Merrill W. Linn will host weekend Go Native! Workshops in the Fall of 2017 and Spring of 2018 to educate community members on the following topics:
- The benefits that native plants offer the gardener with an emphasis on how natives conserve water and mitigate stormwater runoff.
- How native plants help home gardeners and landowners reduce their carbon footprint and the use of fertilizer and pesticides. Â Discussion will include natural alternatives to fertilizers and earth friendly weed killers and how fertilizers and pesticides are killing off pollinators.
- Recognizing, controlling, and removing invasive plants. Â Discussion will include information on how invasive plants negatively affect the landscape and wildlife.
- How and why native plants provide wildlife habitat that exotics and turf cannot. Discussion will include how specific species, such as the Monarch butterfly, rely on specific plants for their survival.
- How to put a native plant garden to bed for the winter. What should the gardener cut back, and what should he or she let stand?
- Analyzing and amending soil.
- How to create and maintain a wildflower meadow.
- How to create and maintain a rain garden.
- How to create and maintain a pollinator garden.
- The aesthetics of native plant gardening: how to choose and group plants to create a natural looking landscape.
- Alternative ways to remove sod—burning, smothering, or digging.
- Developing a sense of place by understanding the geology and natural history of the Central Susquehanna Valley.
For information on dates, times, and locations, please contact the Merrill W. Linn conservancy at linn@ptd.net or at 570-524-8666