Oak Islands help tomorrow!

Hello Taltree volunteers!

We need your help tomorrow with weeding in Oak Islands.  You will be meeting in the small paved parking lot at 8am, volunteering goes until 11am.

Please remember that close toed shoes are required and we suggest bringing any protective wear such as gloves, hat, water, sunscreen, and bug repellent.

If you are interested in participating in this project please contact the Volunteer Coordinator, Anna Mroz at amroz@taltree.org or call 219-742-2778.

All help is greatly appreciated!

Clean up the Gardens Day!

It looks like spring has sprung!  With warm weather comes getting all of the gardens ready for the growing season, come and be a part of it!

This annual volunteer event helps the horticulture staff rake leaves, remove debris, cut back, and otherwise clean up the gardens. It's also a great way to break a sweat in early spring and practice up on some of those pesky garden prep tasks.

If you're willing to lend a hand, bring a rake and some gloves, come dressed for the weather, and we'll sweep the winter blues away!  Clean up the Gardens Day is Saturday, March 31 from 8:30am-11am.

This is a very important project to Taltree and all of the help and support that we can get is so greatly appreciated! If you would like to participate please contact the Volunteer Coordinator, Anna Mroz at amroz@taltree.org or call 219-742-2778. Hope to see you there! 

National Invasive Species Awareness Week

Hello all!

National Invasive Species Awareness Week is approaching us within the next month!  From February 26-March 3, an effort to make invasive species known will be put to the test with your help!  Below is a link to a list of fun and easy ways to contribute to invasive species awareness:

National Invasive Species Awareness Week

To update all of our Eradicators and interested Pest Patrollers, we are in the process of planning and preparing training sessions to begin in April.  Further information will be sent to interested volunteers and on our blog!

Pest Training Success!

Hi everyone!

I'm glad to say that we had over 30 participants show up at Taltree to hear more about Emerald Ash Borer, Gypsy Moth and other pests that we need to keep our eyes out for!  It was a great thing to see staff, volunteers and community members joined in the same room with the same concerns for the areas trees.

Kallie Bontrager from the DNR did an excellent job fielding questions and covering the pests and diseases of most concern to our area.  If anyone did not get Kallie's contact information it is:

Phone: 219-324-8291

Email: kbontrager@dnr.in.gov

Email is the best way to contact her.  Your tax dollars pay for her to help you prevent, identify and dispose of these beasties and the information she gathers helps other organizations so please don't hesitate to contact her.

Also, I encourage you to visit the National Pest Diagnostic Network (got it right that time!) at their website www.npdn.org for loads of information on pests and First Detector training modules.  

If you decided to take any of these modules prior to Taltree officially starting our own program, hand on to that certificate so you don't have to do it over again.

An informative printable brochure with info on what our own First Detector training might entail:

https://www.npdn.org/webfm_send/1442

DNR Pest Training Confirmed

Exciting news if you are interested in becoming a pest scout at Taltree!  Kallie Bontrager from the DNR will be here in our classroom from 10am-noon on Wednesday December 14th to talk about Emerald Ash Borer and Gypsy Moth!  

Space is limited so if you'd like to attend please contact the office at 219-462-0025 and speak with our Volunteer Coordinator.  She'll sign you up!

There won't be any tables set up, just chairs, so bring something hard to write on.  This is the first in many steps we need to take to get a team of volunteers to be on the lookout for the bad guys!

Hope to see you there!

Trainings Coming in December

Hi there!  An update from the Hort/Grounds crew.  We're hoping to hold a training session for those interested in scouting for pests in the arboretum some time in December.  We'll be sure to pass along the date we end up settling on as soon as the details are worked out.

Other good news; we are working with the DNR (Department of Natural Resources) and APHIS (Animal Plant Health Inspection Service) to come to Taltree and hopefully have a training of all our staff, volunteers and the general community about EAB, Gypsy moth and others that we need to be on the look out for.  We've been talking with them so it's just a matter of hashing out the details and again, as soon as we know about it we'll advertise widely.

We're hoping to start a good thing here at Taltree.  Scouting, educating and communicating to help raise awareness about invasive pests and diseases.  Volunteers can contact Anna Mroz, our Volunteer Coordinator with questions or check here periodically for updates!

Welcome and Mission

Welcome to Taltree's blog for Horticulture and Grounds volunteers!  In case you're wondering who you are:

Eradicators
Pest Scouters
Gardeners
Greenhouse helpers

And anyone else who volunteers in the great outdoors of Taltree

The mission of this blog is to do a few things:

1. Update outdoor volunteers on the latest findings in the pest (animal and botanical) world
2. Facilitate conversation between volunteers (Eradicators who may want to work as a team)
3. Educate our outdoor volunteers on the numerous bits of interesting info that crosses the desk of Horticulture Manager (Patty Stimmel) and Grounds Manager (John Lunsford)
4. Fulfill the requirements of the Sentinel Plant Network to educate the community about invasive pests and pathogens
5. Post ways for volunteers to train themselves!  The National Plant Diagnostic Network's training modules are a great example

Help us out!  Let us know how we're doing.  And also, be patient with us as we develop this new blog, populate it with information and hopefully answer questions and address comments posted by you.  As you know, we're a very busy lot, if we don't respond immediately please know that we will respond to the best of our ability.

Thanks for stopping by!