's vision as curator. It reminded me a lot of the J.C. Raulston and I can only imagine what the space will look like as it matures. Planting new plants really is an incredible way to show vision.

I highly recommend getting out to see the garden. Although it may be intimidating being on a college campus, it exists as a teaching tool to all, students and members of the community, local and otherwise! Check out the garden's website to find out about parking and upcoming programs, including their plant sale!

So, after my wonderful tour with Jason (and getting some yummy ice cream made at UDel's creamery), I was off down 301, the interstate that snakes down the Delmarva Peninsula, crosses the Maryland state line and the Chesapeake Bay, makes its way to Anapolis and then Washington, D.C. It was a slow, grey afternoon, but it was an easy, incredibly flat, drive. Very little traffic allowed me to look out at the many farms and new developments coming up (which saddened me because of what is to come after that, as I've seen with the land around Charlotte as I've grown up). The bridge to cross the Chesapeake was amazing, so much longer than I thought it would be, and it was a great place to catch the sunset.

And then the traffic began. But, I was okay with it because the highways were now the organized ones of the south (whoo, crossing the Mason-Dixon line!).

My final thought will be to the people of the southern states: be thankful for your roads and how they are organized. Appreciate the many road signs you have. There are those who do not have them, who live in a place where right lanes just end.

Okay, and my post- post-final thought will be check out these awesome musical people: ilyAIMy.