Hello....

Hot day.. like liliputians under a hair dryer. Anyway, what's going on.... Oh yes- we had an excellent "Walk on the Wild Side" last week in the Blomquist Garden. our topic was all things related to some current renovations/improvements in the garden. We covered everything from deciding when to renovate a garden space, design considerations, opportunities for infrastructural improvements while you're tearing things up, soil building for fungi and invertebrate diversity, etc.

A number of you mentioned some thoughts about follow up info from the walk- soil building recipes, mycorrhizal fungi innoculants, and so on.... It's been a week, so I've forgotten some of the best queries. Please comment on this post with particular questions and I'll respond. Next month's tour(9/2) will be lead by Katherine Wright, the Blomquist Horticulturist. Her topic will be "How Wetlands Work", with an emphasis on ecosystem services, water quality maintenance, how different species have adapted to thrive in wetland soils, etc. Please join us! In the meantime, look for some new construction in the Blomquist Wildlife Garden beginning next week. We'll be installing some low cedar fencing along the path. The fence materials were harvested from Durham County (all Red Cedar branches) and we've been working the last month or so to turn those raw materials into attractive, functional, durable garden art. Enjoy!

p.s.- for those of you following the plant i.d. blog that Katherine is using to enhance her native plant knowledge, there is a new installment. If you have any plants you would like to see covered, or if you have photos of native plants you need help identifying, let us know through this blog and we'll see what we can do!