Pycnanthemum tenuifolium, narrow-leaf mountain-mint, a tough and easy-to-grow native, is chosen as the 2019 Wildflower of the Year.
A Members Seed Pack replaces the Members Seed List. The pack contains 8 packets of native seeds representing popular as well as interesting and unusual native species. Orders can be placed online, through the NCBG's website, beginning in January.
As of February 3, 2019, the NCBG, through the Campaign for Carolina, has raised $18,196,744 towards its goal of $30 million.
UNC biology professor David Pfenning delivers this year's Darwin Day Lecture, the evening of February 12, speaking on the topic Plasticity, Epigenetics, and Evolution.
Education Department staff hold a six-session training workshop for members of the local community interested in volunteering as a Garden Guide, with 2 sessions held each week for 3 consecutive weeks, from mid-February through the first week of March.
A new NCBG volunteer group is organized: Special Events Volunteers who will assist with wayfinding, parking, registration, seating guests, set up, clean up, and refreshments at special events held at the Garden throughout the year.
The UNC Herbarium continues its work of digitizing its collection, with ferns, fern allies, and fossil ferns as the focus for the early part of 2019.
Emily Oglesby becomes the Garden's communications and exhibits coordinator, a newly-created position involving coordinating art and educational exhibits, developing Garden interpretation, leading the Garden's social media offerings, and assisting with other communications projects. Emily has been a Garden staff member since 2016.
The Paul Green Foundation hosts Meet Paul Green: Playwright, Activist, Naturalist, a dramatization of Paul Green's life and work, and presented at the Garden by Playmakers Repertory Company actors Kathryn Hunter Williams and Ray Dooley, on March 31, 2019. The performance, whose script was written by local playwright Debra Kaufman and Marsha Warren of the PGF, was followed by tours of the Paul Green Cabin, which had served as Green's writing studio for 26 years.
Wonder Connection, an outreach program within the NCBG Education Department offering science- and nature-based learning experiences to pediatric patients at UNC Children's Hospital and the Ronald McDonald House, finds a new sponsor and leaves the Garden, which had served as its home since 2011.
Dwayne Estes, executive director of the Southern Grasslands Initiative at Austin Peay State University, speaks on the topic The Southeastern Grasslands Initiative: Charting a New Course for Conservation in the 21st Century, at the annual Sims Lecture, held April 7, 2019.
The NCBG is one of 20 botanic Gardens invited to participate in Gardens Across America, an exhibit in Washington, D.C. hosted by the United States Botanic Garden, located next to the U.S. Capitol. Staff from the NCBG Horticulture Department, along with volunteer Jim Fickle, created a 365-foot vignette of the NCBG, using an assortment of piedmont natives, dried perennial stems for wattle fencing, and vintage farm implements. It was intended to demonstrate how to garden with local plants in a way that nurtures biodiversity by providing food and shelter for wildlife. The exhibit runs from May through October 1.
The North Carolina Pollinator Toolkit is developed by the North Carolina Botanical Garden, in collaboration with multiple partners, including the North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission, the Rural Advancement Foundation International (RAFI-USA), the North Carolina Wildlife Federation, the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, Fresh Energy, and Audubon North Carolina. Funding for development of the North Carolina Pollinator Toolkit was provided by the Burt's Bees Greater Good Foundation. Its purpose is to provide a comprehensive, "one stop shop" for the residents of North Carolina to help promote the enhancement of pollinator habitats.
The Spring Plant Sale and Festival is held on Saturday, May 4, with several local nurseries - Niche Gardens, Cure Nursery, Mellow Marsh Farm, and Growing Wild Nursery - joining the NCBG in selling plants, and live music, food trucks and an environmental fair adding to the fun.
The Garden celebrates National Public Gardens Week (May 13-19) with tours of Mason Farm by Johnny Randall, Edible Campus UNC by Laura Mindlin, the Carolina Campus Community Garden by Claire Lorch, the NCBG Display Gardens by Dan Stern, and Coker Arboretum by Margo MacIntyre.
The Carolina Moonlight Garden Party, the biggest fundraiser of the year, is held June 1, 2019. With the support of 18 event hosts and others, it raises $43,000 for the NCBG.
Pitchers and Pitchers, held June 19, 2019, provides an opportunity for those over 21 to learn about the Garden's Carnivorous Plant Collection from staff members of the NCBG Conservation and Horticulture departments, while enjoying tasty brews.
Matt & Rosemary Putnam and Dave Robert host the annual celebration of UNC's Coker Arboretum at the Dead Mule Club, the evening of June 23, 2019, with food and drink for all, and a Garden update by Director Damon Waitt.
The NCBG initiates a Native Plant Materials Development (NPMD) project designed to provide ourselves and others with seeds and/or plugs for natural area restoration. During the first year of the project, the NPMD collects 1.8 million seeds representing 120 species from the Piedmont, Sandhills and barrier islands.
Alan Weakley, director of the UNC Herbarium, is honored at this summer's Native Plant Conference at the Birmingham Botanical Gardens, and described in a tribute as, "one of the most gifted botanists of our time."
A book signing is held at the Garden on July 2, 2019, in honor of the publication by Timber Press of Wildflowers of the Atlantic Southeast, a portable and easy-to-use illustrated guide with a simple key for identifying more than 1,200 species of wildflowers based on flower color, petal arrangement, and leaf type. All three authors of the guide, Laura Cotterman, Damon Waitt, and Alan Weakley, are affiliated with the NCBG.
The Garden is certified by the NC Green Travel Initiative, a program of the NC Department of Environmental Quality, as a Green Travel Business.
The 31st annual exhibit of Sculpture in the Garden, featuring over 40 works by North Carolina artists, opens with a members-only preview party on September 14, 2019, during which Best in Show and Honorable Mention winners are announced. The show was juried by Mario Marzan, assistant professor of art at UNC-Chapel Hill, and runs through December 8th.
The Fall Plant Sale is held Friday, September 27 and Saturday, September 28, with Friday being a members-only preview party with live music and refreshments, followed by Saturday's public sale. Over 5,000 plants are sold!
Stephen Keith is officially hired as NCBG's director of development, on October 1, 2019. Stephen moved into this post after serving first as associate director of development under Charlotte Jones-Roe and then, following Charlotte's retirement, as interim director of development. Stephen initially joined the staff in 1995, as a summer intern, and later as curator of Battle Park and Forest Theatre. He left the Garden for a brief number of years to serve as associate director of development for the UNC Arts and Sciences Foundation.
Emma York Marzolf joins the NCBG Conservation Department as its Conservation Grower and Rebecca Wait joins the staff of the Horticulture Department as the new curator of the Allen Education Center landscape and entryway gardens.
The Frederick Henry Koch Memorial Forest turns 100! On October 6, 2019, the Forest Theatre 100th Anniversary Celebration features performances by Playmakers Repertory Company, Paperhand Puppet Intervention, the Pauper Players, Company Carolina, and others. The event hopes to not only celebrate the theatre's history, but raise awareness of the need for continued improvements to the theatre so that Koch's vision of community and outdoor theater may continue to flourish.
On October 11, 2019, the Garden celebrates the ten-year anniversary of the James and Delight Allen Education Center. This facility was dedicated and opened to the public on University Day, Oct. 12, 2009, almost 10 years ago to the day. Built entirely with private funds donated by nearly 600 private donors, the facility was named the James & Delight Allen Education Center in 2013.
BOO-tanical, an ever-more-popular Youth & Family event, is held October 25, 2019.
Don't get caught without one! The North Carolina Botanical Garden Foundation and the Friends of Plant Conservation team up to offer a new North Carolina specialty license plate featuring the Venus flytrap (Dionaea muscipula). 500 license plate pre-orders are needed in order for the NC General Assembly to formally approve the application. Proceeds from plate purchases will support efforts of the North Carolina Botanical Garden Foundation, Inc. and the Friends of Plant Conservation, Inc. to conserve native plants and promote the restoration of healthy landscapes across North Carolina.
Benjamin Vogt, author of A New Garden Ethic and owner of Monarch Gardens, a landscape design firm based in Nebraska that promotes the use of native plant communities to help solve some of today's environmental challenges, is the featured speaker for the annual Jenny Elder Fitch Memorial Lecture, held November 3, 2019.
On November 9, 2019, the North Carolina Botanical Garden Foundation purchases the Cochrane Property, a 13-acre parcel of land bordering the Parker Preserve to the north, Mason Farm Biological Reserve to the east, and the Laurel Hill Nature Preserve to the west, and ranked as "exceptional" by the North Carolina Natural Heritage Program. It extends the boundaries of a wildlife corridor linking Garden properties and undeveloped private land with Jordan Lake Gameland. The $750,000 purchase was made possible with contributions from Orange County, the Town of Chapel Hill, private donations, a substantial grant from the N.C. Clean Water Management Trust Fund, as well as the persistence and hard work of NCBG Director of Conservation Johny Randall, who had worked on acquiring the property for 18 years and, in 2015, began discussing purchase of the property with the Cochrane family.
The annual Membership Meeting is held November 15, 2019. Nominees for the North Carolina Botanical Garden Foundation Board include Susan Moeser, Max Leach, Terry Ball, and Janis McFarland. The proposed officer slate includes: Anne Harris, President; Sims Preston, Vice President; Nate Byrd, Treasurer; and Jenny Routh, Secretary.
NCBG's Winter in the Garden Holiday Festival opens to the public on December 7, 2019, with lights, native plant greenery, a crafts market, holiday music, a roomful of raptors, kids' crafts, food for purchase, good cheer - and Rameses decked out in his Santa suit. It follows the annual Holiday Party and Preview Night held the previous evening.
ID: 80Modified by: RingenburgLast Update: 2019-12-03Publish: 1