Twin Cities Chapter Wild Ones • 4th Annual Member Only Tour
Saturday, August 11, 2018
You are invited to join other members of Wild Ones on a field tour to Root River Valley near Rushford, Minnesota.
• Our trip leader will be Scott Leddy, a naturalist and restoration practitioner who is intimately familiar the diverse plants of this region along with the wildlife they support. Scott has referenced several sites we may tour, some are rolling hills, others are steep goat prairies. Members in attendance will choose the sites after a brief overview the morning of the tour. In addition to plants of the driftless sand prairies, we’ll be keeping an eye out for reptiles, grassland birds, and many pollinators.
• Should we decide to venture on to one of the goat prairies, participants who prefer not to climb the bluffs will be welcome to continue exploring the low elevation prairies on their own. All participants should bring sunscreen as well as water and a bag lunch. Our tour coordinator will provide a cooler to store lunches and extra water to refill bottles. Keep in mind that these sites do not have groomed paths and the grass may be tall, brushing against our legs. Appropriate hiking shoes, socks and light-weight long pants are recommended.
• Bonus: Scott will be presenting at our Fall Kick-Off September meeting, a fun way to revisit the site and see plants in bloom throughout the seasons.
• Rushford, Minnesota is roughly a 2.5 hour drive from Minneapolis, a bit more if you break at a rest stop on the way down. Carpools are being organized by the tour coordinator. Please consider whether you would like to be a driver or a passenger when registering. To cover cost of gas, passengers should bring $10 to $15 to give to driver, depending on number in car.
FIELD TOUR ITINERARY:
10:30 am | Gather with tour attendees at Jessie Street Java
Scott Leddy will provide a bit of background and history of area, offering site options to tour based on level of difficulty and what’s in bloom.
11:00 am to 2:30 or 3:00 pm | Field tour and lunch
Tour at least two, perhaps three sites with a break for lunch along the road.
How long we tour will be dependent on comfort level of weather and stamina of group.
At the end of the tour each carpool group will make their own decision on whether to go directly back to Minneapolis, explore more of the Root River Valley area or stop for dinner along the way.
MEMBERSHIP REQUIRED
This is a Wild Ones member only event. If you are uncertain of your membership status, contact your chapter membership chair person to verify or renew. If you are not a current member, you can join now or on the day of the tour.
RSVP by AUGUST 3rd
All attendees must RSVP to tour coordinator via text (612-382-2800) or email (juliakay@winternet.com) so we know who to expect, even if you plan on joining us in Rushford.
Please provide 1) name(s) of all participant(s) and 2) mobile phone number with your reservation. As a courtesy to others, we also need to know if you are no longer able to attend.
Due to the logistics and and desire to "leave no trace", we will cap registration at 20.
CARPOOL IINSTRUCTIONS:
7:30 am | Meet at Nokomis Beach Coffee, 4956 28th Ave S., Minneapolis.
(Please park cars along 28th Avenue.)
7:45 am | Depart for Rushford. Goal is to be there by 10:30 am
Contact Julia via text (612-382-2800) or email (juliakay@winternet.com) if interested in carpool. Please indicate if you are willing to be the driver.
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Thursday, July 26, 2018 | POLLINATOR PARTY!
5-8 pm |Lyndale Park gardens
The 2018 Pollinator Party will take place on Thursday, July 26, from 5 to 8 p.m. The event will take place at Lyndale Park Gardens (4124 Roseway Road, Minneapolis, MN 55409) on the east side of Lake Harriet. Organization of the Pollinator Party is a cooperative effort by Minneapolis Park & Recreation Board and the U of MN Bee Lab/Bee Squad.
The goal of the Pollinator Party is to promote awareness of pollinators, share expert knowledge and celebrate pollinators' contributions to our world. We are excited to have a diverse range of exhibitors. Thank you for sharing your time and energy to help the pollinators!
Here is a link to the Pollinator Party Event Page (Facebook).
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Saturday, July 28, 2018 | Nokomis East Gateway Garden
Native plant demonstration garden at East 50th Street and Hiawatha Ave. S., Minneapolis MN (NW corner).
Enjoy a visit here to imagine how native plants can find a place in your yard. In 2010, a beautiful native perennial planting of wildflowers, prairie grasses and trees emerged from an unused barren half-acre lot. It is a monarch magnet, especially during migration. The gardens are a community collaborative effort between the Nokomis East Neighborhood Association, Metro Transit, the City of Minneapolis and local residents. Colbert/Tews, landscape architects created a garden design of a monarch wing when seen from an aerial view.
Wild Ones Twin Cities will have an informational table at the gardens and offer plant talks. WOTC is part of a national nonprofit organization whose purpose is to provide learning and field experiences to those interested in native plant landscaping and environmental education. wildonestwincities.org.
Autographed bee and pollinator books by local author Heather Holm, will be available. Her latest book titled Bees: An Identification and Native Plant Forage Guide, has won five book awards including the 2018 American Horticultural Society (AHS) Book Award.
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September 8, 2018
10th Annual Monarch Festival – Festival de la Monarca
This year’s Monarch Festival will occur on Saturday, September 8, 2018, from 10 am to 4 pm. The Festival celebrates the monarch butterfly amazing 2,300 mile migration from Minnesota to Mexico with music, food, dance, hands-on art, native plant sales and plenty of opportunities to get up close with monarch butterflies, learn about their habitats, and what you can do to make a difference.
The Festival will be held just east of the Lake Nokomis Community Center in the area bounded by E. Minnehaha Parkway, Woodlawn Boulevard, and E. Nokomis Parkway.
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SUMMER 2018 Wild Ones Gardeneering at NOKOMIS NATURESCAPE
NN Gardeneer Coordinators are:
- Regular group gardening sessions begin in May at 6-8 pm on most Tuesday evenings.
- The meeting time of group gardening sessions changes in late August to 5-7 pm.
- Gardening is weather permitting - light rain, some heat or cold is fine but with any extreme, a gardening cancellation notice will be emailed to group day of session.
JULY
7/24 & 31/Tue ~ NN Gardening 6-8pm
7/28 ~ MPRB Pollinator Party at Lyndale Gardens
AUGUST
8/7, 21, 28/Tue ~ NN Gardening 6-8pm | Time change later in month to 5-7pm
8/16/Thu ~ Wells Fargo Volunteers at NN | 1-4pm, 2 + NN gardeners help requested
SEPTEMBER
9/4, 11 & 28/Tue ~ NN Gardening 5-7pm
(Wild Ones Meeting on the 9/18/Tue)
9/8/Sat 10am - 4pm ~The Minneapolis Monarch Festival
OCTOBER
10/9 & 23/Tue ~ NN Gardening 5-7pm
(Wild Ones Meeting on the 10/16/Tue)
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Rich Harrison, a Registered Landscape Architect, is the director of Landscape Design at Metro Blooms. Rich has been a Metro Blooms staff member for five years. Rich will teach about natural processes, using an approach focused on how we can play a more responsible role living in the natural environment. Rich will include his background and experience, learning and working for 25 years, designing landscapes for improved water quality. He will also help you to assess your land to plan a more ecologically integrated landscape. Rich's goals align closely with Wild Ones, restoring more life and diversity to our human-dominated world. He recognizes on-site treatment of stormwater runoff is the best solution for reducing downstream pollution to save our precious water resources. The audience will learn an abundance of tools and techniques to implement solutions to the problems with declining pollinator diversity that Scott Leddy enumerated at our September meeting.
