Landscaping with Colorado Native Plants Conference
February 10, 2018 at the Denver Botanic Gardens
Registration for the 3rd Annual LWCNP Conference NOW OPEN! landscapingwithcoloradonativeplants.wordpress.com.
Our keynote speaker will be Panayoti Kelaidis: Native Plants in the Garden: a Problem or Panacea?
This talk will present a few of the challenges encountered establishing native plants at Denver Botanic Gardens (and similar institutions) such as the difficulty of procuring germplasm, how hard they can be to establish and maintain and the often negative reaction to poorly designed native plantings. Panayoti will then show solutions to each of these challenges that intelligent design and proper maintenance can obviate: a successfully established native garden can be a panacea in our urban spaces—minimizing irrigation and runoff and reaffirming our connection to Nature in every sense.
Topics for the ‘New to natives’ breakout session will include planting for habitat, planting for year-round interest, adding natives to an existing landscape (including replacing your lawn), and “plant this, not that”. Topics for the ‘Knows the natives’ breakout sessions will include maintenance, rock/crevice gardening (including bare-root planting), soils for native plants, and water conservation through passive water harvesting. We will end the day with panel with a grower’s perspective on natives.
We will also have many wonderful vendors to check out before and after the conference, and during breaks.
The Landscaping with Colorado Native Plants Conference promotes the inclusion of native plants in our landscaping to benefit pollinators and songbirds, save water, and restore the beauty and health of nature in the places we live, work and play.
While we recommend the use of straight species and local ecotypes wherever possible, we support the use of varieties and cultivars of native species as long as their breeding doesn’t interfere with their ability to function in nature and maintain key relationships with pollinators and other lives.