THERE'S THINGS ON THERE THAT YOU
WANT TO GROW OR THAT AREN'T ON
THERE THAT YOU WANT TO GROW.
TRY ONE OR TWO.
TAKE NOTES.
SEE HOW IT DOES FOR YOU.
SOME PLANTS MAY BE STUNTED.
SOME PLANTS MAY WILT AND DIE.
THAT'S HOW THOSE LISTS WERE
DEVELOPED.
GET A GOOD START FROM THOSE
LISTS AND THEN ADD TO IT
YOURSELF.
>> MICAH HAS SOME LED SHOP
LIGHTS.
ARE THESE OKAY FOR INDOOR SEED
STARTING?
>> I'VE HAD -- I DO LED GROW
LIGHTS AND IT'S ENERGY SAVING,
LOW HEAT, GOOD RESULTS.
I HAD A MASTER GARDENER TELL ME
SHE BOUGHT SHOP LIGHTS AND HAD
GREAT SUCCESS.
WE NEED BLUE AND RED LIGHT FOR
PLANT GROWTH AND FLOWERING.
GROW LIGHTS HAVE BOTH.
OFTEN SHOP LIGHTS ARE MORE BLUE,
LESS RED.
SO GROW LIGHT YOU KNOW YOU'RE
GOING TO GET A FULL SPECTRUM.
GIVE IT A TRY.
YOU CAN ALWAYS ADJUST.
KEEP THOSE LIGHTS FOUR TO SIX
INCHES ABOVE THE TOP OF THE SEED
LYNGS,
SEEDLINGS.
>> BONNIE HAS A FOLLOW-UP
QUESTION.
WHEN IS THE BEST TIME OF YEAR TO
MOVE AND SEPARATE PEONIES.
>> FALL IS ALWAYS THE TIME WE
HEAR, JUST AS THE LEAVES ARE
DYING BACK.
DIG THEM, DIVIDE THEM, REPLANT
THEM.
YOU MAY NOT GET FLOWERS THAT
FOLLOWING SPRING, BUT YOU SHOULD
THE FOLLOWING YEAR.
KEEP THOSE EYES ABOUT TWO INCHES
BELOW, NO DEEPER, SO YOU DON'T
BURY THEM TOO DEEP AND IMPEDE
FLOWERING.
AND FULL SUN AND GOOD DRAINAGE.
>> WE'RE COMING INTO OUR FINAL
MOMENTS HERE AND WE STILL HAVE A
LOT OF QUESTIONS COMING IN FOR
FOASKS.
WHERE CAN FOLKS REACH OUT TO YOU
WITH QUESTIONS AFTER TODAY.
>> INFO AT MELINDA MYERS.COM.
I KNOW THERE'S LECTURES YOU
DON'T WANT TO MISS.
IF YOU JUST PUT QUESTION FROM
GARDEN EXPO I'LL PUT YOU AT THE
TOP OF THE LIST.
I'M DOING FREE WEBINARS AS WELL
AND DO MY BEST TO ANSWER
QUESTIONS AND WE HAVE LOTS OF
VIDEO AND AUDIO TIPS TO HELP YOU
ALONG THE WAY.
>> MELINDA, THANK YOU SO MUCH
FOR JOINING US TODAY.
I WANT TO SHARE ONE FINAL
COMMENT FROM A VIEWER IN
ONTARIO.
THANK YOU.
THIS HAS BEEN GREAT AND SO
HELPFUL.
DELIGHTED TO ATTEND VIRTUALLY.
SO THANK YOU FOR JOINING US.
>> OH, THANK YOU.
>> AGAIN, AS A REMINDER, THIS IS
RECORDED.
YOU CAN GO BACK AND VIEW IT
ONLINE AT
gardenexpo.org/schedule, ON
FACEBOOK, YOUTUBE OR ANYWHERE
YOU MAY BE WATCHING TODAY.
PLEASE STAY TUNED BECAUSE WE
HAVE MORE GARDEN EXPO COMING UP
OVER THIS.
onsin's
online gardening series Let's Grow Stuff!
Welcome to this year's virtual
Wisconsin Garden and Landscape Expo.
I hope you'll enjoy this special educational presentation.
And remember, you can leave your questions for our presenter
at any time by typing them into the chat
and we'll ask them in a live Q & A
at the end of the session.
Also, don't forget to stick around and check out
everything this virtual event has to offer.
From inspiring garden tours
to an interactive exhibitor mall,
there's something for everyone.
And, thanks for joining us.
Now, please enjoy the show.
- Hi, I'm Aaron Wynn, Farm Manager here at Victory Gardens.
Let me show you our garden.
Here we have our community garden,
where we rent out garden boxes to community members.
Here we have our food forest,
where we grow a variety of fruit and nut trees,
and we had an excellent elderberry harvest this year.
Here we have our produce area,
where we grow a majority of what we provide
to the community daily.
And at the back of our farm, we have a huge compost pile
that we use to grow food.
With this compost, we keep about one ton of food waste
a day out of the landfill.
Alex is here now, making our compost.
- Hey, hi, I'm Alex.
I'm the Composter here at Victory Garden Urban Farm,
and I'm here working on our main compost pile right now.
At this compost pile, I take waste products
and turn it into high-nutrient soil to grow food.
Every day, I dig a hole in our compost pile
to add organic materials.
Pretty big.
At Victory Garden, we get our waste materials
from local businesses such as grocery stores,
cafés, and breweries.
[waste materials splashing]
- Man: Love it.
- Digging the hole helps to aerate the compost,
and adding the fresh ingredients into the hole
helps to initiate decomposition.
[plastic rustling]
After a couple of months,
this will be soil that's ready to be used on the garden.
[compost soil rustling]
This is some of our finished compost.
Let's bring some over to the farmhouse.
- Hi, Montana.
I brought you some soil. - Oh, thanks, Alex!
Hi, I'm Montana,
and I run the Victory Garden Blitz program,
where we install raised vegetable gardens
all over the city of Milwaukee every spring.
Today, I'm gonna teach you how to make one.
To build our four foot by eight foot garden beds,
we use one yard of this 50/50 compost topsoil mix.
We use three eight-foot boards,
and some drill and screws to put it all together.
The first step to building your garden
is to choose your garden location.
You wanna make sure that your garden spot has lots of sun
and is on nice, level ground.
Today, I'm gonna show you that you can even build
a raised garden bed on concrete and reclaim urban spaces,
maybe up against the side of your house and grow food.
Today, Aaron and Alex are gonna help me
put together this bed.
First, they're gonna cut one of the eight-foot boards
in half, and those will be the two short ends
of our garden bed.
[saw buzzing]
Now we're gonna attach our boards together.
We're gonna use three screws on each corner
to hold the boards in place.
If you want, you can drill pilot holes
to help avoid cracking.
It's good to do this part with a partner
so one person can drill
while the other person holds the board.
[drill buzzing]
Once we're done drilling the frame together,
we're ready to fill it with soil.
We are using a 50/50 mix of some topsoil that we have
and some compost that Alex made on the farm.
[wheelbarrow clangs]
After you dump in the yard of soil,
you can rake it all nice and level,
so that it's ready for planting.
Lavender's a perennial here in Wisconsin,
and perennials are good to be transplanted
in the spring and fall.
So we're gonna transplant some into our new garden bed.
Now we're gonna transplant our perennial herbs
into our new raised garden bed,
so that Joya always has fresh herbs to cook in her kitchen.
Our Victory Garden Blitz program
installs 500 of these raised garden beds every spring,
all around Milwaukee.
We raised money to install 50% of these gardens
into the lowest income neighborhoods in Milwaukee
at an affordable rate,
so growing food is accessible to everyone.
- And here at the Victory Garden,
not only are we showing people how to grow food,
but we're also showing people how to cook it.
Come on, let's go see the newly renovated community kitchen.
- Man: Welcome to the crib.
- And this is our community kitchen
where all the magic happens.
My name is Joya.
I am the Community Outreach Coordinator here
at the Victory Garden.
And it's my job to take the delicious food
that we grow on our farm, and bring it here to turn it
into something even more delicious.
We do community meals, we teach cooking classes,
and we do all of our preserving here in this kitchen.
Over the summer, we've been preserving things
like tomatillo salsa, marinara sauce,
sun-dried tomatoes, and some hot sauce.
Over here, I have some dried lavender that I'm going to take
and put in this jar here.
And I'm gonna use them for a multitude of things,
like infusing in oils, making tea,
or making scented sachets or soup.
One of the next steps for our kitchen
is to get our commercial kitchen license,
where we'll be able to rent out the space
to community members who want to start
their own cooking business.
And our kitchen is connected to our community classroom.
Here is where we host our in-person classes
and special events.
Right here we are preparing for our
elderberry syrup virtual class.
And for all those herbalists out there,
this is just a small amount of the dried herbs and berries
that we have collected from the farm over the summertime.
Victory Garden Initiative is a nonprofit organization
located in the Harambee neighborhood
of Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
- Our farmhouse is on Concordia and Richards,
and our urban farm is across the street on Concordia.
- Christine: Our focus is primarily
on helping communities grow their own food,
and creating a sustainable and socially-just food system.
- VGI, for me, is a place in the middle of the city
where people can connect with their roots,
connect with their neighbors, spend time with their families.
And it's just like this little oasis in the middle of town.
I love it so.
- It's a focal point for the community with,
you know, there is no focal point.
So it's a place where everybody goes.
It's not, that's what I like about it.
It's not just for one group of people, but for all people.
- Victory Garden Initiative, I think it's an opportunity
for people to take a good look
at some of the roots that we've lost.
It gives us a chance to think about
the earth and the fertility of the earth.
How we use space, especially in an urban environment.
- Sam Alford: It's an intersection of communities,
and everybody in the equation is educated.
White allies and employees, Black and Brown neighbors,
um, Black employees.
So it's an intersection and the gumbo pot,
and everybody's educated.
And in some small way, I think heal by doing this work.
- Interviewer: What is the Victory Garden Blitz?
- Rabbi: Oh, that's in May,
that's when everybody gets out and puts plants, trees,
and they build the boxes at places.
- Victory Garden Blitz is a big effort
to build beds around the city for the most part at this point.
And help people that want to have their own little garden.
- Usually what, 500 or 600 that you have to do
in like less than a month, and it's hard.
It takes a lot of volunteers,
a lot of people with pickup trucks,
a lot of backbreaking work.
- Ian: And sometimes the first step
of getting a garden going is tough for people
because they might not even have the ability
to put a box together and fill it with soil.
- So here in Milwaukee, you know,
we're an urban environment,
and everybody, every different community
has different access
to green space that could be used for growing food.
Some places have open space, open lots, others don't.
And sometimes those lots, even if they are open,
the ground is really not compatible
for growing healthy food.
So us installing these garden beds
and getting these into different places
into backyards or churches or schools, wherever they go,
really provides a lot more infrastructure,
but it also provides it in a different way.
A lot of nonprofits build community gardens,
they build gardens, they grow food and urban farms,
but those are usually owned by an entity,
whereas we're putting these in the hands of actual people
and individuals to control.
- Interviewer: How does gardening make you feel?
- Gardening makes me feel
like I'm part of the flow of the season.
- It makes me feel um, happy, healthy, and nourished.
Physically, spiritually, and emotionally.
- It relaxes me, keeps me out of trouble.
[laughs]
I get to meet more people this way.
I have more friends and family that way.
And it's good for you.
- To grow something, cook it, and serve it to my family,
that is hugely fun and rewarding.
So I feel peaceful, I feel meditative,
I feel calm, and I feel connected.
Whether you eat a whole meal of things that are grown
from your kitchen, from your garden or from,
or just a piece of it,
it helps you feel a sense of sovereignty.
Like this is my life.
I'm not just waiting to see what shows up in the store.
It's my life first.
- Christine: When people ask how they can get involved
with the local food system, with growing their own food,
they're often, usually they're asking
'cause they feel overwhelmed.
They don't know what they could possibly do
to make a difference in the local food system
or to make a difference in their own diet
or bottom line for their budgets.
So usually, my suggestion is to start really small,
either you've got, you know, an org or a business
or a community garden nearby that you could reach out to
and say, "Hey, can I tag along
"and just learn a little bit from you?"
Or to just start in their home
with some sort of small thing they can grow,
whether that's a little windowsill herb garden
or something like that.
- So I would say cooking.
Cooking is a huge part
of changing your personal food system.
Because once you learn how to like take a green,
or take a mustard green, or take a herb,
and turn it into something that you usually
actually wanna eat,
then you really have a purpose and a reason to grow it.
Because someday after gardening,
if you walk into a supermarket and maybe you'll realize
how many flavors you really are missing.
How many tastes we no longer have access to?
- Interviewer: What is your favorite thing about VGI?
- Ian: It always felt like VGI
had this incredible strength of inventiveness.
And the structure of it,
and the people involved always allowed that,
allowed people to like make mistakes, you know
or try something new or do something a little different.
And that's been a very powerful thing
is that I, that spirit of inventiveness,
that spirit of, let's try it.
No one else is doing it, you know?
- It's being around other people,
just being around people, helping others, you know,
and, and being part of that is,
you know, is always, it's always been part of me.
Being part of something where it's helping others.
And that's what VGI does.
>> HI.
I'M BEN FUTA, HOST OF "LET'S
GROW STUFF."
WE JUST FINISHED LEARNING ABOUT
THE VICTORY GARDEN INITIATIVE IN
MILWAUKEE AND GROWING BIG IN
SMALL URBAN SPACES.
MICHELLE AND MONTANA ARE JOINING
US LIVE TO ANSWER QUESTIONS YOU
ARE SENDING IN.
YOU CAN KEEP ASKING THOSE
QUESTIONS AS WE'RE CHATTING
HERE, WHEREVER YOU MAY BE
WATCHING.
MICHELLE AND MONTANA, THANK YOU
SO MUCH FOR JOINING US THIS
MORNING.
WE APPRECIATE IT.
>> GOOD MORNING.
>> THANKS FOR HAVING US.
>> WELL, MICHELLE, WE'LL START
WITH YOU.
WE HAD A QUESTION COME IN SORT
OF WHAT WAS THE FARM BEFORE IT
WAS THE FARM?
WHAT DID THAT ORIGINAL SPACE
LOOK LIKE AND HOW LONG DID IT
TAKE TO CONVERT TO WHAT YOU'RE
DOING NOW?
>> THE FARM USED TO BE CON CORE
DEA GARDENS AND IT IS AN ACRE
AND A HALF.
IT WAS JUST PEOPLE WERE GROWING
FOOD THERE.
WE TRANSITIONED INTO THIS SPACE,
VICTORY GARDEN STARTED LIVING IN
THE SPACE ACROSS THE STREET AND
THEN WE ACQUIRED THE FARMHOUSE
IN 2009 WE GOT THE LAND AND 2017
OR MAYBE '18.
I'M SORRY.
MONTANA?
IS WHEN WE GOT THIS BUILDING
ACROSS THE STREET.
IT'S COVERED IN THE MURAL THAT
WAS DONATED BY A LOCAL ARTIST
AND OUR COMMUNITY CLASSROOM AND
KITCHEN ARE DOWNSTAIRS AND OUR
OFFICES ARE UPSTAIRS.
>> WELL, MONTANA, WE'VE HAD A
LOT OF QUESTIONS COMING IN ABOUT
RAISED BEDS FROM YOUR
DEMONSTRATION AND A COUPLE ABOUT
DRAINAGE SPECIFICALLY, SO FOLKS
WONDERING HOW DOES DRAINAGE WORK
IF YOU'RE DOING ON THIS SITE
CONCRETE LIKE YOU WERE DOING.
THINKING ABOUT PLANT ROOTS, ARE
THERE PLANTS THAT WILL DO BETTER
IN A RAISED BED THAN IN SOIL?
>> YEAH.
THE DRAINAGE IS STILL ABOUT THE
SAME IF IT'S ON CONCRETE UNLESS
YOU WERE TO PUT A WHOLE RUBBER
BARRIER DOWN THAT WOULD KEEP IT
FROM DRAINING.
WHAT YOU COULD DO, YOU WOULD
JUST HAVE TO BE MORE CAREFUL
ABOUT THE AMOUNT OF WATER THAT
WENT IN THERE.
OTHERWISE IT WILL DRAIN
NORMALLY, YOU KNOW, KIND OF LIKE
IF YOU WERE TO BUILD A RAISED
BED ON TOP OF THIS CLAY OR
SOMETHING ELSE LIKE THAT.
SO BUILDING ON CONCRETE IS
PRETTY AWESOME, ESPECIALLY FOR
URBAN PLACES WHERE THERE'S JUST
ALREADY TOO MUCH CONCRETE.
IT CAN HELP TO RECLAIM THAT
SPACE A LITTLE BIT.
IT WORKS WELL FOR MOST CROPS.
DEFINITELY SOME THINGS THAT
DON'T WORK AS WELL, LIKE
POTATOES OR THINGS THAT GO WAY
DOWN INTO THE GROUND ARE NOT
GOING TO DO AS WELL.
YOU COULD USE SMALLER CARROTS,
BUT BIG CARROTS OR PARSNIPS,
THINGS THAT ARE GOING TO GROW
OVER A FOOT DOWN ARE NOT GOING
TO DO AS WELL OR THEY'LL BE A
LITTLE STUNTED IN THE RAISED
BED.
AND THEN PER PERENNIALS ARE FIFTEEN
FINNICKY, WHERE YOU CAN GROW
THEM, BUT DEPENDING HOW BIG AND
OLD THEY GET, THEY MAY BE
STUNTED BY THE SHAPE OF THE BOX.
SO IT'S GOOD IF YOU DO HAVE
PERENNIALS IN THE BED THAT ONCE
THEY GET BIG YOU MIGHT SPLIT
THEM AND TRANSPLANT THEM TO A
BIGGER LOCATION FROM THERE.
>> MICHELLE, WE HAVE A QUESTION
FROM JEAN.
SHE'S WONDERING HOW MANY
VOLUNTEERS ARE INVOLVED IN THIS
PROJECT AND IS IT CITYWIDE?
>> WE DO CITYWIDE.
WE ARE FOCUSED IN A
MICROORGANIZING WAY, BUT WE
SERVE THE ENTIRE CITY.
THERE'S HUNDREDS OF VOLUNTEERS
THAT COME THROUGH HERE IN A
YEAR.
FOR OUR GARDEN BLITZ, THERE ARE
LITERALLY DOZENS OF PEOPLE OUT
DAY AFTER DAY INSTALLING THESE
BEDS.
AND THERE ARE VOLUNTEERS IN THE
KITCHEN, CLASSROOM.
WE'RE LARGELY VOLUNTEER-POWERED,
WHICH IS WONDERFUL.
IT'S GREAT.
>> VOLUNTEERS MAKE THE WORLD GO
ROUND.
MONTANA, KARL HAS A QUESTION FOR
YOU.
THE TYPE OF LUMBER YOU USE FOR
RAISED BEDS, DOES THAT MATTER,
AND WHAT ARE SOME THINGS PEOPLE
SHOULD LOOK FOR?
>> WE RECOMMEND UNTREATED
LUMBER.
IT WILL LAST AT LEAST A DECADE.
USE A LUMBER THAT'S NOT TREATED
SO YOU'RE NOT GETTING THOSE
CHEMICALS NOT LEACHING INTO YOUR
SOIL.
WE USE PINE BECAUSE IT'S CHEAP
T..
IT MIGHT NOT LAST AS LONG AS
HARDWOOD, BUT WE TRY TO DO THESE
AS CHEAPLY AS POSSIBLE.
>> MICHELLE, IT'S SO GOOD TO SEE
ALL OF THIS AMAZING WORK AND
SHARING HAPPENING IN THE CITY.
HOW CAN PEOPLE GO ABOUT
REQUESTING A RAISED BED FOR
THEIR PROPERTY?
>> OUR WEBSITE IS GOING TO BE
LIVE TOMORROW AND IN THE
MEANTIME YOU CAN PLACE AN ORDER
THERE ON A FORM WE HAVE.
BUT YOU CAN ALWAYS EMAIL HELP US
GROW@VICTORY GARDEN
INITIATIVE.ORG TO EITHER GET A
BED AT YOUR HOUSE, SPONSOR A BED
AT YOUR CHURCH OR SCHOOL OR ANY
OPEN SPACE THAT YOU'RE IN CHARGE
OF WHERE YOU'D LIKE TO GROW.
WE'LL INSTALL IT.
ROOFTOP.
IT'S WONDERFUL.
>> YOU CAN GROW JUST ABOUT
ANYWHERE.
I LOVE IT.
MONTANA, WE'VE HAD A LOT OF
QUESTIONS, PEOPLE NOTICE HALF
MOON SHAPED OBJECTS IN THE
GARDEN AND FOLKS ARE WONDERING
WHAT THOSE ARE, IF YOU'RE ABLE
TO SHARE.
>> YEAH.
SO WE GET A LOT OF MATERIALS
FROM A LOT OF LOCAL BUSINESSES
THAT GENERALLY WOULD GO TO WASTE
AND WE FIND WAYS TO REUSE THOSE.
SO THOSE ARE BARRELS THAT WE'VE
CUT IN HALF THAT ARE A WASTE
PRODUCT FROM A LOCAL FACTORY AND
WE USE THEM AS MINIATURE COLD
FRAMES.
SO IF WE'RE GROWING THINGS AT
BEGINNING ORT END OF THE SEASON
WHERE THE TEMPERATURE IS CHILLY,
WE PUT THESE LITTLE HALF BARRELS
OVER THE TOP OF THOSE CROPS TO
HELP KEEP THEM WARMER LONGER SO
WE CAN HAVE FOOD FOR LONGER.
>> EXCELLENT.
MICHELLE, ONE FROM NICOLE.
I'M INTERESTED IN STARTING A
COMMUNITY GARDEN AT MY CHURCH.
ANY SUGGESTIONS FOR GETTING
STARTED, LICENSING REQUIREMENTS
OR THINGS SHE NEEDS TO BE AWARE
OF OR THINK ABOUT, ANYTHING LIKE
THAT.
>> USUALLY WITH CHURCH GROUNDS
THERE'S NOT MUCH TO T. YOU PUT
DOWN YOUR SOIL AND INSTALL YOUR
SIDES.
SOMETIMES PEOPLE, IF THEY HAVE
OPEN LAND THAT THEY'D LIKE TO
GROW ON, THEY PUT DOWN NEWSPAPER
OR BURLAP, COVER THAT WITH HALF
TOPSOIL AND HALF COMPOST AND
START PLANTING.
THERE'S NO LICENSE REQUIREMENT.
>> EXCELLENT.
CHERYL HAS A QUESTION HERE.
ANOTHER RAISED BED QUESTION.
I'M LOOKING FOR IDEAS TO GET A
TALLER RAISED BED TO HELP OUT
WITH JOINT ISSUES SO NOT AS MUCH
BENDING OVER BUT WITHOUT HAVING
TO FILL THAT TALL BED WITH SOIL.
ANY IDEA HOW TO BALANCE THOSE
TWO OUT?
>> YEAH.
THAT CAN BE A TRICKY ONE.
A GOOD WAY TO GO, THE BEST WAY
TO GO WOULD HAVE BEEN ROCKS, IF
YOU HAVE LOTS OF ROCKS YOU COULD
FILL WITH YOUR EXISTING RAISED
BED.
THAT'S GOING TO GENERALLY BE THE
CHEAPEST WAY TO GO.
OR YOU COULD TRY FILLING THE
BOTTOM WITH LOTS OF WOOD AND
THINGS LIKE, THAT WHICH WILL
BREAK UP OVER TIME, SO YOU'LL
HAVE TO KEEP ADDING.
BUT IT WILL BE EASY IF YOU ONLY
HAVE TO ADD A LITTLE BIT OF
EXTRA SOIL EACH YEAR.
>> MICHELLE, RITA IS WONDERING,
IS THE FARM AND GARDEN OPEN.
IF SHE'S DRIVING THROUGH
MILWAUKEE, CAN THE PUBLIC COME
IN AND VISIT AND WHAT DOES THAT
PROCESS LOOK LIKE?
>> ABSOLUTELY.
FEEL FREE TO STOP BY ANYTIME.
OUR HOURS IF YOU'RE LOOKING FOR
GUIDANCE, FOR SOMEBODY TO BE ON
THE LAND, WE'RE THERE FROM 10:00
TO 5:00 OR 6:00 OR IN THE SUMMER
UNTIL THE SUN GOES DOWN.
EVERY MONTH WE HAVE A BLOCK
PARTY, SO THE NEIGHBORS ALL COME
OUT.
WE EAT SOMETHING THAT WE GREW,
LISTEN TO MUSIC AND HANG OUT ON
THE LAND.
BUT YOU'RE WELCOME.
ANYONE IS WELCOME TO COME BY AT
ANY TIME.
>> WONDERFUL.
>> WE ALSO HAVE FIELD TRIPS WITH
OUR OUTREACH PEOPLE.
>> I ASSUME ALL OF THAT IS ON
YOUR WEBSITE AS WELL?
>> YEP.
>> PERFECT.
>> YEP.
>> REMIND US THE WEB ADDRESS
AGAIN IF FOLKS WANT TO CHECK
THAT OUT.
>> VICTORY GARDEN
INITIATIVE.ORG.
>> A REMINDER FOR VIEWERRINGS,
THIS IS A RECORDED TALK SO IF
YOU NEED TO GO BACK TO REFERENCE
THINGS, THESE ARE RECORDED ON
FACEBOOK, YOUTUBE AND GARDEN
EXPO WEBSITE AS WELL.
BECKY IS WONDERING, FOR
COMPOSTING, ARE FLAVORED COFFEE
GROUNDS OKAY TO ADD TO COMPOST
OR SHOULD WE BE LOOKING AT JUST
PLAIN COFFEE GROUNDS?
>> WELL, COMPOSTING FROM MY
PERSPECTIVE IS REALLY MORE OF AN
ART FORM.
SO IT'S KIND OF ALL UP TO YOUR
OWN DISCRETION.
THERE MIGHT BE SOME EXTRA
ADDITIVES IN THERE.
BUT IF YOU'RE ALREADY DRINKING
THAT COFFEE, THEN YOU'RE
PROBABLY OKAY WITH HAVING THOSE
SAME ADDITIVES IN YOUR SOIL.
AND IT PROBABLY WON'T CAUSE TOO
MUCH DETRIMENTAL DAMAGE TO THE
COMPOST.
SO YEAH.
I THINK ADDING THOSE KINDS OF
THINGS IS GOING TO BE SUCH A
MINUSCULE DIFFERENCE.
THE BIGGER DIFFERENCES ARE GOING
TO GET INTO THE THINGS THAT YOU
REALLY DON'T WANT TO ADD, WHICH
ARE GOING TO BE LIKE MEAT
PRODUCTS, STUFF LIKE THAT, WHICH
WILL GIVE A REALLY BAD SMELL AND
CAUSE PEST ISSUES AS WELL.
>> VALUE IS WONDERING, MICHELLE,
HOW DO YOU GO ABOUT COLLECTING
THE COMPOST ITEM?
YOU WERE SHOWING IN THE VIDEO
YOU'RE COLLECTING FROM A LOT OF
DIFFERENT LOCATIONS, BUT HOW
DOES THAT HAPPEN?
>> ALEX, OUR COMPOST MANAGER,
LITERALLY GETS IN HIS TRUCK, HE
COLLECTS COFFEE, WOOD SAVINGS
FROM A LOCAL WOODWORKER AND FOOD
FROM GROCERY STORES THAT'S
STARTING TO DECOMPOSE.
IT'S GONE TOO FAR TO SELL.
HE BURIES IT IN THE COMPOST
PILE.
>> EXCELLENT.
DEE IS WONDERING HOW SHOULD YOU
ROTATE IN A RAISED BED.
HOW CAN SOMEBODY SORT OF THINK
ABOUT THAT IDEA?
>> YEAH.
WELL, YOU CAN TRY TO ROTATE IF
YOU REALLY WANT THE SAME CROPS
EVERY YEAR, YOU CAN TRY TO PUT
THEM ON THIS SIDE ONE YEAR AND
THAT SIDE THE OTHER YEAR.
IT MIGHT NOT BE AS EFFECTIVE AS
IF YOU HAD TWO BEDS AND ROTATE
STUFF FROM ONE BED TO THE OTHER.
OR MAYBE YOU DON'T GROW A CROP
ONE YEAR AND YOU MAKE A PLAN
WITH YOUR NEIGHBOR AND THEN
THEY'LL GROW MORE OF THAT CROP
AND THEN YOU CAN TRADE PRODUCE.
THAT'S A GOOD WAY TO DO IT.
BUT IN TERMS OF THE CROP
ROTATION, MOST CROPS DO PRETTY
WELL-BEING REGROWN YEAR TO YEAR
IF YOU'RE GROWING THEM ON A
SMALL SCALE.
AND IT'S USUALLY AFFECTS YOUR
RAISED BED MORE IF YOU'RE ONLY
GROWING ONE CROP IN THAT BED.
ESPECIALLY LIKE TOE TATE TOMATOES, WHICH
USE A LOT OF ENERGY, MIX IT UP
THE NEXT YEAR.
IF YOU'RE NOFT NOT DOING SOMETHING SO
INTENSIVE, MIXING IT UP IN THE
BED SHOULD BE FINE.
>> WHAT DOES YOUR WATERING LOOK
LIKE?
DO YOU USE RAIN BAIFER BARRELS, CITY
WATER?
>> WE HARVEST OUR WATER ON THE
FARM.
AND WE OF COURSE USE RAINWATER
ALWAYS.
WE DON'T HAVE A LOT OF LIKE CITY
PUMP ACCESS.
SO WE HARVEST AND USE RAINWATER
FOR OUR CROPS.
>> AND THEN ONE MORE QUESTION
COMING IN HERE FOR PROBABLY
MONTANA ON COMPOSTING.
SHE'S WONDERING, THIS IS FROM
MARIE, I HAVE A COMPOST PILE,
BUT SHE STRUGGLES TO GET THE
MATERIALS BREAK DOWN.
IS THERE SOMETHING YOU ADD TO
THE COMPOST.
YOU MENTIONED COMPOSTING IS AN
ART FORM.
WHAT ARE SOME THINGS FOLKS
SHOULD THINK ABOUT IN THAT WAY.
>> YEAH.
THERE'S DEFINITELY MORE A
SPECTRUM OF PASSIVE AND ACTIVE
COM POSTING.
IF YOU'RE JUST THROWING THINGS
DOWN IN A PILE, IT WILL TAKE A
LOT LONGER TIME TO BREAK DOWN.
SO THAT'S ONE THING TO BE
CONSIDERING.
THE OTHER THING IS REALLY HAVING
A BALANCE OF NITROGEN AND CARBON
OR GREEN AND BROWN MATERIALS.
SO YOUR VEGETABLES, SCRAPS FROM
YOUR KITCHEN AND EVERYTHING
WOULD BE MORE NITROGEN HEAVY,
THEN DRIED WEEDS, WOOD, STUFF
LIKE THAT.
HAVING A NICE LAYERING SYSTEM
WILL HELP THE INGREDIENTS TO
BREAK DOWN FASTER.
ALSO MAKING SURE THAT IT HAS
MOISTURE.
IT NEEDS MOISTURE TO BREAK DOWN.
IF YOU HAVE A LOT OF DRY
MATERIALS, ADDING WATER WILL
HELP.
AND THEN A BIG THING THAT REALLY
HELPS IT TO BREAK DOWN IS IF
YOU'RE TURNING IT.
SO IF YOU WANT YOUR COMPOST TO
BREAK DOWN, YOU CAN DO A REGULAR
TURN OF THAT PILE TO OXYGENATE
IT AND THAT WILL SPEED THINGS
UP.
>> MICHELLE, WE HAVE A QUESTION
FROM A VIEWER WONDERING ABOUT
PESTS AND CRITTERS IN AN URBAN
ENVIRONMENT AND HOW THAT MIGHT
LOOK DIFFERENT THAN GROWING IN A
RURAL AREA.
HOW DO YOU APPROACH SORT OF
WORKING WITH OR CONTROLLING FOR
THINGS LIKE RACCOONS OR OTHER
THINGS THAT MIGHT BE IN THE CITY
CITY?
>> WE HAVE SEVERAL CATS THAT
LIVE ON OUR LAND.
WE HAVE CAT SHEDS OUT THERE THAT
WE BUILT SO THEY CAN HANG OUT.
THEY'RE ALL CHIPPED AND NEUTERED
BY THE HUMANE SOCIETY, SO THEY
CAN LIVE OUTSIDE.
AND OUR NEIGHBORS ALSO HELP TAKE
CARE OF THE CATS.
WE HAD A FAMILY OF GROUNDHOGS A
COUPLE SEASONS AGO AND WE JUST
PLANTED MORE SQUASH FOR THEM
BECAUSE THAT'S THEIR FAVORITE
THING.
WE HAD A ROW OF SQUASH AND
THAT'S WHAT THEY ATE.
I DON'T THINK THAT WE HAVE
PROBLEMS WITH PESTS AS FAR AS
EATING OUR CROPS.
AND WHEN IT COMES TO LIVE
TRAPPING, IF SOMETHING REALLY IS
A PROBLEM, ESPECIALLY IN OUR
YARD HERE OR IN THE BUILDING, WE
LIVE TRAP AND RELEASE THEM.
>> PERFECT.
STAFF CATS.
I KNOW A LOT OF PUBLIC GARDENS
THAT HAVE STAFF CATS AS WELL.
>> THEY'RE WONDERFUL, YEAH.
>> MONTANA, DO YOU EVER TRY
WINTER SOWING AS COVER CROPS
VERSUS SPRING PLANTING?
>> WE'VE DONE A LITTLE BIT, LIKE
IN THOSE HALF BARRELS THAT I
TALKED ABOUT.
WE'VE DONE SOME SPINACH THROUGH
THE SEASON IN THOSE KIND OF
SYSTEMS.
WE'VE ALSO DONE IN THE PAST
WHERE WE HAD A LITTLE HOOP HOUSE
THAT WE WOULD PUT ON TOP OF OUR
COMPOST PILE.
BECAUSE THE COMPOST PILE CREATES
SO MUCH HEAT, WE'VE ACTUALLY
BEEN ABLE TO GROW LIKE A LOT OF
-- LIKE HAVE A FIG TREE THAT
STAYS ALIVE ALL YEAR OUTSIDE
BECAUSE IT'S ON THIS COMPOST
PILE.
SO WE DO SMALL AMOUNTS WHOEVER
AND THERE.
WE'RE GETTING A NEW GREENHOUSE
THIS YEAR THAT WE'RE GOING TINE
STALL TO HELP WITH MORE
YEAR-LONG GROWING.
BUT IT'S FUN EXPERIMENTING WITH
DIFFERENT METHODS.
>> AND SO WE'RE COMING INTO OUR
FINAL FEW QUESTIONS.
I HAVE ONE LAST ONE HERE FOR
MICHELLE.
DO YOU KNOW OF A VICTORY GARDEN
PROJECT OR COMMUNITY LIKE THIS
IN THE MADISON OR JANESVILLE
AREAS THAT YOU COULD REFER
PEOPLE TO?
>> WE DON'T HAVE ONE IN
JANESVILLE OR MADISON.
BUT WE DO HAVE ONE IN GREEN BAY.
JANESVILLE IS NOT THAT
DIRECTION.
BUT PEOPLE KEEP APPROACHING US
ABOUT HOW DO WE JOIN?
HOW DO WE START A VICTORY GARDEN
IN OUR AREA.
WE GET LIKE TWO OR THREE
REQUESTS A WEEK FROM AS FAR AS
HOUSTON.
SO THAT'S WHAT WE'RE FOAF
CUSSING --
FOCUSING ON THIS SUMMER.
HOW DO WE HELP PEOPLE DO THIS IN
OTHER PLACES?
BECAUSE OUR FOCUS IS IN THE
MILWAUKEE AREA.
BUT NOW THAT WE'VE GOT THE HANG
OF IT, I THINK THAT WE'RE GOING
TO START EXPLORING THAT.
PLEASE BE IN CONTACT WITH US AND
WE'LL WORK IT OUT.
WE'D LOVE TO HAVE ONE IN
JANESVILLE.
>> YOU MENTIONED SO MUCH OF THIS
IS LOCAL AND SO COMMUNITY DRIVEN
THAT IT REALLY STARTS IN
COMMUNITY, SO THAT'S A WONDERFUL
THING.
ROOTED HERE IN MADISON DOES
COMMUNITY GARDEN WORK AS WELL AS
ANOTHER ORGANIZATION TO CHECK
OUT.
SO IT LOOKS LIKE ONE FINAL
COMMENT HERE COMING IN FROM JILL
AND SHE JUST SAYS, AGAIN, YOUR
WORK IS INCREDIBLE.
SHE'S IN AWE OF EVERYTHING THAT
YOU HAVE ACCOMPLISHED AND THAT
YOU'RE DOING.
AND SHE REALLY APPRECIATES YOU
SHARING AS I'M SURE ALL OF YOUR
VIEWERS DO AS WELL.
THANK YOU AGAIN SO MUCH FOR
JOINING US, FOR SHAIFERG YOUR
EXPERIENCE AND YOUR STORY.
WE APPRECIATE T.
>> THANK YOU.
>> PLEASE DO STAY WITH US.
WE HAVE MORE PRESENTATIONS
COMING UP THIS AFTERNOON.
BUT RIGHT NOW IT'S TIME FORTH
VIRTUAL EXHIBITOR BOOTH LIVE
STREAMING.
I HOST "LET'S GROW STUFF" AND
WE'RE LOOKING FOR IDEAS FOR WHAT
YOU'D LIKE TO SEE US COVER.
SO PLEASE SEND THOSE QUESTIONS
TO GARDEN EXPO AT
pbswisconsin.org AND IT MAY
TURN UP IN A SERIES THIS YEAR.
SO STAY TUNED AND SEND US THOSE
IDEAS.
THANK YOU FOR JOINING US AND
WE'LL SEE YOU BACK HERE IN JUST
A FEW MINUTES.
RAN SID
g them into the chat
and we'll ask them in a live Q & A
at the end of the session.
Also, don't forget to stick around and check out
everything this virtual event has to offer.
From inspiring garden tours
to an interactive exhibitor mall,
there's something for everyone.
And, thanks for joining us.
Now, please enjoy the show.
- Hi, I'm Natasha Kassulke,
and I'm here with my father-in-law, Jerry Apps,
and we'd like to spend some time with you today
to talk about how to set the stage
for successful gardening,
and how you can get your family involved.
I grew up in a small town in Wisconsin,
and we had a hobby farm, and we had a very large garden.
I would show our produce in 4-H.
And I haven't met a vegetable that I don't love.
Between Jerry and I, we have about 135 years
of experience in gardening.
And maybe you can guess who contributed most of those years.
Jerry. [Jerry chuckles]
- Yes, I've been at this business of gardening
for a very long time.
Ever since I was a little kid on the farm.
My old farm was just west of Wild Rose in central Wisconsin.
And as you might guess from the years
that I've been gardening, I was growing up
during the Depression and World War II,
where we depended heavily on our garden.
And by the way, for those who might be interested
in knowing more about my experiences,
you might want to take a look at my book, Garden Wisdom ,
which was published by the State Historical Society Press.
- Gardening is a really important family activity,
as it was for both of us growing up.
But in our family, we start planning the garden quite early.
It's actually a year-round activity.
And I'm wondering if you could share a little bit about
your experience in terms of journaling,
using writing, mapping, some of your techniques
onsin's
online gardening series Let's Grow Stuff!
Welcome to this year's virtual
Wisconsin Garden and Landscape Expo.
I hope you'll enjoy this special educational presentation.
And remember, you can leave your questions for our presenter
at any time by typing them into the chat
and we'll ask them in a live Q & A
at the end of the session.
Also, don't forget to stick around and check out
everything this virtual event has to offer.
From inspiring garden tours
to an interactive exhibitor mall,
there's something for everyone.
And, thanks for joining us.
Now, please enjoy the show.
- Hi, I'm Natasha Kassulke,
and I'm here with my father-in-law, Jerry Apps,
and we'd like to spend some time with you today
to talk about how to set the stage
for successful gardening,
and how you can get your family involved.
I grew up in a small town in Wisconsin,
and we had a hobby farm, and we had a very large garden.
I would show our produce in 4-H.
And I haven't met a vegetable that I don't love.
Between Jerry and I, we have about 135 years
of experience in gardening.
And maybe you can guess who contributed most of those years.
Jerry. [Jerry chuckles]
- Yes, I've been at this business of gardening
for a very long time.
Ever since I was a little kid on the farm.
My old farm was just west of Wild Rose in central Wisconsin.
And as you might guess from the years
that I've been gardening, I was growing up
during the Depression and World War II,
where we depended heavily on our garden.
And by the way, for those who might be interested
in knowing more about my experiences,
you might want to take a look at my book, Garden Wisdom ,
which was published by the State Historical Society Press.
- Gardening is a really important family activity,
as it was for both of us growing up.
But in our family, we start planning the garden quite early.
It's actually a year-round activity.
And I'm wondering if you could share a little bit about
your experience in terms of journaling,
using writing, mapping, some of your techniques
for planning a garden.
- Well, first off, the idea of selecting the vegetables
to be planted
the following year,
goes back to my mother,
sitting by the woodburning kitchen stove
on a cold January night, with the snow blowing outside
and the temperature dropping,
and she's sitting by the stove with a big smile on her face.
And I'm wondering, "What in the world is going on?
"Why is she smiling when the weather is so miserable?"
Well, she's smiling because she's looking
at all the vegetables.
And mind you, the catalog vegetables--
I shouldn't say this, maybe--
but generally look a whole lot better
than we were able to grow. [Natasha laughs]
So the planning for the garden
starts with looking at the catalogs.
And, Natasha, you might wannna talk about
how we do this together and make choices.
- Sure, I think it's really a science.
And I think it's a great family activity,
looking at the catalogs.
I've always thought that would be sort of an interesting job,
writing the descriptions for seeds,
but there are certain things
that we pay careful attention to
and start talking about;
things like growing season length and how long--
- The growing season
is so important in Wisconsin,
because as you look at southern Wisconsin
and far northern Wisconsin,
we have extremely different growing seasons.
- Yeah.
- The south much longer and the north much shorter.
In central Wisconsin, we pay particular attention
to that when we're selecting our seeds.
- I know we talk a lot about what's "blight resistance,"
and what does that mean?
- Yes, and in fact, we look at most of,
I think nearly all of the seed catalogs today,
if you look at them carefully,
give you an indication for each variety
as to the extent to which it is blight resistant
and other kinds of disease resistance, as well.
So that's a very important consideration to look at.
- And I think another thing we've been very concerned about
the last few years are pollinators, right?
Seeing a decline of pollinators: bees, butterflies,
and looking sometimes even for self-pollinating plants.
- Well, that's right.
Especially with the vine crops, such as cucumber,
squash, pumpkins, zucchini, all that sort of thing.
But especially the squash and pumpkins
do need pollinators.
- I'm always amazed, you know,
you come to the garden with a journal.
How do you use that in planning, and what are you doing?
What are you writing?
[Jerry chuckles]
- Well, you're not the only one that wonders
what in the world is this guy doing.
But I keep a record of where every vegetable
is planted in the garden.
I have a map that goes back for years.
- Mm-hmm.
- And there's a reason for doing that.
One should not...
This is the one of the little rules,
I hope they'll slip in here along the way,
or at least suggestions for gardening
is to not plant the same vegetable
in the same spot year after year.
If you want to avoid disease,
one way to do that is to move things around.
- Okay. - So, my journal is a map.
- Mm-hmm.
- Where I write down not only
what's planted in which row, but when.
The planting does not occur all at one time.
- And I know it helps me because until the seeds germinate,
until we see plants, it helps us keep track
of who's living where, right?
- Well, yeah, that's really important
because we try to put up little markers,
and sometimes we don't always,
but the rows are numbered in my little journal.
And so I know exactly where everything is every year.
- Talk a little bit about kids
and what their role might be. - Sure.
Well, I go back, of course, to my childhood,
when I was living all these things on their garden.
And I see nothing more important in helping kids
get in touch with nature than the garden.
It's a way to introduce kids to nature
without them realizing that they're being introduced,
which is kind of interesting. [Natasha laughs]
And also, it also helps to underline
the importance of helping, in this case,
my grandkids, know where their food comes from.
- Right.
- So often, people just don't know.
And I have a little short story to tell.
One time I was digging carrots in my garden
and one of the grandkids was there,
and he said to me, "Grandpa, what's that?"
I said, "Those are carrots."
He said, "They grow in the ground?"
[Natasha laughs] "Yes, they grow in the ground."
And then he said, "They're all different sizes?"
"Yes, they're all different sizes.
They're not all one size." - Yes.
- Anyway, it was a wonderful lesson.
As this grandchild was wondering, "What is going on here?"
- Mm-hmm.
The other thing I really enjoy
when we're picking out seeds and deciding what to plant
is to talk about things that might be unique.
- One of the things that we-- I, at least tried to do,
and you've agreed with it,
but we had something unusual every year.
- Mm-hmm.
- And it goes back to my dad; I learned this from him.
I remember the year that he planted sunflowers
that were 20 feet tall.
- Yeah, it's fun. - I mean, it was this...
People said, "Herman, what are you're doing?"
He said, "Well you gotta have something
that's a little different every year."
Now, the purple beans, little did I know,
and I should've read more carefully,
that when you cook purple beans,
they no longer remain purple. - Right.
- But they turn as green as any other green bean.
And what an amazing thing that is for a youngster,
just like, "Whoo! What's going on here?"
That's one of the little miracles,
one of the little mysteries of gardening
that goes along with appreciating nature,
which is full of mysteries and mystique.
- Mm-hmm.
That might be one way to get the kids to try vegetables.
- Well, that's true, if they help plant it,
they might think, "Well, maybe I should try that
to see what that is."
- We also, I think we are very interested
in the culture, the history.
You've written the story of agriculture for the state,
but can you talk about Three Sisters?
The Three Sisters Garden, what is that?
- Yeah, that's a very
interesting part of our history.
The Three Sisters Garden is a Native American garden
where three plants are grown together,
but you don't plant them all at the same time.
You start with the corn, give it a chance to grow.
And then the idea is the corn provides a structure
for the beans as a climbing base to climb up the stalks.
- Right.
- Now the beans also provide some nitrogen,
additional nitrogen for the corn,
and then the squash grow around the bottom.
And their role is to keep the weeds under control.
- Mm-hmm. - Which is, yeah...
- Hopefully. [both laughing]
- You hope that's gonna happen.
And the mistake that I made, and I have directions
in this book for how to do this.
The mistake I made the first year
was to assume that the vegetable varieties
that you find in the catalogs today, they would work.
They do not work.
I had three sisters that were fighting with each other.
[both laughing]
They were competing for space and for light.
My goodness, I never saw such a battle.
[Natasha laughs]
So you're going to the more native...
the more native species,
not the hybrids, for example.
- Sure. - So, yeah.
I think with the Three Sisters, also,
it gets me thinking about
horizontal versus vertical space.
- Sure.
- And to think about, even if you're in an area,
you're in an urban area, you might not have as much space.
But if you think about things more vertically,
like the sisters growing upwards,
you can actually plant quite a bit.
- And that's a good way to think,
because if you wanna have a patio with some sunshine,
you can grow a little garden. - Sure.
- You can grow it in... - I've done it in planters,
lettuce, tomatoes, sure. - Yeah, the flower pot.
I also have a little in-town garden
where I have a lot of stuff going vertically.
- Yeah.
I think another consideration,
and this sort of gets back to on science.
Can we spend a little time talking about soil?
So, soil is important for erosion control,
for water.
But at the farm, we have very sandy soil,
so what do you do to add organic material
and make it more suitable?
- Indeed, we have very sandy soil, and it's of...
It's highly acidic.
It's about 5, 5.5% pH.
- And you can get a pH meter and check your soil.
- And interestingly enough, some vegetables,
like potatoes, for example, enjoy a more acidic soil.
It helps cut down on some of the diseases.
But what we try to do at the farm,
we've tried to do over the last 35, 40 years now
gardening at the farm
is to increase the organic material
in a couple, I think, interesting ways.
One way is to mulch
the vegetable crops,
such as tomato, cabbage, and that sort of thing.
And Natasha does a lot of the mulching
with grass that we have used already during the winter
to keep our septic system from freezing.
- Right, multi-purpose gardening.
[both laughing]
- So, we're incorporating it into the soil
as organic material.
Also, in the fall, when we put the garden to bed,
we plant winter rye or winter wheat.
- Mm-hmm.
- And it grows not very tall in the fall, a little bit,
a little more in the spring.
And then we work that into the soil,
and we've turned our very sandy, very light brown soil
into a nice, dark, humus, organic material kind of soil
that works very well for us.
- And in town, you could consider composting,
having a compost pile.
- Sure, yes, indeed. - And making your own.
So Jerry, I've always been impressed
because I don't do this.
I confess: I buy plants and I start my seeds outside.
I do not start them in containers inside.
So every year, you are so patient in caring
for these teeny tiny tomato plants that you start inside.
Can you talk about how you would start
a seed inside and why? - It does take patience.
And I go back to my mother,
who was in charge of our vegetable garden at the farm.
And she always started, this is in central Wisconsin though,
she always started plants on St. Patrick's Day.
- Hmm.
- Because that's a green day. [Natasha laughs]
That's so cool.
So she would start at tomatoes.
And then, she would start cabbages.
She would start a lot of things.
- I pretty much now only start tomatoes, and you're right,
it takes a lot of patience because we have grown...
Well, I think last year,
we had seven different varieties of tomatoes,
and it's a lot less expensive to buy seeds,
but the seeds do take some caring.
And I plant them in little pots
that are... - Biodegradable.
- You plant them directly into the ground
and they become part of the organic material.
And then, I also, I cheat, I have a grow light over them
and I allow that grow light
to 6 or 8, 10 hours a day, something like that.
And when they get up to be, oh, I don't know,
this three, four inches tall or that tall,
I re-pot them into larger pots.
The problem I have, as you well know,
is keeping track of varieties when you have seven of 'em.
And some of 'em take off and grow like everything.
And some of 'em sputter along, and some of 'em
never make it at all. - Right.
- Some will look absolutely pathetic
when we're ready to set them up.
- I'm always amazed that they make it at all.
- And they take off...
I had some pathetic plants. - Yeah.
- ...when I set up my little garden in town,
they grow six feet tall.
- So don't give up on those little ones,
they might surprise you. - And it's so fun.
It really is fun to start and to see.
- I know you always have us-- and it drives me crazy.
'cuz I wanna pack everything I can.
I wanna use up every possible inch in the garden
and you're very cautious to skip a row,
give them their space.
So can you talk a little bit about,
how do you decide who to plant where?
- Somebody, I guess, has written about it
more extensively than I have.
But I've learned most of this just from doing it.
For example, if you plant pumpkins, for example,
and you plant them right next to cucumbers,
the pumpkins will win.
They fight. - Yeah.
- It sounds like they would be friends.
- Right. - But they're not.
[both laughing]
And so, you make sure that you put the cucumbers
in a different place in the garden
than where you put the pumpkins.
And I break every other row.
Now we've got a lot of room and we want enough room
so that we can run a rototiller between the rows,
so they're about 30 inches apart.
- Right.
- But for the squash and the pumpkins and the cucumbers,
we skip a row and that gives them
more breathing space, growing space.
And if you don't do that, they sort of run into each other.
You would think these vegetables
would like each other, they don't.
[both laughing]
You gotta keep them separated from each other.
- They are competing for resources.
- Well, they're competing for light,
they're competing for moisture,
they're competing for nutrients.
- So, you talked a little bit about when do you plant,
and you talked about The Three Sisters.
You don't plant all at once.
And I know one of our first crops, we plant peas.
And if you stagger things,
you can actually replant
looking at how long your growing season is.
And sometimes we planted early in the late corner,
but can you talk about, how do you know when to plant?
- Again, it depends on where you live in the state
as to when you began planting.
For us in Central Wisconsin, you have to watch the weather.
- Hmm.
- Usually by mid-April, we're able to plant crops
such as potatoes, peas, radishes.
Well, those would be the main.
- Lettuce.
- Oh, lettuce, of course, lettuce.
But what you don't plant is beans and cucumbers
and squash and pumpkins,
all those sorts of things,
because they require a soil temperature
that's considerably higher
than what's there in mid-April.
And if you plant everything at once,
the other stuff is just not gonna grow.
The seeds won't grow.
- You have an interesting relationship with rabbits.
And we have had challenges with critters.
- Oh, have we ever!
- Potato bugs, we've had turkeys, the deer.
How do you negotiate?
[Jerry laughs]
Or keep them from taking over your garden?
- Okay...
Well, we started with the idea that if you put a wire
around the fence and that you hang little balls of hair.
[both laughing]
My brother's a barber
so he gave me a whole bunch of hair.
The sounds really [inaudible].
- Yeah, this isn't something
most people are gonna want to do.
- They shouldn't even try it, 'cuz it doesn't work, people.
It sounds like it might because the whole idea is
that deer will come trotting along,
'Oh I smell a human being,
I better turn around and go away.'
The opposite happens.
'I smell a human being, there must be a garden here.'
[Natasha laughs]
I'll go over the fence and eat everything.
And then, the second thing I tried was moth balls.
- Uh-huh.
- They do-- They keep the moths out of the closet.
They do not keep the deer out of the garden.
[Natasha laughs] It's the same thing.
The deer comes trotting along,
'Oh, my gosh, there's a human being here.
There must be something good to eat.'
- Mm-hmm. - And then, it's true.
So we finally dawned on the idea of maybe we put
a low-intensity electric fence around the garden,
two wires.
Somebody said, "Well, if you're gonna have
to keep the deer off, you've gotta have
a fence 10 feet tall, like I have to have a 10 feet tall!
Our fence is four feet tall but it's electrified.
And there are two wires.
The top wire is for the turkeys and the deer
and the bottom wire is for the raccoons.
And I told him, we got my fingers crossed on the bunnies
because that's a whole different problem.
- Right.
- A deer walking along, people think the deer,
go gaboom, gaboom, gaboom, they don't move like that.
They walk. - Sure.
- And they'll put their nose on this fence once.
They're not stupid. - Mmm-hm.
- And they'll say,'Fred don't go by the house so near.
You gonna have a busted nose.'
It doesn't hurt them that much.
It just dissuades them.
Anyway, with the bunnies, I did something a few years ago.
That I thought solved the problem.
And this may sound a little weird to you,
but people have told me
that some of my other stuff is weird, my writing.
I sat down with the head rabbit. - Hmm.
- And I said, 'Joe,'
I gave him the name, Joe.
I don't know that he knew his name was Joe.
[Natasha laughs]
And I said, 'Joe, we've got to figure out something here
because some of your relatives are chewing on my vegetables.'
- Right.
- And I said, 'Joe, you have access,' I have 120 acres,
'You can have access to 115 of those acres
just stay out of my garden.'
He said, 'Deal.'
- I know we're both concerned about climate
and changes in climate and how that's affecting agriculture.
Can you talk a little bit about that?
And have you seen any changes through your seasons?
- Yes.
And I've been gardening at the farm since about 1967,
just a- Mm-hmm.ears.
- And over those years I have seen several climate, I think.
Well, I'll say, the winters have become milder.
- Hmm.
- And with a more mild winter,
pests that are likely to attack your garden,
will make it through the winter, more likely.
I have seen fluctuations in rainfall.
- Yes. - That are near unbelievable.
- Because of strong events in the spring.
- Some years it's so dry that nothing wants to grow.
- Right.
- And as the last couple of years,
we've had way more rain than we needed.
And as a result of that,
we see things like blight and mold
and all that sort of thing. - Mm-hmm.
- More prevalent than we ordinarily would see.
We have two ponds at our farm.
They are higher than any old timer ever remembers.
And I'm guessing from the trees that are inundated,
that it's more than a hundred years,
that we've had this much,
had the water table has reached a level that it is now.
- Something else that comes out a lot in your writing,
and I know it's one of the reasons I most love gardening
is the time to reflect, to be outside, to listen to nature.
And I have to say, I know a lot of people hate weeding.
Sometimes, I get tired of it, too,
but I'd love to get down and weed onions.
I love the smell and you get close to the soil,
and you just see things from a different perspective
when you are hoeing.
So can you talk a little bit about maybe weeding
and hoeing aren't really the worst things to be doing?
- Well, they're not.
And once you get onto it, I mean the rhythm,
I'm talking about hoeing though,
the rhythm of point, there's a rhythm to it.
- Mm-hmm.
And it is true of most farm tasks,
people don't realize that they're-- once you catch onto
the rhythm, then you don't have to think about it.
You just do it.
And that allows you guys like me,
who have a more curiosity than I oughta have,
I'm thinking about all kinds of things that are not hoeing.
- The next book idea. [laughs] - That's probably true.
And then, at the same time, I'm watching a bluebird.
I have a Bluebird house right next to the garden.
I'm watching a bluebird work, develop a nest.
I make see a pair of sand hill cranes flyover.
- Mm-hmm.
- And I so much enjoy the warm summer sun on a quiet day.
- Another way maybe to get kids interested,
get them away from all this screen time, right?
It's just overwhelming all of us.
Get them their own tools that fit them right.
Give them gloves that fit them.
Give them gardening clothes.
For me, it's bib overalls, whatever it takes.
- That really does make a difference.
And even the grandkids, they...
'This is mine.' 'Well, that's fine.
That's gonna be yours.'
- Your trowel, your gloves.
So you mentioned grandkids.
Several of your grandchildren have gotten
into careers that were probably influenced in some way.
- Well, I wanna talk about two in particular.
Ben Harmon, one of my grandsons.
I remember him as a little kid,
helping put up the fence around the garden.
And he was just four years old.
He's so meticulous. - Yeah.
- I said, 'You know, insulators don't have to be exactly this.'
'Oh yes, they do.'
[Natasha laughs]
And he's measuring and going on.
He is an engineer today. - Right.
- Today, he's a biomedical engineer
working for a firm in San Diego.
I could see engineer in this kid
when he was four years old.
'Cuz everything had to be just precise.
His brother, Josh.
We did lots of things together.
Lots of hiking around, taking care of the garden,
doing all kinds of things.
Josh is today an environmental attorney.
- Mm-hmm.
- I can't believe, I didn't say,
'You need to pay attention to this because the environment...'
I didn't any of that stuff.
I just said, 'Come with me, let's take a walk.'
- Aha.
- And we walked through the woods
or we'd walk around the garden.
And I would say things like, 'What do you see?'
[inaudible]
I said, 'What kind of tree is that?'
'I don't know.' 'Well, that's a birch.'
'Oh, yeah.'
Well, little did I know that that pseudo-teaching
was something that stayed with him to this day.
- I live in an area where we have
a very active community garden.
And I would suggest that, even if you don't have
a lot of space, maybe you live in an apartment
and you consider looking at a garden plot.
And one of the things I love per our community garden,
Troy Gardens, they do a lot for kids.
And they even have a children's garden
where they plant all the toppings
for a pizza, a vegetable pizza.
- That's great.
- They have a stone oven event.
So they gather the kids, do the work throughout the summer,
and then they pick the produce,
and then they celebrate by making a pizza.
So my favorite part of the garden,
of course, is eating what we harvest.
And because of the way we stagger plantings,
we're doing that all gardening season.
But I feel kind of bad, Jerry,
I think a lot of the real work here
falls on your wife, Ruth.
And so....
- She does a lot of the preparation.
- When we do the picking, then it goes
into a whole other process.
- And going back to the days on the farm,
we didn't have electricity
and did everything with a wood stove.
And my mother, during the Depression,
and we depended heavily on the garden
and so, she canned everything.
She canned the beans and strawberries and beets.
Canned everything. - Right.
- And we stored the onions and we stored the pumpkins.
And we stored the squash. She made dill pickles.
We lived off the garden. - We did, too.
- Literally, lived off the garden.
We have this...
- Tomato soup she makes.
- Tomato soup and zucchini bread.
- Yes.
- Two things where the whole family just can't wait.
And the grandkids, especially,
she will make 20, 30 loaves of zucchini bread.
And it's fantastic.
I like it as well.
- So I think cooking is another opportunity
of you have a family member who's not interested
in getting their hands dirty, maybe in the garden,
that there's a role for them to play cooking.
- And we have some lotta recipes in this book.
- And you also wrote a book with your daughter, Susie,
that has some great recipes.
- Yes, Old Farm Country Cookbook .
It's a book of recipes and stories.
- So, at some point, Jerry, fall inevitably comes every year
and it's time to put the garden to bed.
And I know that's always sort of bittersweet for me,
but that also is a really important part of success
and planning for the next year.
So what steps do you take in the fall?
- Well, you don't just leave it,
as some people may do.
By leaving it, I mean the potato vines are there.
The frozen squash vines are there,
the tomato vines are there.
One of the things that you really must do
is to remove all of the material
that is loaded with the potential for disease.
People I think mistakenly believe
that by leaving that stuff, that adds organic matter.
- Right.
- Well, it does, but it just fills your soil
with disease organisms that you can avoid by moving it away.
So once all that is taken away, then we take the fence down.
- Yup.
- And tuck it away for the winter.
That's one of the advantages of having a lightweight
kind of fence with little steel poles
to easily remove and work up the soil
one last time, as I mentioned earlier.
And plant the winter wheat or winter rye,
and then, it's to bed.
Now, here's another wrinkle to it.
Now, the deer, if they wish to come to the garden,
and I have pictures of four or five deer at a time
in my garden eating the winter rye or wheat, that's fine.
They're welcome.
And if the bunny wants to violate the rule
that we have established, no bunnies in the garden,
now he or she may come by and chew on some of that
really succulent new growth of winter rye or wheat.
- And then,
I think about you could move your planters inside.
You could plant an herb garden.
- Sure.
- You can continue this, even with our winters, inside,
or if you have the luxury
of a greenhouse or something like that.
I know some people use the hoops, the little...
- There are all kinds of things that you can do.
- To keep gardening over the winters,
that you can continue with.
So, I think, Jerry, gardening has certainly
brought me closer to you.
We spent a lot of time in the garden.
- We do.
- Gardening is a family activity.
It's a year-round activity and you've given
some really great advice today.
So, I'm looking forward to getting our seed catalogs.
- Yeah, it's almost time.
- Have any final words about...
- No, other than,
I cannot say enough about how gardening
can introduce kids to nature.
And I think that's so important,
particularly, as you mentioned earlier
with so much screen time these days,
and just getting outside where the air is fresh
and the birds are flying and the sun is shining,
and digging, getting your hands dirty.
There's nothing wrong with getting your hands dirty
for Heaven sakes!
When you're working in the garden,
you're going to get your hands dirty.
All that is a way of becoming acquainted
with nature in a way that's so beyond
looking at a movie about nature, nothing wrong with that.
Or reading a book about nature.
Going out there and doing it makes all the difference.
- Right, good, well, I look forward
to gardening with you again this summer.
- And I hope I'm right up to it.
[Natasha chuckles]
>> HI.
I'M FREDERICA BEN FUTA, HOST OF "LET'S
GROW STUFF."
JERRY AND NATASHA ARE JOINING US
LIVE TO ANSWER QUESTIONS YOU'VE
BEEN SENDING IN DURING THIS
PRESENTATION.
THIS PRESENTATION IS RECORDED SO
YOU CAN GO BACK AND WATCH IT AT
ANY TIME ON FACEBOOK OR YOUTUBE.
SO THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR JOINING
US TODAY.
WE'RE GOING TO JUMP RIGHT IN.
>> OKAY.
>> ALL RIGHT.
SO MY FIRST QUESTION IS COMING
IN HERE FROM JANICE.
SHE'S WONDERING -- FIRST SHE HAS
A COMPLIMENT TO SAY YOUR SOIL IS
BEAUTIFUL AND CLEAN.
ANY TIPS FOR HOW YOU KEEP WEEDS
AT BAY AND KEEP THE SOIL
PREPARED.
>> THERE'S NO EASY ANSWER FOR
THAT.
WE USE NO CHEMICAL WEED CONTROL.
IT'S ALL HOEING AND ROTOTILLING.
IT'S A LOT OF WORK.
AND WEED PULLING.
NATASHA GETS DOWN AND HER HANDS
AND KNEES AND GOES DOWN THE
ONION ROADS.
SHE.
I DON'T DO MUCH WEEDING ANYMORE.
BUT SHE AND MY SON STEVE DO MOST
OF THE WEED CONTROL.
BUT I STILL THINK, I FIRMLY
BELIEVE THAT IF YOU'RE GOING TO
BE A GARDENER, YOU GOT TO GET
YOUR HANDS DIRTY.
AND THE WAY TO CONTROL WEEDS IS
THE OLD -- I THINK THE OLD WAY
THAT I LEARNED 75 YEARS AGO WHEN
I WAS A KID, YOU KNOW, PULL THEM
UP BY HAND.
THAT GETS RID OF THEM.
I TELL YOU, WHEN YOU PULL A WEED
OUT OF THE GROUND, THAT'S IT.
YOU'VE DONE IT.
AND THERE'S NO MIRACLE WAY OF
DOING IT.
IT'S JUST SOMETHING THAT HAS TO
BE DONE.
>> WE'VE HAD A FEW QUESTIONS
COME IN ABOUT THE THREE SISTERS
PLANTING AS WELL.
THE FIRST IS DO WE PLANT THEM
ALL AT THE SAME TIME OR ARE
THINGS PLANTED MAYBE IN STAGES?
HOW SHOULD PEOPLE THINK ABOUT
THAT?
>> SO JUST REAL QUICK ABOUT
WEEDING, I DO A LOT OF WORK, BUT
I ALSO ENJOY ADDING SOME MULCH
AROUND THE PLANTS BECAUSE IT
HELPS KEEP THE WEEDS DOWN.
SO I MAKE LITTLE NESTS AROUND
THEM.
IT'S A LOT OF WORK UPFRONT, BUT
IT PAYS OFF THROUGHOUT THE
SEASON IN TERMS OF WEEDS AND
ALSO KEEPING MOISTURE.
THE THREE SEASONS IS JERRY'S
IDEA SO I'M GOING TO LET HIM
START WITH THAT.
>> SURE.
I'M GLAD TO GIVE IT.
YOU DO STRAYING ER THE STAGGER THE PLANTING
BECAUSE THE IDEA OF THE THREE
SISTERS GARDEN IS THAT THE CORN
PROVIDES A STRUCTURE FOR THE
BEANS TO CLIMB ON.
AND THE SQUASH ARE PLANTED WITH
THE IDEA OF CONTROLLING THE
WEEDS AROUND THE LITTLE HILL ON
WHICH YOU HAVE CONSTRUCTED THE
THREE SISTERS GARDEN.
SO YOU START BY PLANTING THE
CORN.
AND YOU CAN GO AS -- I WAIT
UNTIL THE CORN IS UP BEFORE YOU
PLANT THE BEANS.
AND ONE OF THE THINGS I LEARNED
EARLY ON IS DON'T SELECT A
HYBRID VARIETY.
SELECT SOME OF THE OLD VARIETIES
BECAUSE THEY ARE LESS -- AND
I'VE DONE IT A COUPLE TIMES.
THEY'RE LESS COMPETITIVE.
SO START WITH THE CORN.
THEN THE BEANS.
THEN THE SQUASH.
AND HOPE FOR THE BEST.
I'VE HAD MIXED RESULTS.
SOMETIMES THESE SISTERS JUST
DON'T GET ALONG AND THE GREEN
BEANS WANT TO TAKE OVER
EVERYTHING AND THE CORN BEGINS
TO WHIMPER BECAUSE IT'S NOT
DOING WHAT IT WOULD LIKE TO DO
AND THE SQUASH DOESN'T KNOW HOW
TO GET GOING.
ALL OF THAT, BY THE WAY, IS JUST
GREAT FUN, ESPECIALLY WHEN YOU
GOT KIDS AND GET THEM INVOLVED
AND THEY CAN WATCH WHAT'S GOING
ON.
I CAN SAY A LOT MORE ABOUT THE
THREE SISTERS.
I SEE IT AS JUST A VERY
INTERESTING WAY OF CONNECTING
WHAT WE'RE DOING TODAY WITH WHAT
WAS DONE YESTERDAY.
AND I THINK THAT'S VALUABLE ALSO
FOR YOUNG PEOPLE TO LEARN.
THEY CAN LEARN HISTORY.
INTERESTINGLY ENOUGH, THEY CAN
LEARN HISTORY AS WELL AS DOING
GARDENING.
>> ABSOLUTELY.
>> PROGRAM LEADER AT THE
ARBORETUM, INDIGENOUS.
>> ABSOLUTELY.
THE WEWE HAVE ANOTHER QUESTION COMING
IN ABOUT CROP ROTATION.
IS THERE A RULE OF THUMB IN
TERMS OF SPACING AND HOW FAR
SHOULD THEY BE FROM WHERE THEY
WERE LAST YEAR OR JUST PLANTED
IN A DIFFERENT PLACE?
>> MM-HMM.
WELL, WE ARE WORKING ON THAT
EVERY YEAR.
IT'S AN IMPORTANT CONSIDERATION
FOR US, SORT OF MOVING SPACES,
TRYING TO FIND WHERE -- WE HAVE
VERY SANDY SOIL, SO WE'RE ALWAYS
SEARCHING FOR A PLACE THAT HAS
MORE ORGANIC MATERIAL.
YOU HAVE TO TAKE A LOOK AT YOUR
PLOT AND WHAT KIND OF SOILS YOU
HAVE THERE AND WHAT YOU'RE
PLANTING.
CERTAINLY WE'RE CONCERNED ABOUT
BLIGHT.
AND SO TRYING TO ROTATE.
SO BLIGHT STAY NOTICE THE SOIL,
SO YOU DON'T WANT TO KEEP
PLANTING TOMATOES IN THE SAME
SPOT.
YOU NEED TO KEEP ABOUT THAT
EVERY COUPLE YEARS.
JERRY, YOU WANT TO TALK MORE
ABOUT LARGER CROP ROTATION?
>> YEAH.
WE TOO -- EACH YEAR I WRITE -- I
LITERALLY WRITE DOWN AND CREATE
A GARDEN MAP WHERE I NOTE WHERE
EVERYTHING IS PLANTED.
AND I'VE DONE THAT FOR YEARS.
AND I RATHER METICULOUSLY TRY
NOT TO PLANT THE SAME CROP IN
THE SAME PLACE, ESPECIALLY CROPS
THAT ARE SUSCEPTIBLE TO BLIGHT,
TOMATOES AND POTATOES IN OUR
AREA ARE VERY SUSCEPTIBLE TO
PLIGHT.
SO WHEN WE REMOVE THE POTATO
VINES, WE GET THEM AWAY FROM THE
GARDEN AS FAR AS WE CAN.
SAME THING WITH TOMATO VINES
BECAUSE BLIGHT IN OUR NECK OF
THE WOODS IS A TEACIAL PROBLEM.
AND SO THEN WE VERY CAREFULLY --
THIS LAST YEAR WE HAD A TERRIBLE
PROBLEM WITH POTATO BLIGHT AND
YIELDS WERE WAY DOWN.
THIS YEAR WE'RE GOING TO PUT
THEM AS FAR AWAY FROM WHERE WE
PLANTED THE PREVIOUS YEAR AS WE
CAN.
THAT'S JUST A RULE OF THUMB.
AGAIN, IT'S SOMETHING -- DISEASE
TO ME IS ONE OF THE BIGGEST
REASONS FOR DOING THE MOVING
AROUND.
NOW, THE DRAWING DOWN OF
NUTRIENTS AND ALL OF THAT, THAT
MAKES A LITTLE BIT OF
DIFFERENCE, BUT DISEASE IS THE
BIG REASON FOR MOVING THE PLANTS
AROUND.
>> SO, JERRY, WE HAVE A QUESTION
FROM DEB.
ARE THERE ANY VEGGIES THAT WILL
GROVE IN PART SHADE?
>> NOT REALLY.
ONE OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR
GARDENING IS SUNLIGHT.
AND I REMEMBER ONE TIME -- THIS
IS A SIDE STORY, BECAUSE WE'RE
NOT -- WE DON'T HAVE A
STRAWBERRY PATCH IN OUR GARDEN.
WE COULD HAVE.
MY DAD ALWAYS HAD A STRAWBERRY
PATCH.
A CITY NEIGHBOR CAME BY ONE TIME
AND SAID, HERMAN, WORKING DOWN
IN THAT STRAWBERRY PATCH, THE
SUN IS BEATING DOWN ON YOUR
BACK.
I PLANTED MY STRAWBERRIES UNDER
THE SHADE TREE SO YOU COULD SIT
IN THE CHAIR AND WATCH THEM
GROW.
EXCEPT THEY DIDN'T.
[LAUGHTER]
>> STARTED WITH GOOD INTENTIONS.
>> BY AND LARGE NEED SUNLIGHT.
THAT'S THE SIMPLE ANSWER.
>> ABSOLUTELY.
>> YEAH.
YOU MIGHT BE ABLE TO PLANT SOME
HERBS.
BUT YES.
WE ARE LOOKING FOR AS MUCH SUN
LIEPT AS WE CAN.
WE'VE HAD SOME SUCCESS WITH
CERTAIN AMOUNT OF SHADE, BUT
YES.
THEY DEFINITELY NEED SOME SUN.
>> NATASHA, WE HAVE A QUESTION
FROM JEAN.
SHE'S WONDERING WHERE CAN SHE GO
TO LEARN MORE ABOUT COMPANION
PLANTING, WHAT PLANTS GROW WELL
TOGETHER AND MAYBE WHAT
SHOULDN'T.
>> THE GO-TO IS SORT OF THE
BIBLE OF FARMING, THE FARMERS
ALMANAC.
ALSO, USE YOUR NEIGHBORHOOD LIST
SERVES.
THIS IS AN OPPORTUNITY TO START
DISCUSSIONS.
ALSO I THINK WE HAVE EXCELLENT
LOCAL NURSERIES WITH EXPERTS
THERE.
SO YOU MIGHT WANT TO GET SOME
TIME WITH THEM.
BUT FARMERS ALMANAC, YOUR LOCAL
NURSERY AND I THINK SORT OF, IN
MY CASE WORD OF MOUTH, TALKING
OVER THE FENCE TO MY NEIGHBORS.
>> ONE OF SEVERAL QUESTIONS WE
HAVE COMING IN ARE WHERE DO I GO
TO LEARN MORE.
AND I THINK OVER THE FENCE IS
GREAT.
COMMUNITY GARDENS ARE GREAT
RESOURCES.
JERRY, WE HAVE A QUESTION FROM
DARLENE.
SHE'S HEARD THAT ROTOTILLING MAY
NOT BE THE BEST PRACTICE
ANYMORE.
MAYBE DOING SOME NO-TILL,
WONDERING ABOUT ANY EXPERIENCE
OR THOUGHTS YOU HAVE.
>> LET ME SPEAK TO THAT.
I CONSIDER ROTOTILLING NO-TILL
BECAUSE IT'S COMPARABLE TO WHAT
FARMERS -- AND I'M AN OLD FARMER
FROM WHEN I WAS A KID.
NO-TILL FOR A FARMER IS A
MINIMUM AMOUNT OF WORKING UP THE
SOIL.
AND THE ROTOTILL ER DOES NOT
WORK UP MORE THAN MAYBE THREE
INCHES OR SO OF THE TOPSOIL.
FOR YEARS, WE PLOWED.
IN OTHER WORDS, WITH A TWO
BOTTOM PLOW.
WE'D TIP OVER THE SOIL.
AND THAT WE HAVE QUIT DOING.
SO I DO NOT CONSIDER ROTOTILLING
AS A -- I CONSIDER IT AS A
NO-TILL KIND OF PRACTICE.
YOU DO NEED TO WORK UP SOME OF
THE TOPSOIL.
YOU CAN'T -- IN MY JUDGMENT.
NOW, MAYBE OTHERS HAVE AN
EXPERIENCE THAT'S DIFFERENT.
THAT'S FINE.
BUT IN MY JUDGMENT, AT OUR
LOCATION, THE SOIL DOES NEED A
LITTLE BIT OF WORKING UP AND
ROTOTILLER IN OUR SITUATION DOES
THAT.
WE PLANT A COVER DROP CROP OF WHEAT
TO PREVENT SOIL DAMAGE FROM THE
WIND AND THAT SORT OF THING IN
THE WINTER, BUT IT ALSO ADDS
HUMOUS TO THE SOIL.
WE DO THAT BY USING A
ROTOTILLER.
SO IF I HAD ALLOWED THE WHEAT
THAT WE PLANT ON THE GARDEN, IF
WE DON'T ROTOTILL IT IN, WE'RE
GOING TO HAVE A WEED PATCH AND
NOT A GARDEN.
I DON'T KNOW IF THAT SPEAKS TO
YOUR QUESTION.
BUT THAT'S MY EXPERIENCE AND
THAT'S WHAT WE DO.
>> NATASHA, WE HAVE A QUESTION
FROM NATHANIEL.
HE'S WONDERING IF HE'S PLANTING
EARLY WHAT ARE SOME OF THE FIRST
THINGS YOU SHOULD BE PLANTING TO
GET INTO THE GROUND?
>> LETTUCE.
WE PLANT SEVERAL ROWS THAT ARE
JUST SALAD ITEMS.
PEAS ARE AN EARLY CROP.
AND WE ACTUALLY END UP PULLING
THE PEAS AFTER WE HARVEST THEM
AND WE CAN USE THAT SPACE TO
REPLANT.
SO PEAS, LETTUCE.
WE START EARLY WITH SOME OF OUR
EARLY POTATOES, OUR BABY REDS.
AND WE TRY TO GET A COUPLE
DIFFERENT CROPS IN OF CORN.
SO WE STAGGER THAT.
SO, AGAIN, YOU WANT TO BE REALLY
PAYING ATTENTION TO YOUR SEEDS
AND WHAT IT SAYS THEIR
GERMINATION PERIOD IS AND PAYING
ATTENTION TO THE ZONES.
WE NEVER KNOW, RIGHT, WITH OUR
SPRING.
WE'VE BEEN OUT THERE IN MARCH
PLANTING AND AT TIMES WE'VE HAD
TO WAIT UNTIL ALMOST MEMORIAL
DAY.
RADISHES?
>> RADISHES.
THAT'S ANOTHER EARLY CROP.
WE'VE HAD GENERALLY GOOD
EXPERIENCE, BUT AS I MENTIONED
IN THE TALK EARLIER, THE SOIL
DOES HAVE TO WARM UP TO A
CERTAIN EXTENT BEFORE CERTAIN
CROPS WILL GERM NATURE, CERTAIN
SEEDS.
SO WE ALSO, RELATED TOPIC, WE
ARE VERY CAREFUL ABOUT ANY OF
THE CROPS THAT WE GROW.
WE LOOK AT A NUMBER OF GROWING
DAYS REQUIRED.
FOR EXAMPLE, IN CENTRAL
WISCONSIN WHERE WE ARE, I DO NOT
PLANT ANYTHING THAT TAKES MORE
THAN 100 DAYS.
AND A LOT OF VEGETABLE CROPS DO.
SOME OF THE SWEETCORN IS 120
DAYS.
AND THAT'S NOT GOING TO MAKE IT.
SOME CROPS ARE OVER 100 DAYS.
GENERALLY WHEN WE LOOK FOR
NUMBER OF DAYS OF GROWING DAYS,
I WANT TO KEEP IT AROUND 85, 90,
95 ON THE OUTSIDE.
THAT'S A RELATED TOPIC.
AND THAT'S DEPENDS ON WHERE YOU
ARE IN WISCONSIN.
IF YOU'RE IN FAR NORTHERN
WISCONSIN, GROWING SEASON IS
EVEN SHORTER.
SOUTH OF -- HERE IN MADISON, WE
HAVE CONSIDERABLY MORE GROWING
DAYS THAN WE DO IN CENTRAL
WISCONSIN.
AND THAT'S JUST SOMETHING YOU
LEARN BY DOING IT.
BUT YOU CAN ALSO READ ABOUT IT.
AND THERE ARE CHARTS THAT TELL
YOU WHAT'S WHERE.
>> JERRY, WE HAVE A QUESTION
COMING IN FROM HOPE AND SHE'S
WONDERING, IT SOUNDS LIKE SHE
MIGHT BE AT THE BEGINNING OF HER
GARDENING JOURNEY, JUST GETTING
STARTED.
WHAT TIP WOULD YOU HAVE FOR
THAT, ANY BEGINNING GARDENER OUT
THERE WHO'S DOING THIS FOR THE
FIRST TIME?
>> WELL, IT DEPENDS ON WHAT
REALLY YOU HAVE IN MIND.
AND THAT NATASHA HAS HAD MORE
EXPERIENCE AND SHE CAN SPEAK TO
THAT.
AND I WOULD SUGGEST THAT YOU DO
START SMALL.
OUR GARDEN AT ONE TIME WAS HALF
AN ACRE.
YOU DON'T WANT TO START WITH A
HALF AN ACRE OF GARDEN.
WHAT YOU'LL HAVE IS A WEED
PATCH.
SO IF YOU WANT TO START
MINIMALLY, YOU CAN PLANT LETTUCE
IN A FLOWER POT ON THE PATIO AND
GET A DECENT CROP.
BUT, NATASHA, SPEAK TO WHAT
YOU'RE DOING WITH SMALL-SCALE
GARDENING.
SHE'S HAD A LOT OF EXPERIENCE
WITH THAT, MORE THAN I HAVE.
>> SURE.
SO IN ADDITION TO OUR LARGER
GARDEN ON JERRY'S PROPERTY, I
HAVE A GARDEN IN MY BACKYARD.
I'VE BEEN DOING SOME RAISED
BEDS, AND THAT'S BEEN PRETTY FUN
AND SUCCESSFUL.
I HAVE LITTLE PATHS.
I WOULD SAY MOST IMPORTANT IS TO
MAKE IT FUN.
DON'T MAKE IT HUGE.
DON'T MAKE IT A LOT OF WORK,
BECAUSE IT WON'T BE SOMETHING
YOU'LL LOOK FORWARD TO.
AND I LIKE TO THINK ABOUT THINGS
I LIKE TO EAT.
SO PLANTING THINGS I LIKE TO
EAT.
SO JERRY MENTIONED PLANTERS VERY
WELL.
I'VE USED THEM ON MY DECK.
IF YOU HAVE A PORCH, FOR TOE
TOMATOES.
I LIKE TO THROW VERTICALLY USING
TRELLISES FOR MY PEAS AND BEANS.
SO GROWING UPWARDS.
I LIKE TO JUST THINK ABOUT WHAT
I'M GOING TO EAT, SORT OF
THINKING AT THE END, RIGHT?
AND YEAH.
YOU CAN MAKE GREAT USE OF SMALL
SPACES.
YOU DON'T NEED A LOT OF YARD
SPACE OR GARDEN SPACE.
SO THINK ABOUT PLANTERS, SALAD
VARIETIES AND MAKE SURE YOU'RE
HAVING FUN, SO ENJOYING IT.
WE LIKE TO PLANT SOME FLOWERS.
WE LIKE TO MAKE IT VISUALLY
APPEALING AS WELL AND THEN THAT
ALSO BENEFITS THE POLLINATORS.
WE THINK OF OUR VISITORS TO OUR
GARDEN.
BUT ALSO WHEN I JUST LOOK OUT
THE WINDOW, WHAT IS VISUALLY
APPEALING AND THINKING OF THINGS
THAT ARE COLORFUL.
SO IT'S BEAUTIFUL AND FOR ME
IT'S ABOUT EATING, IT'S ABOUT
WHAT I SEE AND HOW IT MAKES ME
FEEL AND I THINK WE ALL NEED A
LITTLE CHLORITE NOW.
>> ABSOLUTELY.
NOT ONLY IN THE WINTER.
>> LET ME ADD WHAT I SAID
EARLIER.
NO MATTER HOW LARGE OR LARGE SMALL
YOU'RE DOING IT, KEEP TRACK OF
THE FACT WHERE DOES THE SUN
SUN SHINE.
>> LAST QUESTION ABOUT MOLDS.
JUDY IS HAVING SOME ISSUES WITH
MOLDS.
ANY TIPS OR THOUGHTS FOR SORT OF
THESE UNDERGROUND DWELLERS WHO
MIGHT COME INTO OUR GARDEN?
>> BLESSEDLY WE DON'T HAVE ANY.
>> WELL, I DO.
>> NATASHA, TAKE IT AWAY.
>> I HAVE A MOLD PROBLEM IN
TOWN.
AND I HAVE TO SAY THERE ARE SOME
THINGS -- SO, THEY DON'T REALLY
LOVE LOUD NOISES.
I'M A BIG FAN OF WIND CHIMES.
I THINK THEY'RE BEAUTIFUL.
YOU COULD TRY MOVING WIND CHIMES
AROUND.
PEOPLE HAVE SOME SUCCESS WITH
CAYENNE PEPPER, COFFEE GROUNDS.
APPARENTLY THEY'RE NOT LIKE ME.
THEY DON'T LIKE THE COFFEE.
THAT'S A GOOD USE OF YOUR COFFEE
GROUNDS.
BUT I DO HAVE ONE.
IT'S VERY STRANGE, BUT MY
HUSBAND DID IT.
WE HAVE A DOG WHO LOVES TO CHASE
THEM.
AND MY HUSBAND PUT THE DOG POOP
DOWN THE HOLES.
AND SINCE THEN I'VE DONE A
LITTLE RESEARCH AND THAT IS AN
EFFECTIVE WAY, CAT POOP, DOG
POOP, TO KEEP THE MOLES AWAY.
MAYBE A BETTER SMELLING TACTIC
WOULD BE DAFFODILS AND
MARIGOLDS.
RABBITS DON'T LIKE MARIGOLD
SAYS.
>> WE HAVE SO ENJOYED CHATTING
WITH YOU.
THERE ARE SO MANY EXCELLENT
QUESTIONS COMING IN.
WE DON'T HAVE TIME TO GET TO
THEM ALL.
LATER THIS AFTERNOON AFTER OUR
NEXT PRESENTATION WE HAVE A GOOD
CHUNK OF TIME FOR ASK THE
EXPERTS WITH OUR UW-EXTENSION.
SO MANY OF YOUR QUESTIONS WOULD
BE A WONDERFUL -- YOU CAN STILL
GET THEM ANSWERED IN THAT
SEGMENT.
SO HOLD ON TO THEM.
THERE WILL BE A CHANCE FOR YOU
TO GET SOME ANSWERS.
JERRY AND NATASHA, THANK YOU FOR
JOINING US.
WE APPRECIATE IT VERY MUCH.
>> YOU ARE MOST WELCOME.
>> THANKS, BEN.
>> WELL, STAY TUNED, EVERYONE.
WE HAVE MORE PRESENTATIONS
COMING UP JUST AFTER THIS.
onsin's
online gardening series Let's Grow Stuff!
Welcome to this year's virtual
Wisconsin Garden and Landscape Expo.
I hope you'll enjoy this special educational presentation.
And remember, you can leave your questions for our presenter
at any time by typing them into the chat
and we'll ask them in a live Q & A
at the end of the session.
Also, don't forget to stick around and check out
everything this virtual event has to offer.
From inspiring garden tours
to an interactive exhibitor mall,
there's something for everyone.
And, thanks for joining us.
Now, please enjoy the show.
- I'm Dan Cornelius.
I am a member of the Oneida Nation of Wisconsin,
and I work for UW-Madison, the UW-Madison Law School's
Great Lakes Indigenous Law Center,
as well as the Intertribal Agriculture Council.
- And I am Claire Luby.
I work in the Horticulture Department
at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
And we are really excited to talk to you today
about a project, or a number of projects
that we have been working on together
in partnership with others in the region.
One of these is the Indigenous Research Garden
at the University of Wisconsin Arboretum.
And then we'll also talk
about some different land education initiatives
that we have, developing Indigenous curriculum
at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
So back in 2017, Dan was instrumental
in organizing the Food Sovereignty Symposium Festival.
And this was an event that brought together a lot of people
from around the region to share and talk
about different elements of food sovereignty
for Native nations in the Great Lakes area.
And so I was lucky enough to attend this conference
and met a few people there,
one of whom is named Jessika Greendeer,
and she had been working hard to locate seeds
that had connections with the Ho-Chunk Nation
but that were no longer being grown by community members.
And she was really interested in seeing
if she could grow out larger amounts
of these different varieties
and get them back into the hands of the community
and get people growing those seeds again,
and having that connection with these corn,
particularly corn varieties.
And so we started talking, and we were able to partner
and use some land at one of the UW research stations.
And we grew out about 20 different varieties
of corn that summer.
And then she was able to take those
and continue working with them and growing them out
in her current role
and sharing those with other members of the community.
And so this project really launched a whole series
of projects around this idea of seed rematriation,
or this concept of, basically,
getting seeds back into the hands
of people to begin working with them again.
And so we, together with the Intertribal Agriculture Council,
Dan, along with Dan and Rowen White
of the Indigenous Seed Keepers Network wrote a grant
to the Baldwin Wisconsin Idea Fund.
And this is a grant program
through the University of Wisconsin
that funds projects that support the Wisconsin Idea
or the concept of, basically,
making sure that the bounds of the university
are the bounds of the state,
and that the research and outreach work
that happens at the university be beneficial
to all members of the state.
And so, while the Horticulture Department at UW
has done a good job of working with farmers
in many different ways,
there really had been no collaborations
with any of the the Native nations
in the state of Wisconsin.
And so this project was intended
to at least work on this seed rematriation
and development of culturally-relevant curriculum
around seed stewardship.
And so we partnered, again,
with Intertribal Agriculture Council
on some beginner farmer trainings,
where we had Indigenous farmers
and ranchers share their experience
with people who were interested in getting into this,
and we also developed a cohort
that was a nine-month-long cohort
with the Indigenous Seed Keepers Network,
that was online and in-person,
and basically covered a... Or was a development
of a culturally-relevant seed stewardship program,
and really intended to help people increase their skills
in seed stewardship,
and become resources for others in their community
who might also be interested in saving seeds.
And so Rowen White, who you see in the photo here,
was really instrumental in designing this curriculum.
So we launched all of these different projects
and it's been really exciting to watch them develop.
One of the other pieces that we had
as part of this was a collaboration
with the University of Wisconsin Arboretum.
And I'll let Dan talk about that.
- Thank you, Claire.
So in moving to, transitioning to talking
about the partnership with the UW Arboretum,
I think it's important to recognize
the land that we're on.
And this is Ho-Chunk territory.
This is Ho-Chunk land.
But this land has been...
Madison, the Teejop area, has been a capital city
for a long time.
This has been a huge center
of population of people living here,
going back hundreds and really thousands of years.
And recognizing that history and thinking
about what it means is gonna be part
of what we're gonna be talking about here today.
Going back to when the first Europeans
and Americans came into the area, what did they see?
What was here back in the 1830s, the 1840s?
This excerpt from the Charles Brown Papers,
this is talking about,
there are some traders that came into the area
and they met with a camp of Ho-Chunks
at present-day Tenney Park.
And they talk about not only the accuracy
of the Ho-Chunk hunters in hunting geese and ducks,
but they also talk about the wild rice
that grew around the edge of most of the lakes
and in the low, swampy ground.
And you know, I think that looking at this type
of surviving documentation,
it helps to think about, what did this land used to be?
And today we... The area is known for the lakes,
the water quality in the lakes is not always the finest,
which is the main reason why wild rice is not as prevalent
here today as what it once was historically.
But how does it change someone's perspective
of the landscape of today when we have floods?
You know, those floods are going in in the low ground.
Most of that area is historic wild rice fields.
And so how does that perspective,
does someone's perspective shift when you think about,
150 years ago, this area that now is a street or parking lot
or housing, that used to be a wild rice field.
And I know for myself, I'm also a grower.
I grow corn, pumpkins, harvest wild rice, make maple syrup,
and I'm up at the Dane County Farmer's Market.
I have wild rice, I've got hominy corn up there.
And you know, part of what these efforts are,
it's also to get people thinking
of what did the historic food system of this area look like?
What were the foods that made up that food system?
Rice and corn were two of the main ones.
And so when we look at a map of the area,
this was a map developed in the early 1900s
based off of archeological excavations
and other documentation.
You see the immense concentration of effigy mounds,
of the historic trails going through the area,
of fields, and even of some of the rice beds.
And when you look at this map as one indicator,
if you walk the landscape today, you'll still see a good number
of those surviving effigy mounds,
but the majority of them have been destroyed.
But part of what our efforts are is to think about,
what did this landscape used to look like?
And what can we learn today
from how people lived on the landscape historically?
So thinking about that historic food system,
this is just a snapshot of what it would've looked like,
of husking corn.
You see the squash drying in the bottom left corner there,
and you go into a grocery store today,
in most grocery stores,
you're probably not gonna find dried squash.
That was a staple food of not just of the Ho-Chunk
here in the area, but a lot of...
Most Indigenous nations would have had dried squash.
And drying would have been one of the main ways
that food was preserved because, of course,
you didn't have refrigerators or mason jars for canning.
So drying, historically,
was one of the main ways that food was preserved.
And then, looking at...
Claire was talking about the seeds.
These are some of those historic seeds,
and then the traditional tools,
and then I think it's just fascinating,
and I do want to thank Bill Gardner
from the UW Geography Department
for sharing some of these photos here,
but looking at the historic mounds there
versus the ridges, and both of those would've been used.
So some of these efforts of...
We're not totally recreating the historic practices
and ways of growing, but bringing some of the seeds back
and looking at how can we use a little bit
of modern equipment to more closely mimic
a traditional approach?
That's part of what these projects are about as well.
And we're gonna talk about that in a little bit more detail
as we transition here to talking about the Arboretum garden.
I'll turn it back over to Claire.
- Yeah, thanks, Dan.
So that was really great context, I think,
for why we approached the Arboretum
and began this collaboration,
was really to think about the historic landscape,
not just from what today we think of
as sort of an ecological preservation landscape,
but really a working landscape.
And as part of that, we started working
with the Arboretum on an Indigenous Research Garden.
And so the idea here was, you can see this in this photo,
was to grow out corn, beans, squash, sunflowers, amaranth,
and engage local Native families as well in the process.
And here you can see that the other part of this was
to explore some different growing technique.
Instead of plowing up this entire grassy area,
we just tilled in these strips and planted directly into those
so as to minimize exposing the soil
and sort of learn more about how this technique
might be used in other areas.
And so you can think back on that photo Dan showed
of the historic fields and those rows
and sort of, this is what we're exploring
with these techniques.
So some of the crops that we grew
in partnership with local youth and families
were corn, pumpkins, amaranth, sunflowers, and some beans.
And this was in the garden last year.
And the project has morphed a little bit in the time since,
but these would have all been crops
that would have been very important parts
of historic foodways and are still important elements
of foodways today.
So the other thing that we wanted to do
was engage students in learning
about all of these different elements
that we've been talking about.
And so you can see up in the top there, right,
a sort of classic classroom that you might think of at UW,
which is students in rows, sitting in seats,
all looking up at the front of the room.
Those desks, those tables are bolted in place.
You can't move them.
And so this kind of classroom really facilitates
that lecture style, right?
Someone in the front of the room,
talking at you and learning information in that way.
And so what we wanted to do was really engage
with the land and with Indigenous foodways
and get students out and doing activities
where they would actually learn how to grow different plants,
how to process, how to cook, and really start listening
to those seasonal cycles and how they can...
What the land is saying at any given time of year,
and how we as people can really learn from that
and how that ties in with the foodways of this place.
And so Dan and myself and Irwin Goldman
in the Department of Horticulture
have been working on developing a couple of different courses
that give students these hands-on experiences.
- The first course that the three of us had taught together
was the horticulture class last spring.
And one of the exciting parts of that class was,
we had, again, worked with the UW Arboretum
in putting together a sugarbush,
and not just for sugar maple, but you can see here,
if you look close at that tree, some people may be saying,
"Well, that doesn't look like a sugar maple to me."
That's actually a boxelder tree.
So we tapped sugar maples, boxelder,
and then we also tapped some black walnuts.
Oddly, the black walnuts didn't,
the sap didn't run, or barely really ran last spring.
I found that to be the case
with the trees that I tap as well.
I'm not sure exactly why.
But that's one of those questions of,
so why didn't the black walnuts run in 2020?
I couldn't tell you exactly,
but having these type of learning
and educational opportunities,
it also opens up new avenues for research,
including research that is more focused
on supporting and engaging Native communities.
So that was, that, I think,
is one of the big questions that came out of,
why didn't those black walnuts run?
But one of the other, I guess, insights
that I had come across in doing the sugarbush is
you can see here, this is a traditional spile tap.
And so when we tap that tree, we're just really nicking
just the very outer portion of the tree.
And the nice thing is that the tree will be able
to heal faster, and there's a higher sugar content
in that outer layer.
But when we were doing this, I had...
I was carving that spile,
and I turned to David Stevens, the curator of the Arboretum,
and one of our close partners on these efforts,
and I just asked David, "When do you think the last time
"that these trees were tapped traditionally like this?"
And he stops, looks at me, and says,
"These trees have never been tapped
"since the Arboretum was created in the 1930s."
So in some ways, these are just small demonstration efforts.
But to me, that broader significance is to bring back,
as Claire said, the working landscape to the Arboretum
and to campus.
I think it is, symbolically it's huge.
And I think that it's offering a lot of new opportunities
for just thinking about education more deeply,
including the research component of that education.
And what can we be doing
to be developing stronger partnerships
and connections with tribes throughout Wisconsin
and the region,
while being able to have both this classroom
and this laboratory right on campus
is a great opportunity for being able to do it.
This was right before the pandemic really took effect,
or the lockdowns took effect, back in March.
I think for a lot of people,
this was probably the last event that they were at
with other people in person.
So we took the collective experiences
from the spring class, and a lot of the discussions
that came out of that class led to creation
of a First-Year Interest Group class on campus
that was hosted in the Educational Policy Department.
And it wasn't the exact same course
as what we taught in the spring
because there was more of a focus on education,
thinking about education, and then with language.
And all of the First-Year Interest Groups, or FIGs
as they're called, they're limited to 20 students.
And they're all first-year, incoming students.
We had 15, ours was actually capped at 15
because one of the linked classes,
Principles of Environmental Science,
that was the maximum number of seats
that they could hold for the freshmen.
But each FIG will have the the main core course
with two linked courses.
So Principles of Environmental Science
was one of the linked courses, and then we also had it linked
to Introduction to Ojibwe that was taught by Brian McGinnis.
So all of the students in this FIG were able
to take all three of those classes together
with one another, and it was a good opportunity for them
to be able to have that small cohort
to be able to connect with.
And I will say that it was a bit of a challenging semester
to be teaching, and I'm sure it was even more
of a challenging semester for the students
to be entering and starting their collegiate careers.
This was the first class that we had in-person.
This was at the end of September,
because when classes started,
there was about one week of class in person,
and then the COVID cases started skyrocketing,
and there was a couple of the dorms were locked down
and all learning went virtual.
We weren't sure if we were gonna be able
to have any in-person classes, but it was pretty cool,
it was pretty exciting to finally get together
and to be able to see everyone in person,
for them to get to meet each other in person.
And we figured, what better way, what better introduction
for the in-person learning than to be able to actually braid
some of the corn that we grew
at the UW Indigenous Research Garden this year.
So that was our first class.
And did want to connect this past semester's class
with this broader effort.
And as I was saying before,
of when opening up this presentation of,
what does it mean to give a land acknowledgement,
to acknowledge that we're on Ho-Chunk territory,
or for wherever you are,
that you're acknowledging the Indigenous,
whether it be territory or ancestral homelands.
In the case of the UW-Madison,
there's been Our Shared Future Initiative.
The plaque was created and dedicated in the summer of 2019.
I've been a part of a couple of different
of these grant applications that campus has supported,
different departments can apply to host the plaque,
and you do different educational programming.
One of the events with the UW Law School
that we had done is we brought Biskakone Greg Johnson
from Lac du Flambeau and Jon Greendeer from Ho-Chunk
to campus for a class on traditional ice fishing.
We ran into a little bit of a challenge
in preparing for this class,
in that we did apply to the Wisconsin DNR for a permit
to be able to spear musky on Lake Mendota,
and we applied a couple of months before the class,
and we had numerous discussions with them,
and that permit was ultimately denied.
And so when you've got the former president
of the Ho-Chunk Nation, Jon Greendeer,
who's coming down and is excited to get out on the lake
and exercise his treaty rights,
and you got the DNR saying, "No, you can't do it."
And we're kind of stuck in the middle of,
we're doing a class.
That was a bit of a, I think, of an exercise
in thinking about what does sovereignty truly mean,
and if we want to acknowledge the land and the territory,
what does that mean?
And I know for our students, we talked through all of this
and it was a pretty interesting, I guess, situation.
Part of how we dealt with it was, coincidentally,
I happened to get a call from the Arboretum
the day before this class,
and they had a deer that was harvested.
And so we had, Jon Greendeer went through the process
of traditionally, of breaking down a deer.
And then we had groups of five students
that cycled through the ice fishing shanty
and were able to see the demonstration on the spearing,
but we didn't actually spear a musky.
So I think that for a lot of people,
it was a little bit cold that day,
not everyone was really dressed for being out on the ice,
but it was a great opportunity to connect with the land
and to learn from two people that I very much respect
and have learned a lot from, with Jon and Greg.
So I think that that really, it brings up a deeper question
of how can the University of Wisconsin help
to better support Native communities
in the state and beyond,
and in the process, how can the university help
to support rural communities as well?
'Cause a lot of the issues that Native nations face
are the same issues that a lot of rural communities face.
And as I mentioned before,
of having the space on campus for the classrooms,
these outdoor, interactive, hands-on classrooms,
it also provides a laboratory.
And that's part of the approach that we've taken
with the Indigenous Research Garden,
where this year, we planted five different types of Ojibwe corn.
The two corns that you see, with the red and the yellow,
are both Mohawk corns that were grown the year before.
This year, we grew five different Ojibwe corns,
three different Bear Islands, one Turtle Mountain White,
and then Red Lake Flint Corn.
And we grew 'em all together
under the same or similar conditions.
And it was really interesting to see
that one of those corns, one of those Bear Islands finished,
from the time we planted till the time we harvested,
the first ears started ripening
and being ready to harvest within 70 days.
The longest took over 115, almost 120 days.
Some of it was still actually going
when the first frosts hit.
So you think about that difference of,
if you have a corn that's one month or over,
almost a month and a half faster than another,
if you're up in northern Wisconsin,
it's gonna be a lot more likely to have,
that you're gonna be a lot more likely
to have a successful harvest if you've got a corn that is...
that's one month faster than another one.
So most of those seeds that we harvested
from the garden this year are going back
to Indigenous communities throughout Wisconsin.
And it's pretty exciting
to be able to provide that type of support.
And I think the other great thing is that this space,
this is right on Monroe Street,
it's a high visibility, it's a high-traffic area.
And part of the inspiration behind approaching the Arboretum
and the inception of this project was,
the Arboretum has done fantastic work over the years.
But personally, when I hear about discovering
the use of fire as an ecological restoration tool
and a land management tool,
and that they were discovering in the 1930s the use of fire.
I just kind of scratch my head and shake my head of...
Indigenous people have been using fire
as a land management tool for thousands of years.
And so just to bring more, at least of a recognition,
a respect, and to the impact that Native people have had
on this landscape, going back thousands of years.
That's part of what this project is,
is helping to provide, at least giving a space
where we can be growing our traditional foods again,
and really identifying what are some
of those priority research areas.
And so you can see here, of those different corns,
the long one, I call it the Bear Island Tall,
it's kind of in the middle here.
You can see how much taller that one is.
And then we also grew,
we grew wild rice there this year as well,
for seed and just to get a bit more of a knowledge
and a familiarity with growing it
under more controlled conditions.
And I think part of the broader impact
of all of this work is, you know,
2020 has been a challenging year for most people.
And I've seen that some classrooms,
some schools have gone to more of outdoor learning.
And my question is, why does it take a pandemic
to think about the need for outdoor learning,
for more hands-on education,
and then the lack of space to be able to do it?
That was one of the challenges with the class
that we hosted this fall,
is where can we even go to have a fire on campus,
to be able to parch wild rice or to cook hominy corn?
And a lot of my work coming in
has brought Native communities together,
and hosting big intertribal events such as this one.
And that power of getting outside
of a conference center and being on the land,
being able to cook over an open fire,
the difference of the relationships
that it helps for people to form among not only themselves,
but deepening the relationship
with the foods that we're focusing on.
And that's part of the power and the impact
of how the classroom itself can impact learning
and overall outcomes.
And I wish that we had more of these
type of spaces here on campus.
And still, we're having discussions
not only with the Arboretum, but with the rest of campus
of what would it take for us to be able to,
just to be able to harvest some wild ramps?
And I get the challenges of,
you can't have the whole city going
and harvesting these resources or they'll get wiped out,
but I mean, I think that that,
and for people who may be watching
and listening to this presentation,
I think part of it is thinking about what is...
What is each of our collective impact on the landscape,
and how can we...
How, through our activities, can we be supporting more
of a healthy landscape?
And part of the challenge is living in a city,
that not everyone can go and harvest ramps at the same time.
But I think having more of these type of spaces,
I think it does help
to facilitate better learning outcomes.
And I think it can help people to connect better
with one another as well.
So thank you for tuning in.
If you have questions and want to contact us,
here are both of our emails.
We're happy to hear from you,
and hope to see out there in person
at some point in the near future.
- Thanks, everyone.
>> HI.
I'M BEN FUTA, HOST OF "LET'S
GROW STUFF."
THANK YOU FOR JOINING US FOR OF
THE VIRTUAL GARDEN EXPO.
WE JUST LEARNED ABOUT THE
INDIGENOUS GARDENING HAPPENING
AT UW-MADISON.
AND NOW WE'LL ANSWER YOUR
QUESTIONS.
YOU CAN KEEP ASKING THOSE
QUESTIONS AS WE'RE CHATTING HERE
WHEREVER YOU MAY BE WATCHING.
ALSO DON'T FORGET THIS TALK WILL
BE ARCHIVED, SO IF THERE'S
ANYTHING YOU WANT TO GO BACK AND
REFERENCE YOU CAN SEE THAT AT
gardenexpo.org/schedule OR ON
ANY OF THE PLATFORMS YOU MAY BE
WATCHING.
DAN AND CLAIRE, THANK YOU SO
MUCH FOR JOINING US.
WE REALLY APPRECIATE YOU BEING
HERE.
>> THANKS FOR HAVING US.
>> WELL, DAN, THE FIRST QUESTION
I'LL THROW YOUR WAY HERE.
AND IT'S WONDERING WHERE DID YOU
FIND THE SEED TO BEGIN THIS
CULTIVATION IN THE FIRST PLACE
IF THESE HAD FALLEN OUT
CULTIVATION?
WHERE DID YOU START WITH
SOURCING THESE?
>> FROM REALLY A VARIETY
DIFFERENT PLACESMENT YOU KNOW,
KIND OF A LOT THEM JUST HAVE
FOUND ME OR THE YEARSMENT YOU
KNOW, TO HELP TO STEWARD AND TO
TAKE CARE OF THEM AND HELP GET
THEM BACK OUT TO THOSE
COMMUNITIES.
SO A LOT OF IT IS WE HAVE A
NETWORK OF GROWERS.
IT'S NOT OWNERSHIP.
IT'S REALLY THAT STEWARDSHIP,
TAKING CARE OF THEM AND BEING
ABLE TO PASS THEM ON.
>> CLAIRE, WE HAVE A COUPLE
QUESTIONS FROM TERESA AND BILL
WONDERING ABOUT CROSS
POLLINATION.
IF YOU'RE GROWING THESE
VARIETIES IN THE ARBORETUM, IS
CROSS POLLINATION SOMETHING YOU
THINK ABOUT?
>> YES.
THAT'S A GREAT QUESTION AND
SOMETHING EVERYONE NEEDS TO BE
THINKING ABOUT IF THEY'RE
GROWING ANY KIND OF PLANT FOR
SEED PRODUCTION ON, OUT-CROSSING
OR SELF POLLINATION.
CORN SENDS TO OUT-CROSS.
WE DID A HAND OF HAND
POLLINATION TO MAKE SURE THAT
VARIETIES WERE BEING CROSSED
WITH OTHER PLANTS OF THAT SAME
TYPE.
THE OTHER WAY THAT WE CONTROLLED
FOR POLLINATION WAS BY PLANTING
AT DIFFERENT TIMES SO THAT THE
POLLINATION WINDOWS FOR THE
DIFFERENT TYPES OF CORNS
WOULDN'T OVERLAP AND THOSE WERE
THEN ALLOWED TO NATURALLY
POLLINATE AND WE DIDN'T HAVE TO
HAND POLLINATE IN THAT CLASS.
SO, YES, DEFINITELY A
CONSIDERATION FOR ALL OF THE
SEED WORK.
>> SO, DAN, WE HAVE A QUESTION
FROM BECKY AND SHE'S WONDERING
CAN DESCENDANTS OF CHEER CHER ROW CHEROKEE HELP
WITH ANY OF THESE EFFORTS?
LOOKS LIKE WE MIGHT HAVE --
>> YEAH.
THIS PAST YEAR WAS KIND OF -- WE
WEREN'T ABLE TO HAVE IN-PERSON
WORKSHOPS TO THE SAME DEGREE
WITH THE PANDEMIC AS WE HAD IN
THE PAST.
BUT HOPEFULLY MOVING FORWARD
WE'LL BE ABLE TO HAVE SOME MORE
OPPORTUNITIES FOR PEOPLE TO GET
INVOLVED IN PERSON.
>> EXCELLENT.
A QUESTION FROM BARB.
CLAIRE, I'LL TOSS THIS ONE YOUR
WAY.
ARE THERE WAYS THAT NONUW
STUDENTS CAN GET INVOLVED AND
LEARN MORE, PARTICIPATE AND
SUPPORT THE WORK THAT YOU'RE
DOING?
>> YEAH.
THAT'S A GREAT QUESTION.
I THINK AS DAN MENTIONED, WE DID
HAVE -- BEFORE THE PANDEMIC WE
HAD A NUMBER OF PUBLIC WORKSHOPS
CO-HOSTED BY THE ARBORETUM AND I
ASSUME THOSE WILL START UP AGAIN
MOVING FORWARD.
AND SO MANY OF THOSE WERE POSTED
IN CONJUNCTION WITH THE
ARBORETUM OR THROUGH UW.
SO THOSE WERE OPEN TO THE
PUBLIC.
SO I'D SAY KEEP AN EYE OUT FOR
THAT OR GET ON THOSE LIST SERVES
IF YOU'RE INTERESTED IN LEARNING
ABOUT FUTURE PROGRAMMING.
>> AND, DAN, WE HAVE A QUESTION
FROM JODY.
SHE NOTICED YOU'D MENTIONED
TAPPING BLACK WALL WALNUTS FOR SAP
AND SHE'S WONDERING WHAT THAT
SAP IS USED FOR?
>> SHE USE USE IT JUST LIKE MAPLE.
GREAT FOR EATING.
GOT MORE OF A NUTTY FLAVOR AND
TASTE TO IT.
>> AND SORT OF ON THAT SAME
TOPIC, SOMEONE IS WONDERING IS
MAKING YOUR OWN MAPLE SYRUP AND
TREES IN THEIR YARDS OR SPACES,
IS THIS SOMETHING PEOPLE CAN DO
AT HOME AND, IF SO, WHAT DO THEY
NEED TO GET STARTED?
>> YEAH.
DEFINITELY.
ALL YOU REALLY NEED IS JUST A
POT AND A STOVE AND YOU CAN COOK
IT DOWN.
IF YOU HAVE LIKE A TURKEY FRYER,
IT'S NICE TO DO IT OUTSIDE.
IT REALLY GIVES A LOT OF
CONDENSATION THAT'S GOING TO
COME OFF FROM THAT BOIL.
BUT YOU CAN JUST COOK IT RIGHT
ON YOUR STOVE TOP.
ALSO JUST A CANDY THERMOMETER.
YOU CAN USE IT TO TAKE THAT
TEMPERATURE.
AND THAT'S AN INDICATION THAT
YOU'RE GETTING TO YOUR CORRECT
SUGAR CONTENT THERE.
>> AND, CLAIRE, WE HAVE A COUPLE
QUESTIONS FROM FOLKS ASKING SORT
OF ARE THERE OTHER THINGS YOU'RE
HOPING TO GROW BESIDES THE CORN?
ARE THERE OTHER CROPS OR VA RIFE
RYETIES
VARIETIES YOU'RE LOOKING TO GROW
IN THE FUTURE?
>> YEAH.
THE CROPS HAVE BEEN THE FOCUS OF
THIS AND I SEE THOSE CONTINUING
TO BE THE MAIN FOCUS.
MAYBE ADDING IN.
BUT MAYBE -- WE'VE CERTAINLY
GROWN THE MOST NUMBER OF CORN
VARIETIES AND SO I COULD SEE
REALLY EXPANDING OUT THE SEED
WORK WITH SOME OF THE OTHER
CROPS AS WELL.
THERE ARE A LOT OF DIFFERENT
TYPES OF AMARANTH AND SUNFLOWERS
AND SQUASH AND BEANS.
AND ASIDE FROM JUST THE UW
ARBORETUM PROJECT, A LOT OF THE
GROWER NETWORKS THAT DAN
MENTIONED HAVE BEEN WORKING WITH
A NUMBER OF DIFFERENT TYPES OF
THOSE CROPS AND VARIETIES.
>> SO WE HAVE A FINAL QUESTION
HERE COMING IN FROM NATASHA AND
I THINK, DAN, I'LL THROW THIS
ONE TO YOU.
SHE'S WONDERING DID YOU USE
SUMAC SPILES FOR TAPPING THE
TREES THAT YOU SHOWED?
>> NO.
SUMAC, I GUESS MY ISSUE WITH
SUMAC IS THAT IT'S SO WIDE THAT
I DON'T REALLY THINK IT'S VERY
GOOD FOR THE TREE TO USE SUMAC.
IN GENERAL, YOU WANT TO REALLY
MINIMIZE HOW MUCH DISTURBANCE
YOU'RE CREATING TO THE TREE
ITSELF.
AND SUMAC IS REALLY WIDE.
WE DID USE A TRADITIONAL SPILE,
MORE OF A FLAT, A FLAT, WIDE
PIECE OF WOOD.
MY UNDERSTANDING, THAT WAS
REALLY ONE OF THE MAIN HISTORIC
WAYS THAT PEOPLE TAPPED TREES.
AND SO YOU'RE JUST GETTING THE
VERY OUTSIDE OF THE CAMBIAN
LAYER OF THE TREE SO YOUR SUGAR
CONTENT IS HIGHER AND THE TREE
CAN HEAL FASTER.
WHEN YOU GO WIDE AND DEEP, IT'S
CREATING MORE DAMAGE TO THAT
TREE AND PROVIDING A VECTOR FOR
DISEASE TO COME IN.
SO WE REALLY TRY TO MINIMIZE IT.
SO WE DIDN'T USE SUMAC FOR THAT
ONE.
>> WELL, DAN AND CLAIRE, THANK
YOU SO MUCH FOR JOINING US TO
SHARE YOUR STORY AND YOUR
EXPERTISE AND YOUR WORK.
I THINK I SPEAK FOR ALL OF OUR
VIEWERS THAT THIS IS FASCINATING
AND IMPORTANT AND WE REALLY
APPRECIATE EVERYTHING THAT
YOU'RE DOING AND THANK YOU FOR
BEING WITH US TODAY.
>> THANKS FOR HAVING US.
>> A REMINDER THE EXPO IS STILL
GOING STRONG.
AT 2:00 P.M. THERE IS THE
VIRTUAL ASK THE EXPERTS WITH THE
WISCONSIN EXTENSION.
SO ANY QUESTIONS THAT WE HAVEN'T
BEEN ABLE TO ANSWER FOR YOU
TODAY, THAT WILL BE YOUR CHANCE.
AND SOME LET'S GROW STUFF COMING
UP RIGHT AFTER THAT.
ALSO WE'RE GETTING READY TO FILM
A NEW SEASON, SO IF THERE'S A
TOPIC YOU WANT US TO COVER AND
SEND THOSE IDEAS TO
gardenexpo.org/schedule.
STAVE TUNED AND WE'LL SEE YOU
SOON.
at the end of the session.
Also, don't forget to stick around and check out
everything this virtual event has to offer.
From inspiring garden tours
to an interactive exhibitor mall,
there's something for everyone.
And, thanks for joining us.
Now, please enjoy the show.
- My name is George Archibald.
I'm the co-founder of the International Crane Foundation.
And it's a pleasure to be with garden lovers today
to talk about birds that live on our landscape called cranes.
And today, I'm joined by the CEO
and president of the Crane Foundation, Rich Beilfuss,
who will be continuing after my introduction
about our cranes here in Wisconsin and North America.
The largest, the tallest flying bird is this one,
it's called the whooping crane.
And here's a picture of its breeding ground way up
in northern Canada, in Wood Buffalo National Park.
This population was reduced to just 15 birds
A lot of people know our center in Baraboo.
Here's a photo from our center,
our remodeled center that you'll be able to see
in May when we have our grand reopening,
but our work is worldwide.
And a lot of what my role with the crane foundation is
is to take you from our site
in Baraboo to our world of crane conservation projects.
and share in the wonder of these birds e e e e
and see the healthy landscapes that we're working to restore
and make better for people
and wildlife and cranes around the world.
So thank you, thank you for joining us today.
It's a pleasure speaking with you,
and I hope you enjoy the rest of the conference.
and we'llin a live Q & A
at the end of the session.
Also, don't forget to stick around and check out
everything this virtual event has to offer.
From inspiring garden tours
to an interactive exhibitor mall,
there's something for everyone.
And, thanks for joining us.
Now, please enjoy the show.
- Hi, I'm Lisa Johnson.
I'm the horticulture educator with Dane County Extension.
And today, we're gonna be talking about rain gardens.
So there are a lot of good reasons to use rain gardens.
They do prevent excess runoff that carries soil nutrients,
particularly phosphorus, away.
And we want to try and make sure to capture
as much water as we can on the property
so that it doesn't run off and carry those nutrients
down into our lakes and other places
that provided photos
So I've got some resources there for you to take a look at, eeeepepepepepe
and I want to thank all the people that provided photos
and input into this presentation.
And I thank you so much for listening today
and for your interest in rain gardens.
So I've got some resources there for you to take a look at, rdrdrd
and I want to thank all the people that provided photos
and input into this presentation.
And I thank you so much for listening today
and for your interest in rain gardens.
onsin's
online gardening series Let's Grow Stuff!
Welcome to this year's virtual
Wisconsin Garden and Landscape Expo.
I hope you'll enjoy this special educational presentation.
And remember, you can leave your questions for our presenter
at any time by typing them into the chat
and we'll ask them in a live Q & A
at the end of the session.
Also, don't forget to stick around and check out
everything this virtual event has to offer.
From inspiring garden tours
to an interactive exhibitor mall,
there's something for everyone.
And, thanks for joining us.
Now, please enjoy the show.
- My name is George Archibald.
I'm the co-founder of the International Crane Foundation.
And it's a pleasure to be with garden lovers today
to talk about birds that live on our landscape called cranes.
And today, I'm joined by the CEO
and president of the Crane Foundation, Rich Beilfuss,
who will be continuing after my introduction
about our cranes here in Wisconsin and North America.
The largest, the tallest flying bird is this one,
it's called the whooping crane.
And here's a picture of its breeding ground way up
in northern Canada, in Wood Buffalo National Park.
This population was reduced to just 15 birds
back in the early 1940s, but they've recovered.
And today, we have about 500 whooping cranes
on this beautiful flock that breeds up there
and then migrates almost 3,000 miles
to winter on the coast of Texas.
And just now, we have those 500 birds all down there
along the coast of Texas.
And in the winter, they're feeding on blue crabs,
preparing their bodies
for the long migration north in the spring.
They leave in early April, and a new breeding cycle.
They're called whooping cranes
because they have a very, very loud call.
[whooping crane calling]
That's a pair of whooping cranes
at their nest way back up in Wood Buffalo National Park.
The male and female assist in the incubation of their eggs,
and the incubation period is about one month.
And they lavished care on their chicks.
For three months they're flightless,
and then they develop flight, and in autumn,
they migrate south.
Whooping cranes and all cranes are famous for their behavior.
Not only for their calls that can carry for miles,
but by their courtship dances.
This is a pair near Baraboo, Wisconsin
in our new population here
in the Midwest, doing their dance.
They jump and they leap,
and this helps synchronize their behavior
so that when the female is ready to lay her two eggs,
a male is going to be fertile.
They're going to mate successfully
and we're going to have a new generation
of whooping cranes.
The little guys are extremely fragile,
and they depend on aquatic animal organisms
found in these marshes.
The whooping crane is very dependent on wetlands,
as are many of the species of cranes.
And it's in this habitat of shallow water
that they are supported to survive, to breed.
And of course, a big problem worldwide
is the conservation of wetlands.
And the whooping cranes used to breed
in southern Wisconsin historically,
and across the tallgrass prairies,
which stretched from northern Indiana
across Illinois and Iowa, up through Minnesota
into Saskatchewan, and into eastern Alberta.
That was the main nesting ground of the whooping crane.
And when settlers came into that area,
they had to live off the land, and they shot the wildlife.
The elk, the buffalo, the antelope disappeared,
the trumpeter swans, the whooping cranes,
the sandhill cranes, and the landscape was pretty devastated.
Fortunately, that little group survived north of the prairies
on the wetlands in Wood Buffalo National Park,
but we went through a very, very bad period
in the 1700s and the 1800s,
when this population dropped from an estimated 10,000 birds
to a final count of just 15 individuals.
And this shows the number of cranes
over the years, from the early '40s up until recently.
Up until 1916, we counted every bird,
but then as the population became larger,
we had to do transects and estimate the numbers.
At the Crane Foundation here in Wisconsin,
we keep about 40 whooping cranes in captivity.
And we share a population of about 170 birds in captivity
at a number of centers around the U.S. and Canada.
They produce their young in captivity,
and we teach them using costumes
and puppets to imprint on their own kind
although they're raised by humans,
and these birds can successfully be placed
back into the wild.
For example, this bird was raised
with its parents in captivity,
and then she was released in Wisconsin in 2017.
And here she is with her chick this past summer,
and on a marsh very near Baraboo, Wisconsin.
This year, about four whooping cranes were produced
in our new flock and are now starting to migrate.
Now, we have the other species of crane, the sandhill crane,
and the normal color for sandhill crane is light gray.
That's what they look like today.
Like the head and neck of this bird.
But in the spring, they paint their feathers with mud
and it stains their feathers a beautiful brown color,
which helps them to hide on their nest.
So the normal color is
like the back of the head of this bird.
And one of the reasons this crane is so successful
is because they can benefit
from agricultural fields around the wetlands,
and they can breed on quite small wetlands.
The whooping cranes require larger wetlands.
And like the whooping cranes, they have two chicks,
and usually they only raise one every second year.
So there's a lot of loss with the young cranes,
but that's the same in most animal species.
They lavish care on their little chicks,
and we are very happy that in Wisconsin,
our cranes have increased.
Back in 1935 when Leopold wrote his beautiful "Marshland Elegy,"
an essay that's published in his Sand County Almanac ,
he talked about the cranes.
Just beyond this photograph is the Leopold Memorial Reserve
and Leopold's Shack, where he wrote that beautiful essay.
When I came to Wisconsin in 1973,
there were no sandhill cranes on these fields.
There was a very small population
further north in Wisconsin,
but they have increased dramatically.
Leopold thought back in the 1930s
that the sandhill cranes would follow the path
of the whooping cranes and would be gone.
But they're back.
They're back on our landscape here
in Wisconsin in the thousands; Leopold would be thrilled.
I'm always reminded through his words
of the sensitivity of cranes and the profound impact
if we should lose them.
This is one of my favorite quotes.
"The sadness in some wetlands stem
"perhaps from their once having harbored cranes,
"now they stand silent, adrift in history."
We are thrilled that the calls of sandhill cranes
and whooping cranes are now back on our Wisconsin landscape
for us all to enjoy.
The spirit of the cranes is with us.
Thank you very much.
And now here is Rich Beilfuss
to tell you about the cranes in Africa.
- Thanks, George, great to be with all of you.
And my name is Rich Beilfuss, I'm president
and CEO of the International Crane Foundation.
I've worked together with George
for almost 30 years at the Crane Foundation,
and we are very passionate about cranes
and delighted you could join us for this talk.
George told you a little bit
of the story of our whooping cranes,
a little bit of sandhills, our cranes here at home.
And I'm gonna take you a little bit further afield
and talk a little bit about our international world.
A lot of people know our center in Baraboo.
Here's a photo from our center,
our remodeled center that you'll be able to see
in May when we have our grand reopening,
but our work is worldwide.
And a lot of what my role with the crane foundation is
is to take you from our site
in Baraboo to our world of crane conservation projects.
And the cranes are all over the world.
They occur on many different continents: in North America,
in Europe, in Asia, in Africa and Australia.
There's no cranes in South Africa, sorry,
in South America or in the Arctic, Antarctic today.
But historically, there were even cranes
in South America as well.
Of the 15 cranes that are around the world,
I'm gonna tell you the story of one crane,
the wattled crane, in one place:
the Kafue Flats, and give you a little flavor
of the work that we do worldwide.
So this is the wattled crane.
It's the tallest bird
in Africa that can fly, big, beautiful bird.
And I'm gonna show you a little video clip
of these wonderful birds.
This is taken at our site in Baraboo,
but it really gives you a sense of how they are in the wild.
There's a female tossing sticks in the air
and playing, trying to get the male's attention.
So hard to get right now.
She is dancing around; they're joyous birds.
They're fascinating to watch, as you saw with the ones
that George was showing you.
And just wonderful, amazing birds to see
at the Crane Foundation and to see in the wild.
The place I'm gonna take you to is the Kafue Flats,
that's in the country of Zambia in southern Africa.
This is a map of the Kafue Flats, this big green area.
It's a big floodplain; it's fed by the Kafue River,
which flows right down the middle of it
and spreads its water.
And that supports all kinds of beautiful, wondrous wetlands,
vegetation communities, papyrus
and different reeds, swamps, and wet floodplains,
and even beautiful uplands that surround it,
like this giant baobab tree that's in the uplands
that surround Kafue Flats.
It's really a beautiful landscape and ecosystem.
The Kafue Flats supports all of the world's population
of this species, which is the Kafue lechwe.
It's a very aquatic or very wetland-dependent antelope,
quite a lovely animal.
They're in big numbers on the Kafue Flats.
There's also lots of other big mammals of Africa,
like the hippos and the sort of classic grazing lawn
of zebras and wildebeest
and other grazers that are out on these floodplains.
But the Kafue Flats is also home
to more wattled cranes and anywhere on Earth.
There's more than 3,000 of these wattled cranes.
And there's only about 9,000 in the world of this species.
So it's about a third
of all the wattled cranes in the world
are on this floodplain.
So it's very important to us and our mission
at the International Crane Foundation
to save the world's cranes.
So this is one of our big priority places
around the world.
Why are there so many wattled cranes there?
A couple of reasons:
one is really abundant food supply for them.
They eat the tubers, which is like the underground bulbs
of a plant called Eleocharis, it's a spikerush.
We actually have some of this plant that grows
in our wetlands here in North America,
but the ones in Africa and Asia put down a big bulb
that cranes like to eat; several species of cranes
like to eat these underground tubers or rhizomes.
And wattled cranes love them,
and they feed on them in huge numbers out on the floodplain.
And the Kafue Flats is also a very safe place
for cranes to nest.
These tiny little dots in the middle of the screen
are two crane eggs, and they build a platform nest
that sort of floats out on the water
during the high flood season.
And that's a safe place for them to avoid the many,
many predators that are out in this landscape
and be able to hatch their eggs
and raise chicks on all of the abundance
of floodplain life that's out on the floodplains.
So it's a very good place for them to be.
The Kafue Flats also supports grey crowned cranes,
their cousins, a very endangered crane species
that occurs across Africa.
They also are in the Kafue Flats in good numbers,
as are lots of other birds, more than 470 birds species,
which is way more than we have ever had
in the state of Wisconsin here, occur just on this floodplain
of the Kafue Flats; it's really a magnificent place
and best known for its birds.
Although of course it has many important mammals as well.
Well, the Kafue Flats floodplain is also,
besides being so important for wildlife,
it's really important for people.
People use the natural resources
of the floodplain to build their homes
and to make objects that they need.
They use fisheries, they graze their livestock
in big numbers, and they depend on the water
provided by the floodplain.
So it's essential to their lives.
And the floodplain also creates jobs for people.
There's jobs in tourism, jobs in park management.
Many people from the surrounding community are hired
as scouts to help patrol the reserve.
So it's very important for employment for people
as well as resources for their livelihood.
And it's also a magnificent oasis.
It gets its water in upper northern parts of Zambia
where the rain waters first fall
into the river that ends up on the flats.
And it's a real oasis, especially
during drought years with water and helps combat drought
and water scarcity associated with climate change.
Well, despite all these wonders of the floodplain,
there are some extreme challenges there
that we're trying to deal with.
One is poaching of these lechwe.
They have been hunted
in big numbers for a variety of reasons.
And the population has been
in steep decline for almost 20 years now.
And part of the reason we're getting more deeply involved
is to try and stem that decline of these lechwe,
because they live hand in hand with the wattled cranes.
We care about the lechwe,
but also, our wattled cranes depend on the grazing grounds
of the lechwe and they live side by side.
So it's a really important challenge that we have to solve.
Another challenge that I mentioned,
people graze their cattle on the floodplain,
but there are so many of the cattle on the floodplain.
There's now far more cows than lechwe.
And then a really important role
for us right now is to really manage the cattle population
and figure out sustainable grazing
in the system that's compatible with cranes
and with wildlife and with the lechwe and not overloaded.
So we have to find that delicate balance.
Another big challenge we're dealing with is fisheries,
and especially permanent settlements on the floodplain.
If you look carefully at this picture,
this used to be a temporary fishing village,
but there's actually some metal roofs there.
You see some homes that are becoming more
and more permanent in this rural area.
And this is right in the heart of the Kafue Flats.
And people like to pick highland areas to live on
of course, to build homes in the middle of the floodplain.
And those same highlands are what the lechwe
and other wildlife need during times of high flood.
So there's a lot of competition for limited space.
And when people are out on these upland areas,
it really drives the lechwe out
and they have less and less habitat that they can use.
Other big challenges throughout the region,
a big one is water.
Water is managed upstream of the flats
by dams that really change the flow of water
in the exchange of these floodwaters onto the floodplain,
which really give the life to the floodplain.
So it's essential to keep good flows coming
from these upstream dams onto the plains
so that it can stay nourished and healthy for wildlife.
And also increasingly, there's a lot of pressure on mining.
Believe it or not, this mine is inside of the park.
We're working actually to get it shut down,
but it's right inside the park.
It creates a few jobs, but not nearly as many as tourism.
And it is a big problem right
in the heart of the reserve for wildlife.
Another big problem that we're dealing with
and we've been very active on is invasive species.
You're all gardeners,
so you know something about dealing
with problem plants and as well as good plants,
and this is a shrub
from Brazil that has invaded into a lot of Africa.
And the mimosa shrub is taking over
huge areas of the floodplain.
And it crowds out wattled cranes,
it crowds out lechwe,
and many other animals are unable to access the floodplain
because of this thorny shrub.
So lots of problems on the floodplain
that we're trying to deal with, the density of people
and water management and invasive species
and poaching, and many, many challenges.
So with all of that, how do we make a difference
for the cranes, for the lechwe,
even for the people that need the system?
How do we make a difference?
Well, the first thing we did
and are doing is building a great team in Zambia.
We have a wonderful team.
We have an office, we're registered in the country,
and we're very active working across the country.
And especially in the Kafue Flats with our great team
of folks, and we have a great team and we have a vision,
and our vision is a thriving floodplain for all.
And it's about refinding that balance between rare
and threatened species and all the wildlife
on the floodplain and the needs of people
in the area and finding that elusive balance
where people can use the floodplain, but not to excess,
and we can find a win-win for all involved.
And we're doing this
in partnership with the government of Zambia.
We've signed a 20-year agreement
with the government to move forward on this project.
And then really important partners for us in Africa,
like the Endangered Wildlife Trust out of South Africa,
we work with very closely at World Wildlife Fund.
So this is a big project, a big partnership,
right in line with the government to really help
bring back this floodplain.
Here's a shot again of the Kafue Flats,
and our agreement covers two national parks
and a huge floodplain area
called the Kafue Flats Game Management Area.
So we've sort of taken all of that on with this big agreement.
And really, we have three pillars of our support.
One is law enforcement and sort of the core management
of the park, trying to reverse the tide of the poaching
of the lechwe and other species, and really make sure
that they can continue to thrive on this floodplain.
We're supporting all aspects
of law enforcement with our project efforts there,
and really trying to get them well-equipped
and able to do their jobs
and drawn from the communities that surround the flats.
We're also very involved in management and restoration.
And I'll talk a little bit more
about this invasive species mimosa
that I talked about a minute ago, too.
But trying to make sure conditions for wattled cranes,
for lechwes, and other species are solid
on the species and that the wetland remains healthy.
And then finally, community support
for the park and their livelihoods.
So how can we find that balance for grazing on the floodplain,
for fisheries on the floodplain meant for other uses?
So those are really our three pillars,
trying to bring better law enforcement,
improve ecological management of the park,
and to build community support
and really support the livelihoods
of the people that fully depend on this floodplain system.
And an example where we're bringing that all together
is in our mimosa control project.
This is a big project we've been doing there
for about three years now,
and it's really dealing with this terrible problem of mimosa,
which covers thousands and thousands of acres on the area.
And as I said, is really crowding out species
that need the floodplain where it occurs.
And here we have a project that's bringing together
the control of the invasive species,
improved livelihoods for the people that live
around the park, and increasing support for conservation.
So what are we doing?
Well, we hired about 150 people from the community.
That's from people from 150 different households
to come out, and they're cutting and burning
the mimosa from the floodplain, systematically moving across,
removing the mimosa, then coming back
and removing the resprouts year after year
to really eliminate the mimosa from the floodplain.
And then they're also helping us with these exclosure plots,
if you can see that on the bottom photo.
We're bringing plots where we're studying the removal
of that mimosa and collecting data
on how plant species are recovering
and how food sources are recovering
that will support lechwe on the floodplain
and also wattled cranes and other species
as the mimosa is continuously cleared.
Well, we've been very fortunate so far
to clear more than 2,500 acres of this weed,
restoring these open floodplains.
And it's been a wonderful response, lechwe are back
in areas that we have cleared in big numbers,
wattled cranes are moving back in.
And actually, we had a team that was out there
studying bird life on the floodplain,
and they found several bird species
that weren't recorded anywhere else in Zambia
that had come back into that floodplain area.
So wildlife is responding back to this removal
and really recolonizing these critical areas.
So we're really increasing the effective area
of this park by a lot, and that's really wonderful.
And the people, the 150 people that were employed
by the project all had income.
And this is a very income-scarce area.
Everyone in this area are subsistence farmers,
which means basically they farm to keep themselves alive
and they have very few options to make cash.
So what do the people do with the cash from the project?
They used it to pay school fees
and to buy school uniforms for their kids.
They used it to repair their homes
and to get food supplies, backup food supplies
during drought periods or other stressful periods.
And they used it to invest in different projects.
Sometimes they invested in goats or pigs
that they could use to support their livelihoods.
Sometimes they invested in beekeeping,
like this beekeeping photo here.
So they invested in different ways
to improve their livelihoods.
So it's really a great opportunity
for people to improve their own situation,
their own livelihoods around the flats
while also providing a really big management service
for the park and increasing their buy-in
and support for the park
as we continue on year after year with this effort.
So this story, like the stories George told you
about the whooping cranes, you know, wherever we work,
cranes really commit us to healthy landscapes.
And those healthy landscapes not only support
or sustain cranes, but they also support the people
that live with cranes on these landscapes.
And so many other species,
really the diversity of life on Earth.
So it's a wonderful opportunity to really work
for healthy landscapes through the power
and the love people have for cranes
to make a real difference.
Well, I hope you'll come and visit us
at our Cranes of the World Education Center in Baraboo.
We just were closed all last year
for remodeling and in part, because of the COVID crisis,
we'll have our grand reopening in May.
We're excited to host everyone
to see our all-new exhibits in our new welcome center.
It's really beautiful onsite.
It's also fantastic to stroll our prairies
and our restoration area.
We've got more than 250 acres of restored prairie on our site,
which is beautiful to see.
We are a member-based organization,
and we welcome you to become a member
and learn more about us and our work
all around the world, for the whooping cranes here
in the U.S., for the wattled cranes in Africa,
and everywhere that we were around for these birds.
Or join us on one of our trips,
like this amazing scene from the Platte River in Nebraska.
We love taking people out to see the spectacle of hundreds
of thousands of sandhill cranes out on the Platte
and we take people further afield to Africa, to Asia
to really experience cranes in the wild
and share in the wonder of these birds
and see the healthy landscapes that we're working to restore
and make better for people
and wildlife and cranes around the world.
So thank you, thank you for joining us today.
It's a pleasure speaking with you,
and I hope you enjoy the rest of the conference.
>> HI.
I'M BEN FUTA, HOST OF "LET'S
GROW STUFF."
WE JUST FINISHED LEARNING ABOUT
CRANES AND RICH AND GEORGE ARE
JOINING US TO ANSWER THE
QUESTIONS YOU'VE BEEN SENDING IN
AS YOU'VE BEEN LISTENING.
DON'T FORKT, FORGET, YOU CAN KEEP
ASKING THOSE QUESTIONS WHEREVER
YOU HAVE BEEN WATCHING.
THIS PRESENTATION IS BEING
RECORDED AND ARC ARCHIVED, SO YOU
CAN GO BACK AND WATCH IT AGAIN
AT YOUR LEISURE.
RICH AND GEORGE, THANK YOU SO
MUCH FOR BEING WITH US TODAY.
WE APPRECIATE IT.
>> THANKS.
>> YOU'RE WELCOME.
>> GOOD TO BE HERE.
>> WE'LL GO AHEAD AND JUMP RIGHT
IN.
WE'RE GETTING SEVERAL QUESTIONS,
GIVEN RECENT WEATHER EVENTS IN
TEXAS IN PARTICULAR ABOUT THE
IMPACT OF THIS COLD SNAP ON
MIGRATION PATTERNS.
RICH, DO YOU WANT TO TAKE THIS
ONE AND KICK US OFF HERE?
>> SURE.
SURE.
AND THEN GEORGE CAN TALK A
LITTLE BIT TO THIS AS WELL.
WELL, IT HAS BEEN AN EXTREMELY
COLD YEAR.
CRANES ARE VERY RESILIENT TO THE
EXTREME COLD AND A NUMBER OF
CRANES LIVE IN REALLY COLD
CLIMATES.
SO THEY ARE FINE.
WE DON'T KNOW YET IF MIGRATION
UP NORTH WILL BE DELAYED AT ALL,
BUT WE EXPECT TO START SEEING
SANDHILLS WITHIN THE NEXT COUPLE
OF WEEKS.
THEY'LL BE FINE.
WE'VE HAD BIG BIG CHALLENGES WITH
OUR STAFF IN TEXAS IN HOUSTON
AND CORPUS CHRISTI.
THEY'VE HAD NO WATER AND LIMITED
ELECTRICITY.
A LOT OF CHALLENGES.
THEY'RE COPING OKAY, BUT IT'S
BEEN A REALLY DIFFICULT TIME FOR
A LOT OF PEOPLE DOWN THERE.
THEY ARE NOT HARDY WISCONSIN
FOLKS LIKE US FOR THE WINTER.
DEFINITELY BEEN A SHOCKER DOWN
THERE.
>> GEORGE, WE HAVE A QUESTION
FROM JODY.
DO WE KNOW APPROXIMATELY HOW
MANY CRANES ARE IN WISCONSIN AND
WHERE MIGHT BE SOME GREAT PLACES
TO VIEW THEM AS THEY'RE
MIGRATING THROUGH?
>> WELL, SANDHILL CRANES ARE
ALMOST EVERYWHERE, BUT THE
LARGEST NUMBERS ARE IN THE
CENTRAL PART OF THE STATE.
AND YOU CAN READILY SEE SANDHILL
CRANES ALONG THE ROAD NEAR
CHEROKEE MARSH OR GOOSE POND IN
MADISON, HORICON MARSH.
EVERY MARSH IN WISCONSIN HAS
SANDHILL CRANES.
IF PEOPLE WOULD LIKE TO
PARTICIPATE IN OUR MID APRIL
SANDHILL COUNT, THEY SHOULD
CONTACT THE CRANE FOUNDATION AT
SAVINGCRANES.ORG.
THOUSANDS OF VOLUNTEERS GO OUT
TO COUNT THE SANDHILL CRANES.
THE WHOOPING CRANES ARE VERY
EASILY SEEN AT THE NECEDAH
WILDLIFE AREA FROM THE
OBSERVATION TOWER AT THE SOUTH
SIDE OF THE REFUGE.
YOU CAN CLIMB UP AND LOOK OUT
AND LIKELY SEE SEVERAL PAIRS OF
WHOOPING CRANES.
THEY'LL BE RETURNING IN THE NEAR
FUTURE.
WE CAUTION PEOPLE IF THEY SEE
WHOOPING CRANES IN OTHER AREAS
OUTSIDE THE PROTECTED AREAS NOT
TO HARASS THEM BY TRYING TO TAKE
PICTURES, WHATEVER.
BUT JUST KEEP YOUR DISTANCE.
>> SO, RICH, QUESTION FROM
AMANDA.
SHE'S WONDERING HOW CAN PEOPLE
GET INVOLVED TO SUPPORT YOUR
INTERNATIONAL WORK IF THEY'RE
INTERESTED IN SUPPORTING SOME OF
THESE OTHER PROJECTS?
>> WELL, WE APPRECIATE THAT VERY
MUCH.
THE NUMBER ONE, WE ARE A MEMBER
ORGANIZATION.
OF COURSE, WE APPRECIATE PEOPLE
THAT JOIN US AND HELP SUPPORT
OUR WORK.
IT'S VERY, VERY IMPORTANT FOR
THE WORK THAT WE DO AROUND THE
WORLD.
WE DO TRIPS TO THESE AREAS.
WE RUN TRIPS, INTERNATIONAL
TRIPS FOR PEOPLE AROUND TO GET A
FEEL FOR THESE AREAS AND KIND OF
BRING THEM CLOSER TO HOME.
AND WE HAVE A LOT OF PEOPLE THAT
DO VOLUNTEER WORK FOR US HERE AT
THE INTERNATIONAL CRANE
FOUNDATION DURING NORMAL TIMES
WHEN WE'RE OPEN.
IT'S BEEN CHALLENGING IN THESE
COVID TIMES, BUT VOLUNTEERS WHO
HELP WITH TOURS AND HELPING
RESTORE OUR LANDS NEAR BARABOO.
THERE'S LOTS OF WAYS PEOPLE CAN
GET INVOLVED WITH OUR
ORGANIZATION.
WE'RE VERY GRATEFUL TO OUR
SUPPORTERS WHO KEEP OUR
INTERNATIONAL WORK GOING.
MOST OF IT IS SUPPORTED BY
PRIVATE DONORS.
>> WE HAVE ANOTHER QUESTION OF
SUPPORT COMING IN FROM SUSAN.
GEORGE, I'LL TOSS THIS ONE TO
YOU.
SHE SAYS SHE HAS A BREEDING PAIR
OF SANDHILL CRANES IN HER YARD.
SHE'S WONDERING IS THERE
ANYTHING SHE SHOULD BE ADDING TO
HER LANDSCAPE TO AID AND SUPPORT
THEM?
>> WELL, IF SHE HAS A DOG THAT
CHASES THEM, I SUGGEST SHE KEEP
THE DOG CONFINED, ESPECIALLY
WHEN THEY HAVE CHICKS.
I WOULD CAUTION ABOUT FEEDING
THE CRANES.
WE WANT TO KEEP THEM WILD.
AND SOMETIMES PEOPLE ARE
CONCERNED THAT CRANES BECOME TOO
TAME AND THEY COULD PECK A YOUNG
PERSON.
SO WE DON'T WANT TO DOMESTICATE
THESE CRANES.
WE WANT TO ENJOY THEM.
BUT IT'S GOOD TO KEEP THEM AS
WILD AS POSSIBLE.
>> NOW, RICH, WE HAVE A QUESTION
FROM JANE.
SHE'S WONDERING, YOUR METHODS
FOR CONTROLLING THOSE INVASIVE
PLANTS, DO GOATS LIKE THE SHRUBS
OR WHAT METHODS DO YOU USE TO
KEEP THOSE UNDER CONTROL?
>> GREAT QUESTION.
WE'VE BEEN THINKING MORE ABOUT
GOATS.
CONTROLLING THE SHRUB IS A
LITTLE BIT LIKE CONTROLLING SOME
OF OUR NASTY SHRUBS IN WISCONSIN
LIKE BLACK LOCUST AND OTHER
THINGS.
WE DID A LOT OF IT BY CUTTING BY
HAND.
THEY DID SOME SPOT HERBICIDE
TREATMENTS.
THAT HELPS A LOT TO REDUCE THE
RESPROUTING.
WHEN WE REALLY CUT THE SHRUBS
DOWN, OUR HOPE IS THAT THE
NATURAL FLOODING OF THE WETLAND
SYSTEM WILL HELP PREVENT THE
REGENERATION.
THEY DON'T LIKE TO GENERATE SO
MUCH IN STANDING WATER, BUT
THEY'LL GROW JUST FIND IN
STANDING WATER.
SO YOU REALLY HAVE TO CUT THEM
DOWN AND KEEP THEM UNDER WATER.
LIKE ANY PRAIRIE OR ANY GARDEN
IN WISCONSIN, WEEDING IS SORT OF
A LIFE-LONG OBLIGATION.
SO WE'RE IN IT FOR A LONG HAUL.
WE'RE IN A 20-YEAR AGREEMENT
THERE TO DO A BUNCH OF THINGS.
THAT INCLUDES KEEPING SUPPORT
AND FOR CONTROLLING THIS
INVASIVE SHRUB.
WE KNOW IF WE TAKE A COUPLE
YEARS OFF, IT WILL ALL BE BACK
IN.
ONE OTHER THING THAT WE'RE DOING
THERE IS WE'RE USING A BEETLE, A
TINY LITTLE MOTH LARVAE THAT
SEEMS TO WORK VERY SPECIFICALLY
ON CONTROLLING THOSE SHRUBS.
SO THE HOPE IS THAT INTRODUCING
THOSE IN WILL HELP REDUCE THE
COVER OF THE MIMOSA, TOO.
THEY DIE OUT ONCE THEY EAT OUT
THE MIMOSA, BECAUSE THEY DON'T
JUMP TO OTHER PLANTS.
YOU HAVE TO BE VERY CAREFUL WITH
THOSE BIOCONTROL TECHNIQUES.
THIS ONE HAS BEEN PRETTY WELL
TESTED ON THIS MIMOSA.
SHE WAS ASKING ABOUT GOATS.
I THINK GOATS WOULD LOVE TO EAT
MIMOSA.
GOATS EAT EVERYTHING, SO YOU
HAVE TO BE VERY CAREFUL ABOUT
GETTING THEM IN THERE.
BUT THEY ARE AVENUE THE ONE
THING THAT WOULD EAT A LOT OF
THAT MISM MOST MIMOSA.
CATTLE WON'T EAT IT.
THAT MAY BE PART OF THE FUTURE.
>> DAVE SAYS CONFIRMING
SANDHILLS USUALLY HAVE TWO EGGS
AND ONLY RAISE ONE CHICK?
WHY IS THAT AND WHAT HAPPENS TO
THAT OTHER EGG OR THAT OTHER
CHICK?
>> USUALLY BOTH CHICKS WILL
HATCH.
THEY CAN WALK WITHIN A DAY OR SO
AND SWIM VERY WELL.
AND THEY ESTABLISH A DOMINANT
SUBORDINATE RELATIONSHIP.
THEY HAVE A LITTLETIVE AND THE
DOMINANT BIRD IS THE STRONGER
BISHED.
AND IF THERE'S A FOOD SCARCITY,
THE STRONGER BIRD GETS THE FOOD
FIRST.
SO THE OTHER BIRD WILL NOT
SURVIVE.
SO IT'S A MATTER OF FOOD.
BUT IF THERE'S A SUPER ABUNDANCE
OF FOOD, IT'S NOT UNUSUAL FOR
SANDHILLS TO RAISE BOTH OF THE
CHICKS.
>> SO, RICH, WE HAVE A QUESTION
FROM LEILA.
SHE'S WONDERING GIVEN THE STATE
OF THE WORLD IF YOU'RE PLANNING
ANY INTERNATIONAL TRIPS THIS
YEAR OR WHEN YOU THINK YOU MIGHT
RESUME.
>> YEAH.
WELL, THAT'S A LITTLE BIT OF A
CRYSTAL BALL FOR THAT.
BUT OUR HOPE IS TO RESUME SOME
INTERNATIONAL TRIPS IN THE FALL
AND THEN IN THE WINTER.
I AM RUNNING A TRIP TO CHAD IN
AFRICA NEXT FEBRUARY WHICH I'M
HOPING WILL GO.
IT'S A MAGNIFICENT PLACE.
GEORGE OFTEN DOES A TRIP TO
BHUTAN.
WE'RE HOPING THAT ONE WILL GO.
RIGHT NOW WE'RE HOPEFUL,
WATCHING HOW VACCINES ROLL OUT,
HOW BORDERS REOPEN, A LOT OF
THINS OUT OF OUR CONTROL.
BUT WE'RE HOPEFUL TO GET THAT
GOING AGAIN.
A LOT OF OUR LONG-TERM
SUPPORTERS AND BOARD MEMBERS AND
OTHER LONG-TERM FRIENDS OF THE
FOUNDATION HAVE REALLY CONNECTED
IN WITH US ON THESE TRIPS
GETTING OUT TO SEE THE WILD
CRANES.
WE WOULD LOVE TO GET THEM GOING
AGAIN.
>> GEORGE, A QUESTION FROM JANE.
WHEN IS THE BEST TIME OF YEAR TO
COME AND VISIT YOUR NEW FACILITY
UP IN BARE BARABOO?
>> THANK YOU VERY MUCH, JANE.
WE JUST REDID OUR VISITOR AREA.
IT'S ABSOLUTELY SPECTACULAR.
AND WE WERE OPENING TO HAVE A
GRAND OPENING IN THE YEAR 2020.
BUT WE COULDN'T OPEN AT ALL.
SO WE ARE GOING TO HAVE A SOFT
OPENING FROM THE 1ST OF MAY AND
PEOPLE CAN PHONE IN AND MAKE
RESERVATIONS AND WE CAN CONTROL
THE FLOW VERY CAREFULLY.
SO PLEASE CONTACT THE CRANE
FOUNDATION AND SIGN UP AND YOU
CAN SEE OUR NEW FACILITIES AND
MEET ALL 15 SPECIES OF CRANES IN
2021.
>> EXCELLENT.
RICH, WE HAVE A QUESTION HERE
FROM A VIEWER WONDERING HOW MANY
-- DO WE KNOW HOW MANY CRANE
SPECIES ARE OUT THERE AND ALSO
HOW MANY ARE THREATENED OR
ENDANGERED?
>> YEAH.
THERE ARE 15 SPECIES OF CRANES
OUT IN THE WORLD SPREAD ALL
OVER.
THEY'RE IN AFRICA, ASIA,
AUSTRALIA, NORTH AMERICA AND
EUROPE.
OF THE 15, 11 ARE ON THE RED
DATA LIST.
THAT'S A SPECIES THAT'S
CONSIDERED NEAR THREATENED OR
VULNERABLE OR ENDANGERED.
AND SO 11 OF THE 15 CRANES ARE
ON THAT LIST.
AND IN FACT OF THE OTHER FOUR
CRANES, INCLUDING OUR SANDHILLS,
THEY HAVE POPULATIONS THAT ARE
SERIOUSLY THREATENED, TOO.
FOR EXAMPLE, THE SANDHILL CRANE
IS STILL CONSIDERED A HIGHLY
THREATENED SPECIES OUT ON THE
WEST COAST IN CALIFORNIA, UP
INTO OREGON AND WASHINGTON.
>> CAN YOU HEAR, RICH?
>> RICH, I THINK WE LOST YOU.
>> OH.
SORRY.
>> YOU'RE BREAKING UP, RICH.
>> CAN YOU HEAR ME?
>> WE CAN HEAR YOU NOW.
YOU'RE GOOD.
>> SORRY ABOUT THAT.
DID I GET THAT OR DID I GET CUT
OFF THERE?
>> JUST THE LAST MAYBE 20
SECONDS.
>> OKAY.
SORRY ABOUT THAT.
I WAS JUST SAYING THAT 11 OF THE
15 CRANES ARE OFFICIALLY
CLASSIFIED AS THREATENED AND
EVEN AMONG THE CRANES THAT ARE
NOT ON THAT LIST FOR ENDANGERED
SPECIES ARE STILL -- STILL HAVE
POPULATIONS THAT ARE VERY
THREATENED INCLUDING OUR OWN
SANDHILLS.
THERE'S ENDANGERED POPULATIONS
IN CUBA AND MISSISSIPPI AND EVEN
ON THE WEST COAST THEY'RE
CONSIDERED THREATENED, ALTHOUGH
OURS HERE IN THE MIDWEST ARE
DOING SO WELL.
IT'S A VERY THREATENED FAMILY OF
BIRDS AND THAT'S A BIG REASON
WHY WE HAVE SO MUCH FOCUS ON
THEIR CONSERVATION IN THE WILD.
>> WE TALKED ABOUT NOT GOING OUT
OF OUR WAY TO INTRUDE OR BE
DISRUPTIVE TO LOOKING FOR
CRANES, BUT MELISSA HAS A
QUESTION IF WE'RE OUT HIKING OR
KAYAKING AND HAPPEN UPON THEM,
HOW SHOULD WE BEHAVE?
WHAT'S THE BEST WAY TO MOVE
FORWARD WHEN THAT HAPPENS?
>> YEAH.
OFTEN CRANES WILL BUILD THEIR
NEST OUT IN SHALLOW WATER AND IF
THERE'S AN OPEN AREA OF WATER
NEAR THAT, IF YOU COME IN A
KAYAK, YOU COULD DISTURB THEM AT
THE NEST.
SO MY ADVICE IS IF YOU COME
ACROSS CRANES IN A WETLAND AND
YOU'RE IN A BOAT, GET AS FAR
AWAY FROM THEM AS YOU POSSIBLY
CAN, BECAUSE YOU MIGHT DISUSH
THEM AT THEIR NEST.
>> SO, RICH, WE HAVE ANOTHER
QUESTION FROM A VIEWER WONDERING
ABOUT SAND CRANE HABITAT AND DO
ALL CRANES PREFER WETLANDS OR DO
SOME LIVE IN OTHER TYPES OF EESK
OWE SYSTEMS.
>> ALL CRANES DO NEED WETLANDS
FOR SOME PART OF THEIR LIVES,
BUT SOME ARE MORE DEPENDENT ON
WETLANDS THAN OTHERS.
SOME CRANES FEED IN WETLANDS.
>> RICH, YOU'RE BREAKING UP
THERE AGAIN JUST A LITTLE BIT,
I'M AFRAID.
>> CAN YOU HEAR ME STILL?
>> THERE YOU GO.
YOU'RE BACK NOW.
>> YEAH.
SORRY ABOUT THAT.
OKAY.
SORRY.
SO YEAH.
SO SOME OF THE CRANES ARE REALLY
CHALLENGED, REALLY ARE VERY
DEPENDENT ON WETLANDS.
AND SOME OF THE CRANES USE MORE
UP LAND AREAS, LIKE THE BLUE
CRANES IN SOUTH AFRICA AND EVEN
SANDHILLS HERE ARE FEEDING MUCH
MORE IN AGRICULTURAL AREAS AND
EURASIAN CRANES.
THERE'S A NUMBER OF SPECIES THAT
HAVE SHIFTED MORE INTO UP LAND
AGRICULTURAL AREAS.
THEY'LL STILL BREED IN WETLANDS,
BUT FEED IN UPLAND AREAS.
SOME OF THE MOST THREATENED
CRANES DEPEND ON WETLANDS
THROUGHOUT THE YEAR, SO THEY
REALLY NEED THOSE GOOD
CONDITIONS FOR ALL OF THEIR
NEEDS AND OTHERS ARE A LITTLE
BIT MORE GENERALIST AND CAN USE
UPLAND AREAS.
WETLANDS ARE IMPORTANT TO ALL OF
THEM, BUT A NUMBER OF THEM ARE
STARTING TO GET MORE ON
GENERALIST IN THEIR DIVE ETS, A
LITTLE MORE FLEXIBLE OVER TIME.
>> WE HAVE A QUESTION FROM KATE.
SHE WAS COMMENTING MANY YEARS
AGO SHE WAS ABLE TO WATCH THE
TRAINING OF THE CRANES FROM A
GLIDE PLANE AT THE NEKOOSA
WILDLIFE REV NIEWJ.
IS THERE ANY CHANCE OF A PROGRAM
LIKE THAT COMING BACK?
>> NO.
THAT PROGRAM WAS A WONDERFUL
PROGRAM, STARTED IN 2001 BY AN
ORGANIZATION CALLED OPERATION
MIGRATION.
AND THEY LED CRANES FROM
WISCONSIN TO FLORIDA AND THEN
LATER JUST AS FAR AS ALABAMA
UNTIL 2015.
AND THEN THERE WERE SO MANY
CRANES OUT IN THE FLYWAY THAT IT
WAS FELT THAT WE DON'T NEED TO
LEAD THEM ANYMORE.
WE SIMPLY RELEASE THEM WITH THE
CRANES THAT ARE ALREADY THERE,
WHICH IS A LOT CHEAPER.
>> WITCH, I RICH, I HAVE A PERSONAL
QUESTION FOR YOU.
I'M WONDERING IF YOU'RE ABLE TO
SPEAK TO AGAIN THINGS THAT WE AS
GARDENERS COULD DO IN OUR OWN
SPACES FOR CONSERVATION.
I'VE HEARD TELL THAT PETE MINING
MINING, SOMETHING IN SO MANY OF
OUR SOILS, CAN BE PRETTY
DESTRUCTIVE TO WETLANDS.
WONDERING WHAT ELSE CAN
GARDENERS THINK ABOUT AS A PEAT
ALTERNATIVE.
>> WONDERFUL QUESTION.
A LOT OF CONSERVATION BEGINS AT
HOME.
I WILL SAY A FEW THINGS AND
DEFER TO GEORGE.
PEAT MINING IS A CHALLENGE.
MINING OF PEAT IS A NONRENEWABLE
RESOURCE.
IT'S CREATED OVER MILLEN KNEE A.
IT'S A VERY SLOW PROCESS TO
BUILD UP PEAT.
SO THOSE QUALITIES WE LOVE, LIKE
ITS GREAT ABILITY TO RETAIN
WATER AND HOLD IT IN THE SOIL AN
ALSO AN IMPORTANT QUALITY OF
PEAT IN THE WILD.
IT KEEPS WETLANDS WET THROUGH
DRY PERIODS AND MAINTAINS PLANTS
IN THE WILD.
ALTERNATIVES, OF COURSE, THERE
ARE ARTIFICIAL ALTERNATIVES TO
IT THAT ARE AVAILABLE ON THE
MARKET.
BUT IT'S GOOD TO THINK ABOUT THE
IMPACT OF THINGS THAT WE APPLY
IN OUR GARDENING AND ON THE
LAND, FERTILIZERS AND PESTICIDES
AND TRY TO MINIMIZE THAT USE AS
PART OF OUR OVERALL FOOTPRINT ON
THE LAND.
I DON'T KNOW.
GEORGE, YOU HAVE SUGGESTIONS FOR
WHAT GARDENERS CAN DO TO HELP
CRANES?
>> I'M AN ORGANIC GARDENER.
I DON'T USE CHEMICALS.
THERE ARE VARIOUS BIOLOGICAL
TRICKS, LIKE PLANTING MAIFERRY MARIGOLDS
NEAR YOUR CABBAGE.
SAWDUST IS A GOOD SUBSTITUTE FOR
PEAT MONTHS.
IT ROTS DOWN AND WORKS OUT VERY
WELL.
SO IF THERE'S A DANGEROUS
SUBSTANCE, TRY TO FIND A
SUBSTITUTE.
AND THAT'S WHAT WE'RE PREACHING
ALL OVER THE WORLD.
ANOTHER IMPORTANT THING ABOUT
PEAT IS IT'S CARBON, AND WE KNOW
THAT PUTTING MORE CARBON INTO
THE ATMOSPHERE IS A BIG PROBLEM
WORLDWIDE.
AND WE'RE HOPING THAT WETLANDS
THAT HAVE BEEN FARMED CAN GROW
PEAT BY RESTORING THEM AS
WETLANDS AND LET THE PEAT BUILD
UP, BRINGING MORE CARBON OUT OF
THE ATMOSPHERE.
SO IT'S A BIG CONSERVATION
ISSUE, OF COURSE.
>> THANK YOU.
>> YEAH.
IT'S A REALLY EMPOWERING MESSAGE
FOR GARDENERS TO REALIZE WHAT WE
THINK IS A SMALL ACTION IN OUR
OWN LITTLE PLOT COMBINED WITH
EVERYONE CAN MAKE A BIG IMPACT
FOR THE MATTER.
GEORGE, WE HAVE A QUESTION FROM
LYNN.
SHE'S WONDERING, SHE'S HEARD
STORIES THAT MAYBE FARMERS OR
LANDOWNERS WHO DON'T WANT THE
CRANES ON THEIR LAND COULD TAKE
NEGATIVE ACTION, IF YOU KNOW IF
THAT'S STILL HAPPENING OR ARE
THERE LOCAL PROTECTIONS IN PLACE
FOR PRIVATE LANDOWNERS WHO MAY
BE TAKING AGGRESSIVE ACTION TO
REMOVE THE BIRDS FOR SOME
REASON.
>> YEAH.
THE PROBLEM FARMERS HAVE IN THE
SPRING WHEN THEY PLANT THE CORN,
A FLOCK OF CRANES WILL COME IN
AND DIG UP THE SEEDS.
AND CAUSE A LOT OF DAMAGE.
BUT THERE'S A SUBSTANCE WE'VE
DEVELOPED CALLED AVAPEL THAT'S
AVAILABLE COMMERCIALLY.
IF YOU APPLY THAT POWDER TO THE
CORN SEEDS BEFORE THEY'RE
PLANTED, THEY'RE DISTASTEFUL TO
THE CRANES AND THEY WON'T EAT
IT.
SO IT'S A VERY EASY WAY TO
CONTROL THAT TYPE OF DAMAGE.
>> AND LOOKS LIKE PROBABLY OUR
ONE LAST QUESTION HERE FROM
VIEWER ED, HE'S ASKING, GEORGE,
THIS MIGHT BE ONE FOR YOU.
HE'S WONDERING DO THE WADDLE
CRANES STOP IN WISCONSIN ON
THEIR JOURNEY FROM CANADA TO
TEXAS?
>> THE ONLY WATTLED CRANES IN
WISCONSIN ARE AT THE
INTERNATIONAL CRANE FOUNDATION
AND THEY'RE NOT TRAVELING
ANYWHERE.
THEY'RE CAPTIVE BIRDS.
WATTLED CRANES ARE ONLY FOUND
FROM ETHIOPIA TO SOUTH AFRICA.
THEY'RE ENDEMIC TO THE AFRICAN
CONTINENT.
THE TOTAL POPULATION IS 8,000 TO
10,000.
>> 9,000 TO 10,000.
NOT MANY IN THE WIESTLED.
BUT DOING A LITTLE BETTER IN THE
WILD THAN OUR WHOOPING CRANES
HERE.
>> WE HAVE A BEAUTIFUL PAIR ON
EXHIBIT.
HOPE YOU COME UP AND SEE THEM.
THEY'RE GORGEOUS.
>> IN OUR FINAL MOMENTS, THAT'S
A GREAT WAY TBOR FOR US TO START TO
WRAP UP.
REMIND FOLKS WHERE THEY CAN
CONNECT WITH YOU TO LEARN MORE,
GET INVOLVED.
HOW'S THE BEST WAY FOR FOLKS TO
GET INVOLVED?
>> ABSOLUTELY.
WELL, OUR WEBSITE IS A GREAT WAY
TO LEARN MORE, SAVINGCRANES.ORG.
WE HAVE THESE WONDERFUL WEEKLY
SEMINARS, WEBINARS THAT WE DO.
THEY'RE SHIFTING TO EVERY TWO
WEEKS NOW.
YOU CAN FIND A YOUTUBE THROUGH
OUR WEBSITE WEBINARS ON
PROJECTS.
I TALKED ABOUT THE KAFUE FLATS.
WE HAVE AN HOUR-LONG ONE ABOUT
OUR WORK THERE AND OUR WORK IN
MONGOLIA AND ALL OVER THE WORLD.
THEY'RE WONDERFULLE TO WATCH AND
IT'S A GREAT WAY TO GET TO KNOW
ON BETTER THROUGH THOSE.
THEY'RE ON THURSDAYS ABOUT 11:00
IN THE MORNING.
THERE'S LOTS OF OPPORTUNITIES TO
LEARN MORE ABOUT WHAT WE DO.
WE HOPE YOU'LL COME VISIT US
AFTER MAY.
WE WILL DEFINITELY BE OPENING UP
OUR DOORS IN WAY AND THEN
DEPENDING ON THE STATE OF THE
WORLD, WE'LL KNOW HOW MUCH WE DO
OR DON'T NEED TO RESTRICT
NUMBERS OF PEOPLE ON-SITE AND
EVERYTHING ELSE.
BUT WE ARE PLANNING TO BE OPEN,
SO WE WOULD LOVE TO SEE YOU.
>> WONDERFUL.
GEORGE AND RICH, THANK YOU SO
MUCH FOR TAKING THE TIME TO
SHARE YOUR STORY AND EXPERTISE
WITH ALL OF US TODAY.
WE SO APPRECIATE IT.
THANK YOU SO MUCH.
>> THANK YOU.
IT WAS FUN TO BE WITH YOU AND
HAPPY GARDENING, EVERYBODY.
>> YES.
HAPPY GARDENING.
AND ON THAT NOTE, WE STILL HAVE
MORE EXPO COMING UP.
STAY TUNED.
WE HAVE MORE COMING UP JUST
AFTER THIS.
onsin's
online gardening series Let's Grow Stuff!
Welcome to this year's virtual
Wisconsin Garden and Landscape Expo.
I hope you'll enjoy this special educational presentation.
And remember, you can leave your questions for our presenter
at any time by typing them into the chat
and we'll ask them in a live Q & A
at the end of the session.
Also, don't forget to stick around and check out
everything this virtual event has to offer.
From inspiring garden tours
to an interactive exhibitor mall,
there's something for everyone.
And, thanks for joining us.
Now, please enjoy the show.
- Hi, I'm Lisa Johnson.
I'm the horticulture educator with Dane County Extension.
And today, we're gonna be talking about rain gardens.
So there are a lot of good reasons to use rain gardens.
They do prevent excess runoff that carries soil nutrients,
particularly phosphorus, away.
And we want to try and make sure to capture
as much water as we can on the property
so that it doesn't run off and carry those nutrients
down into our lakes and other places
we don't want them to be.
Another good reason to use rain gardens
is that they can provide a really nice,
diverse garden area that supports pollinators
and birds, and is lovely to look at as well.
And one thing you do need to think about though
is that rain gardens are only able to work
in areas where there is actually runoff.
So if you have just a flat area,
that isn't going to work very well.
So some places that you can build your rain gardens
are where there's a downspout.
You can put them where there is water running downhill,
as in this picture.
We put one in at the Dane County Extension teaching garden,
where we had a swale.
So you can actually see that both sides there are curved.
And you can also use rain gardens in median strips.
Of course, you do need the permission of the city.
The other place that you can build rain gardens
are in planting islands in parking lots.
And you see a lot of these being used nowadays.
They're a great way to keep water off the parking lot
and not have to worry about using so much salt
during the winter because more of the water will drain off.
So siting your rain garden at home.
You need to make sure that your rain garden is at least
10 feet from your foundation, and you want it to be integrated
somewhat with your landscaping style.
So if you have a fairly informal style,
most rain garden plants will work quite well for you.
But if you have a more formal style,
you might need to be a little more careful
in choosing the plants, but there are still plenty
of rain garden plants that will work well.
Sunny or partly sunny areas are best.
Although there are certainly some rain garden plants
that will work in partial shade,
and we'll talk a little bit about those later.
Then you want to make sure that the water in the area
that you're going to build your rain garden
doesn't pool for long periods of time.
It needs to drain out in three to five days.
And even though we said
the site should not be completely flat,
you don't want a real heavy slope on the site either,
because that's just an invitation for erosion.
And then one last thing, don't put it over the septic system.
So how do you size your rain garden?
This is one of the most important parts
in building a rain garden,
because you wanna make sure that it's big enough
to capture the rain water, but no so big that it is,
is going to not fit into your landscape.
So you want to make sure that you've got it properly sized.
And so there's some questions you need to ask yourself.
First of all, and the most important
is what type of soil do I have?
Then you want to ask, how big is that area
that's gonna be draining?
And there's ways that you can try and figure that out.
Then you need to ask, what is the slope?
And there's a mathematical way you can figure that out too.
And then, what's the best size to fit my yard?
Keep in mind that the smaller your area is,
the deeper you're going to need to dig your rain garden
so that it can hold enough water.
So ways that you would calculate your drainage area.
If it is coming off of a downspout,
and a lot of us do put rain gardens near the downspout,
is that you want to figure out what the area of roof is
that's closest to that downspout.
So that will tell you where your major runoff comes from.
And so in this case, we're looking at the length of a house
that is a hundred feet long,
and the width of the house is 20 feet long
in our example here, so you would just multiply
your length times your width and you get your square footage.
And then, because that was your whole house,
you're really only going to be looking at that quarter.
So you end up with 500 square feet of area
that drains into the rain garden.
Now you need to figure out your soil type.
What you can do is you can certainly take a soil sample
and send it to soil lab up in Marshfield, the UW Soil Lab,
but you can also do kind of a quick
and dirty measurement on your own.
So the thing with soil types
is that the higher the infiltration rate,
the higher that it soaks into the soil,
the smaller your rain garden needs to be.
But the, if you have a heavy clay soil,
it's going to hang around a lot longer.
So you need to make sure that that rain garden is big enough
to accommodate that water hanging around longer.
So if you had a sandy soil for example,
the infiltration rate on that
is about 2.5 inches of water per hour.
If you have a silty soil,
then you're looking at more like a half an inch an hour.
And if you're looking at a clay soil,
it can be 0.3 inches per hour.
So how are you gonna figure that out?
Well, so it's some things that you can do is
again, if the soil sample is the best way to do it,
sending to the soil lab, but you can also kind of get an idea
just by rubbing the soil between your fingers
like we used to do in the Soils 101 course that I took.
If the soil feels kind of gritty and coarse,
then it's probably a sandy soil.
If it feels kind of silky and smooth, but not sticky,
then it's probably a silty soil.
And if it's very sticky and clumpy
and when you rub your thumb against your finger,
the soil kind of forms a ribbon, then it might be a clay soil.
So those are all important things to know.
But again, the best thing to do
is have that soil analyzed at the UW Soils Lab.
One more thing that you can try and do
is run a what's called perc test,
a percolation test, to determine that infiltration rate.
And you can do that with a fancy item
that's called an infiltramator.
I never say that right, infiltramator.
And the, this particular piece of equipment
can be just as easily done with a coffee can
with the bottom cut out, or an inexpensive like,
ice cream bucket with the bottom cut out.
Basically, what you're trying to do
is to figure out how long it takes
for a specific amount of water to sink into your soil.
So you can do your test then
by digging a 6 to 12-inch-deep hole,
letting it fill with water,
letting it drain, and refilling it.
And the second time, that's when you time it
to see how far that water goes down.
So what you want to do is have a little measuring stick
in that hole so that you can measure
how many inches that water's gonna go down.
Okay.
So now we determine the size of your drainage area.
And you can see here from the photo,
we've got a rain garden, a couple of 'em
that we have the length and width figured out.
We have them sited.
In this example, it's less than 30 feet from the downspout.
And then there's another rain garden
lower in the picture that is closer to the downspout.
So if your rain garden is less than 30 feet,
there's gonna be a table on the next slide
that I'll show you, that's table one that you use.
And if it is more than 30 feet, then you use table two.
Okay, so here are table one and table two.
And what you're doing with this table
is you're taking the type of soil that you have,
and you're figuring out
how far your rain garden is going to be
from your drainage area.
And so based on that, this tells you how deep
you need to make your rain garden.
And so this is kind of a good guide to use.
So for example, if your drainage area for,
think about that roof that we were looking at,
500 square feet, and let's say we had a silty soil
and it is less than 30 feet from the downspout.
Then you have 125 square foot rain garden.
And another example in the same, less than 30 feet,
if you have a clay soil, then you can see how much bigger
you need to make that rain garden
to accommodate all of that runoff
that's gonna be hanging around longer
because your soil is more clay.
So then your rain garden is gonna be
a balance between how big your drainage area is,
what your slope is, and we're gonna talk about that next,
and what your soil type is.
So that will help you figure out your desired size.
So here's a slope.
Now, you can figure out your slope really easily
by using a stake and a string, pretty, pretty low tech here.
So what you're doing here,
you can see in the photo that we've got a 5% slope.
They measured it over a 10 foot area,
and it's just the figuring out the rise over the run.
And so you can see here, we have,
you've got the string stretched straight across.
And once you figure out what your slope is,
then you figure out where you need to do your digging.
So now we'll talk about the really fun part,
which is the rain garden plants.
And rain garden plants need to be able to tolerate
both wet and dry conditions
because they're gonna obviously get both of that.
Rain garden plants are best
if they are ones that have a really deep root system.
So a lot of times, our native prairie
and savannah plants are used
because they produce really long root systems.
And they have to be plants that will tolerate adverse soil
because we know that a lot of our soils
are heavy, compacted clay, for example.
So I have written here
a few different sites that you can go to
that will give you some examples of different rain garden plants.
However, I am gonna also talk about some of them.
In Dane County, we also have a cost share program
that you can find online that is Plant Dane.
And that one should help you with costs of rain gardens
in areas like school gardens.
So here's an example of what this might look like.
You can see the downspout,
and we've got the rain garden situated 10 feet away
from the foundation.
And in this case, less than 30 feet from the drainage area,
which is the downspout.
And you can see the uphill part and the downhill part.
Now, you need to build a berm if it's on a slope
with a downhill part,
because that's where it needs to be highest
so that your water doesn't spill out.
Now, some people like to put in a little drainage area,
a little kind of escape valve,
just in case it does get filled up
so that it doesn't spill over but goes directely where you,
where you're wanting it to go.
So that berm is really important then on the downhill part.
Okay, so some rain garden plants then.
We have one of my favorites,
one of my favorite types of milkweed, Swamp Milkweed.
It's a fairly tall plant, but you can, you can pinch it back
in usually June, and that will help keep it a little bit,
little bit shorter and a little bit denser
and more branched.
But this is a great one for milkweeds.
And if you are gonna pinch it back,
I would do it as early as you can in June.
But this is not like the common milkweed
that runs all over the place.
This one grows in a clump.
Now, certainly milkweeds do produce seeds.
So you need to be careful to take
some of those seed heads away
if you're starting to get a lot of seedlings.
There are all kinds of different native sedges
that you can use.
Sedges are grass-looking type plants.
They're not actually grasses, but they appear like grasses.
But they are suited really well to growing in wet areas.
So Bristly Sedge,
you can see it has a really cool seed head on it.
So that's one reason I like this one.
It's also, you know, fairly, as far as sedges go,
a petite plant in that it doesn't get much taller
than one to two feet.
That one's also a clumper.
And then Rose Turtlehead.
This is called Turtlehead because supposedly
the flowers are the shape of a turtle's head
if turtles were pink.
And this is a great plant that grows natively
in wet prairie areas.
And it will also though take regular soil moisture.
So it's a great plant to use in rain gardens.
It's very sturdy.
And a cool thing is that it blooms in September
when most other things are done blooming.
And so it's really nice to have that extra color
at the end of the year on something that isn't an aster.
Really nice, glossy leaves as well.
Now this does tend to spread and form colonies.
So if it starts to overwhelm your other plants
in the rain garden, you may need to
do a little bit of division and take some of it out.
Then, Joe-Pye weed.
This is one of our natives.
Now, our native gets to be six to eight,
even maybe taller feet tall.
So a lot of people don't like to grow that one
just because it gets so massive.
So I've got a solution for that.
It's a dwarf Joe-Pye weed,
and this one usually grows about four to six feet.
There are a few different varieties.
The one we have in our teaching garden is called Phantom.
They all look very similar to the native variety,
but again, they're just a little bit shorter,
and the butterflies love them.
So they're a really great plant to put in your rain garden.
Rattlesnake master.
Now this is another cool native Wisconsin plant,
and you'll notice that it's zone three.
So even those of you in the top part of the state
can grow this plant,
and you'll see that it has the flowers
and the seed heads look very, very similar.
And it's called Rattlesnake master because
when the seeds are ripe,
they rattle around in that seed head.
So it's actually, the species name is yuccifolium
because the leaves look somewhat like yucca leaves,
but it's three to four feet tall
and a really nice rain garden plant as well.
And it, a lot of these are gonna bloom in like July
or August, but this one,
because the seed head looks the same as the flowers,
is going to have more bang for your buck
'cause it looks great for a long period of time.
Many different species of a liatris
will work well in your rain garden.
You just need to make sure that it isn't one of the species
that likes to grow in sandy prairie soils.
You need to have one that is going to better tolerate
being periodically flooded in your rain garden.
So Rough Blazingstar, Liatris aspera is one of those.
And again, it's a great magnet for butterflies.
When this blooms in the teaching garden,
we see butterflies all over the place.
So this one has a really long bloom period as well.
Now if you have more shady area,
you might want to look at this native plant,
which is Great Blue Lobelia, and you can see
it's got really lovely blue flowers in a spike.
This is zone four too.
So most areas of the state can grow it.
And it's not too tall, but it's more than a foot tall.
So most of these plants of course
are gonna be between two to four feet tall.
And this one works really well for rain gardens.
You can grow all kinds of prairie grasses in rain gardens,
but Little Bluestem is particularly well-adapted.
So that's the one that I usually recommend.
It is a bit smaller than some of our others
and it is a clumper,
unlike something like Big Bluestem, which forms a sod,
and that one would probably tend to take over
your rain garden.
Little Bluestem is a little bit less aggressive,
and some people like to put it around the edge of the berm.
So this would be one of the plants that needs less water,
so it's a good place to put it around the edge.
A lot of the nativars,
which are, they're still are a native species,
but they've been cultivated for deeper color
or to be a little bit shorter
or have better fall color, something like that.
So there are a number of nativars that you will find
in the garden centers and nurseries.
Then Short's Aster,
a lot of different asters of course are great plants
for rain gardens.
I like this one because it's a little bit less tall
than some of the others.
Some of the others get up to five feet,
but this one does really well in rain gardens
and is, it's got kind of an arching habit to it.
So it's got kind of this informal look as well,
and it just is covered with flowers when it blooms.
So really nice one.
And then one of the taller ones, again, is Hoary Vervain,
beautiful purple flowers.
And this one is again, a little bit later bloomer
into the season, but it starts earlier in the season too.
So it has a really long bloom period,
and who doesn't like that on a plant?
And this one also attracts butterflies.
So your rain garden can be a great place for pollinators
as well as making sure that
it captures rainwater on your property.
So here's just an example of what this might look like
from start to finish.
Roger Bannerman wrote a really great publication
on rain gardens that you can still find,
I think on the DNR website, and it's...
it is based on what he did in his own yard.
So I'm gonna show you a little bit of his yard
and a little bit of what we did
in the Dane County teaching garden.
So you can see here, he killed the grass
around where his downspout is.
And of course, the first thing that you need to do
before you even stick a shovel in the soil
is call Diggers Hotline.
And make sure before you even start
designing your rain garden
that there aren't any underground utilities
in the area that you're wanting to dig in.
That's really important.
So you want to make sure that your rain garden
is sited properly for underground utilities.
So again, you can kind of see
in the middle right part of the slide is the downspout,
and he's digging out his rain garden here
and he's actually using some plastic edging
around the end of it.
Now, you don't have to use that heavy of equipment
if you don't want to,
but his was a fairly small rain garden there
and he needed to dig it a little bit deeper
because it was smaller.
This rain garden's a little bit bigger
and you see there's even sort of a dry stream bed
sort of thing with rocks that he's put in
to help facilitate the drainage into the rain garden.
But this one is a little bit bigger,
and you can see he's got some straw there along
where the berm is going to be around the lower edge,
and you can see it also mounded up there
against the back side.
So with the Dane County Extension teaching garden,
rain garden, you can check that out online.
This was back when we put it in, in 2007,
and we had, luckily one of the master gardeners
was also a landscaper.
And so he helped to figure out the elevations
and to put in the, figure out the slope.
And we had one of our people from parks
in the building figure out
how big the drainage area was going to be.
So I gotta tell you, the soil was really crummy there.
We actually had to use a Bobcat to dig that thing out.
It was, the clay was so compacted, but we got it done.
We put a plant every square foot.
That's what the strings are for there.
And even though the soil was really crummy,
those prairie plants did an excellent job.
And so now we have a very beautiful rain garden.
One of the master gardeners, Jane Graham
and Diane Amundson care for that rain garden
along with their team.
And it is full of prairie plants and looks absolutely gorgeous.
So just a quick review then of the construction steps.
You need to figure out the size
and the location of your rain garden.
Remember to call Diggers Hotline.
And then you design your shape.
Usually a rounded, natural-looking shape.
Not anything with any sharp edges is recommended,
and it should be bermed up on the downhill side
or along the edges wherever it's sloped
so that the water is retained.
And if you live in a designed community,
you may need to consult the rules
of your design community
to see if you can actually put a rain garden in.
And it's not a bad idea to talk about rain gardens
with your neighbors so that they understand
what you're putting in.
And maybe they'll be inspired to put one in themselves.
So don't forget that Diggers Hotline step.
One thing that neighbors sometimes are concerned about
are mosquitoes.
And that's, you know, an understandable concern.
So if the rain garden is well-sited and designed
and drains away in no more than five days,
mosquitoes don't have time to complete their life cycle.
So that should be fine, and you're not actually
creating a mosquito breeding facility.
And also another thing to think about and tell people
is that mosquitoes that carry the most diseases
don't usually live in ponds.
They actually are going to live in small, cavity-type areas.
So I've got some resources there for you to take a look at,
and I want to thank all the people that provided photos
and input into this presentation.
And I thank you so much for listening today
and for your interest in rain gardens.
>> HI.
I'M BEN FUTA, HOST OF "LET'S
GROW STUFF."
WE JUST FINISHED LEARNING ABOUT
HOW TO CREATE OUR OWN RAIN
GARDEN.
LISA IS JOINING US NOW LIVE.
YOU CAN KEEP ASKING QUESTIONS
HERE AS WE'RE CHATTING NO MATTER
WHERE YOU'RE WATCHING.
AND ALSO DON'T FORGET THAT THIS
PRESENTATION IS RECORDED AND
WILL BE AVAILABLE TO WATCH
LATER.
SO IF YOU HAVE QUESTIONS ABOUT
PLANTS OR OTHER RESOURCES,
YOU'LL BE ABLE TO GO BACK AND
REVIEW THIS PRESENTATION FOR
FREE ANYTIME, EITHER ONLINE AT
gardenexpo.org/schedule OR ANY
OF THE OTHER PLATFORMS WHERE YOU
MIGHT BE WATCHING.
SO WITH THAT, LISA, THANK YOU SO
MUCH FOR JOINING US TODAY.
WE APPRECIATE IT.
>> THANKS FOR HAVING ME.
>> WE'LL JUST GO AHEAD AND JUMP
RIGHT IN.
ONE OF OUR FIRST QUESTIONS
COMING IN FROM A FEW VIEWERS IS
DOES THE SOURCE OF THE WATER
MATTER?
IF IT'S A SUMP PUMP DRAIN OR
PARKING LOT DRAIN VERSUS A ROOF,
DOES THAT MAKE ANY DIFFERENCE?
>> NO.
THAT WON'T MAKE MUCH OF A
DIFFERENCE AT ALL.
>> EXCELLENT.
THAT'S GREAT TO HEAR.
>> PRETTY QUICK ANSWER.
>> THAT'S NOT A BAD THING AT
ALL.
AND KIM IS WONDERING, SO YOU
MENTIONED THE TEACHING GARDEN
AND SHE'S CURIOUS, AGAIN, WHERE
THAT'S LOCATED BUT ALSO IS THE
PUBLIC WELCOME TO VISIT.
IS THAT SOMETHING THAT'S OPEN
FOR FOLKS TO VISIT?
>> ABSOLUTELY.
YES.
THE TEACHING GARDEN IS
DEFINITELY OPEN FOR FOLKS TO
VISIT.
IN FACT, YOU CAN EVEN TAKE A
KIND OF VIRTUAL TOUR OF IT RIGHT
NOW IN THE MIDDLE OF WINTER BY
GOING TO THE DANE COUNTY
EXTENSION WEBSITE.
IF YOU JUST PUT INTO YOUR
BROWSER DANE COUNTY EXTENSION.
AND WHEN IT COMES UP, THERE IS A
TAB THAT SAYS TEACHING GARDEN.
AND IT GIVES YOU A LIST OF ALL
THE 12 DIFFERENT GARDEN AREAS
AND THE PLANTS THAT ARE IN IT.
AND IF YOU CLICK ON THE GARDEN
AREA, IT WILL SHOW YOU EACH
PLANT AND ALL ITS VITAL
STATISTICS, WHEN IT BLOOMS, HOW
TALL IT GETS AND LOTS OF HANDY
THINGS LIKE THAT.
WE ARE ON THE EAST SIDE OF
MADISON JUST OFF OF STOUGHTON
ROAD AND CLOSE TO -- WELL, VERY
CLOSE TO AGRICULTURE DRIVE.
>> PERFECT.
SO TERESA FROM BLACK CREEK IS
WONDERING, SHE KNOWS THERE'S
SOME COMMUNITIES OUT WEST THAT
HAVE RESTRICTIONS THAT PREVENT
THE COLLECTION OF RAINWATER OR
THINGS LIKE THAT.
ARE YOU AWARE OF ANYTHING IN
THIS AREA THAT PEOPLE WOULD NEED
TO BE MINDFUL OF IN THAT REGARD?
>> I'M NOT AWARE OF ANYTHING IN
THIS AREA THAT WOULD BE A
PROBLEM, BUT I DID MENTION FOR
SOME DESIGNED COMMUNITIES THAT
YOU MIGHT HAVE TO ASK PERMISSION
ABOUT PUTTING ONE IN.
AND CERTAINLY IF YOU WERE DOING
ANYTHING ON PUBLIC PROPERTY,
WHICH WOULD INCLUDE THE TERRACE
IN FRONT OF YOUR HOUSE, SOME
COMMUNITIES DO ACTUALLY ALLOW
RAIN GARDENS IN TERRACES, BUT
IT'S SOMETHING YOU'D HAVE TO ASK
PERMISSION FOR.
>> SO ONE OF OUR VIEWERS IS
WONDERING HOW DO RAIN GARDENS
HANDLE DROUGHT IF WE HAVE A
PROLONGED STRETCH WITH NO RAIN.
SHOULD WE PLAN TO TAKE ANY EXTRA
STEPS TO CARE FOR THESE PLANTS
IN THOSE DRYER MOMENTS?
>> SURE.
THAT'S A GREAT QUESTION.
MOST OF THE RAIN GARDEN PLANTS
WE CHOOSE BECAUSE THEY ARE ABLE
TO HANDLE BOTH DROUGHTY
CONDITIONS AND BEING FLOODED
PERIODICALLY.
SO IF THEY ARE MOSTLY NATIVE
PRAIRIE PLANTS, THAT SHOULDN'T
BE AN ISSUE.
HOWEVER, THE FIRST COUPLE OF
YEARS WHILE THEY ARE GETTING
ESTABLISHED, YOU PROBABLY WILL
WANT TO MAKE SURE THAT THEY GET
AT LEAST AN INCH OF WATER A
WEEK.
>> SO YOU TALKED ABOUT SOIL AND
KNOWING YOUR SOIL PROFILE BEFORE
YOU REALLY GET STARTED.
SHOULD WE THINK ABOUT AMENDING
SOIL IN ANY WAY?
ARE RAIN GARDENS SOMETHING THAT
WE WANT TO CHANGE OUR SOIL
BEFORE WE PLANT OR REALLY JUST
BEST TO WORK WITH WHAT WE HAVE?
>> YEAH.
YOU SHOULD DEFINITELY WORK WITH
WHAT YOU HAVE.
ONE OF THE GREAT THINGS THAT
PRAIRIE PLANTS CAN DO WITH RAIN
GARDENS IS CREATE THESE CHANNELS
FOR INFILTRATION BECAUSE THEY
HAVE SUCH POWERFUL ROOT SYSTEMS.
AS THEY BECOME ESTABLISHED OVER
TIME, THE RAIN GARDEN WILL
BECOME MORE AND MORE FUNCTIONAL.
WE STARTED OUR RAIN GARDEN WITH
LITTLE TINY PLUGS BECAUSE WE GOT
SOME DONATIONS.
IT WAS ALSO A LOT MORE
FINANCIALLY FEASIBLE.
SO IT TOOK A FEW YEARS BEFORE
THE RAIN GARDEN REALLY GOT INTO
ITS OWN.
AND THE FIRST TWO YEARS YOU DO
HAVE TO DO A LOT OF VIGILANT
WEEDING, ESPECIALLY IF YOU'RE
STARTING WITH SMALL PLUGS.
>> SUSAN HAS A QUESTION ABOUT
GETTING THE RAIN GARDEN AND
DOWNSPOUT CONNECTION WORKING.
AT THE END OF HER DOWNSPOUT
EXTENSION DOES SHE NEED TO DIG A
DITCH OR LINE IT WITH GRAVEL TO
REACH THAT TEN-FOOT DISTANCE OR
COULD IT JUST SORT OF RUN
THROUGH THE GRASS?
WHAT WOULD YOU RECOMMEND FOR
THAT?
>> THAT'S A REALLY GOOD
QUESTION.
IT'S PARTLY GOING TO DEPEND ON
YOUR SITUATION.
WHAT SOME PEOPLE WILL DO IS
THEY'LL RUN A PIPE UNDERGROUND.
YOU CAN CERTAINLY MAKE A DRY
CREEK BED BY CREATING KIND OF A
SMALL DITCH.
I SHOULDN'T REALLY USE THE WORD
DITCH BECAUSE I THINK OF THAT AS
BEING MUCH BIGGER, BUT A
DEPRESSION THAT LEADS DOWN INTO
THE RAIN GARDEN AND LINE THAT
WITH ROCKS.
THAT WILL HELP CHANNEL THE FLOW
AND HELP SLOW IT DOWN A LITTLE
BIT AND I GUESS I WOULDN'T JUST
LEAVE IT IN GRASS BECAUSE PART
OF THE REASON YOU'RE PUTTING IN
YOUR RAIN GARDEN IS TO PREVENT
EROSION, RIGHT?
AND IF YOU JUST LEAVE IT IN
GRASS, YOU MIGHT STILL END UP
WITH SOME PROBLEMS THAT WAY,
ESPECIALLY IF IT'S DOWNHILL.
>> TOTALLY.
SO KAREN IS WONDERING IS THERE A
DIFFERENCE BETWEEN A RAIN GARDEN
AND A SWALE?
>> WELL, YES.
A SWALE IS MOSTLY PLANTED WITH
GRASSES, AND IT STILL HAS THE
SAME KIND OF GOAL IN CHANNELING
WATER.
WE HAVE -- WHAT WE DID WITH OUR
RAIN GARDEN AT THE TEACHING
GARDEN IS IT ACTUALLY WAS A
SWALE.
AND SO IT WAS DESIGNED TO KIND
OF CHANNEL OFF THE WATER INTO A
DITCH AREA.
SO WE JUST DUG IT OUT A LITTLE
BIT AND HAD A BERM SO THAT WE
WERE ABLE TO PATCH THROUGH THE
WATER THAT CAME THROUGH THAT
SOIL.
AND THE RAIN GARDEN -- SORRY.
SO THEN A RAIN GARDEN WOULD BE
ONE THAT IS DELIBERATELY PLANTED
WITH A NUMBER OF SPECIES THAT
HELP TO CATCH THE WATER AND TO
ALLOW BETTER INFILTRATION INTO
THE SOIL.
>> SO THAT'S A GREAT SEGUE TO A
QUESTION FROM SUE.
SHE SAYS IT SOUNDS LIKE SHE HAS
AN ESTABLISHED SWAMP SOIL WITH
LOTS OF GRASSES, BUT WANTS TO
ADD COLOR AND FLOWERS.
CAN SHE ADD PLANTS TO THIS MORE
GRASSY AREA?
>> IT DEPENDS ON THE TYPE OF
GRASSES THAT YOU HAVE.
HOPEFULLY THEY'RE NATIVE GRASSES
AND NOT SOMETHING LIKE REED CA
CANARY GRASS.
THAT'S AN AGGRESSIVE SPECIES, SO
YOU MIGHT HAVE TROUBLE GETTING
THINGS ESTABLISHED.
SO I WOULD TRY AND FIND OUT WHAT
YOUR SPECIES MIX IS.
OFTEN THE GRASSES TEND TO BE
MORE AGGRESSIVE THAN FORBS
ANYWAY.
SO I WOULD SAY GIVE IT A SHOT,
BUT DON'T INVEST A LOT UNTIL YOU
SEE HOW WELL THEY COMPETE.
BECAUSE IT MAY BE THAT YOU NEED
TO DO SOMETHING IN THINNING OUT
THOSE GRASSES.
>> SO WE HAVE A FEW QUESTIONS
COMING IN ABOUT LONG TEMP
MAINTENANCE.
ARE THERE WAYS THAT WE SHOULD
PLAN TO MAINTAIN A RAIN GARDEN
DIFFERENTLY THAN A CONVENTIONAL
GARDEN SPACE?
>> MM-HMM.
SO IF YOU'RE OUT IN THE COUNTRY
SOMEWHERE OR YOU'RE SOMEPLACE
THAT YOU CAN BURN AND YOU'RE
USING PRAIRIE PLANTS IN YOUR
RAIN GARDENS, THAT WOULD BE A
GREAT LITTLE SPOT TO DO A
CONTROLLED BURN.
IF NOT, THEN THAT'S FINE, TOO.
JUST DO THE SAME THING THAW
WOULD DO WITH YOUR REGULAR
PERENNIAL GARDEN TO CUT THINGS
DOWN IN THE FALL OR IF YOU LIKE
TO LEAVE SEED HEADS UP FOR THE
BIRDS, DO IT IN THE SPRING.
WHAT WILL HAPPEN OVER TIME IS IF
YOU JUST LEAVE IT GO AND LEAVE
IT TO THE PLANTS TO DUKE IT OUT,
THE ONES THAT SEED MORE OR ARE
MORE AGGRESSIVE WILL BECOME THE
DOMINANT SPECIES.
SO IT'S UP TO YOU TO REFEREE TO
MAKE SURE EVERYBODY PLAYS NICE.
YOU SOME PLANTS THAT ARE MORE
AGGRESSIVE, SOME THAT AREN'T.
SO YOU JUST KIND OF DO SOME
SELECTIVE REMOVAL OF CERTAIN
THINGS.
I WOULD SAY, THOUGH, THAT,
AGAIN, THE FIRST FEW YEARS YOU
DO NEED TO BE PRETTY VIGILANT
ABOUT WEEDS.
BECAUSE YOU CAN END UP WITH A
WEEDY MESS IN YOUR GARDEN PRETTY
EASILY.
>> A WORD I ALWAYS LIKE TO GO
BACK TO.
EDIT.
ESPECIALLY AS THEY GET INVOLVED.
THERE ARE ALWAYS THOSE THINGS
THAT ARE JUST MAYBE A LITTLE
HAPPIER THAN OTHERS, DEPENDING
ON WHERE YOU'RE GROWING.
SO APRIL HAS A QUESTION ABOUT
PUTTING A RAIN GARDEN NEXT TO OR
IN AN AREA WHERE THERE'S SOME
TREE ROOTS AROUND AN ESTABLISHED
TREE.
IS THIS A GOOD IDEA OR SHOULD
SHE THINK ABOUT A DIFFERENT
SITE?
>> YOU MIGHT WANT TO THINK ABOUT
A DIFFERENT SITE DEPENDING ON
THE TYPE OF TREE.
IF IT'S AROUND A SILVER MAPLE,
YOU PROBABLY ARE GOING TO GET A
LOT OF SILVER MAPLE ROOTS ENDING
UP IN THAT RAIN GARDEN AND IT
MIGHT NOT BE VERY MUCH OF A
WATER COLLECTION FACILITY
BECAUSE SILVER MAPLES ARE JUST
WATER PIGS.
HOWEVER, SILVER MAPLES ARE A
RIVER BOTTOM SPECIES, SO THEY
ARE VERY USED TO THE FLOOD AND
NON-FLOOD SORTS OF STAGES.
OAKS ARE VERY SENSE SENSITIVE TO GRADE
CHANGES, SO I WOULDN'T WANT TO
DO THAT AROUND OAK.
>> DON'T DIG AROUND A SEPTIC
FIELD, BUT KARL WANTS TO KNOW IF
HE'S NOT DIGGING, COULD HE STILL
PLANT NATIVE PLANTS ON TOP
WITHOUT DIGGING TOO DEEP?
IS THAT OKAY?
>> YES.
THAT SHOULD BE OKAY IF YOU'RE
SEEDING, FOR EXAMPLE, OR PUTTING
SMALL PLUGS.
THAT SHOULDN'T AFFECT THAT AT
ALL.
NOW, YOU WANT TO BE CAREFUL
ABOUT SPECIES.
YOU PROBABLY WOULDN'T WANT TO
PUT IN A WILLOW OR SOMETHING
LIKE THAT.
BUT IF YOU WANTED TO PUT IN SOME
OF THE SPECIES WE'VE TALKED
ABOUT IN THE PRESENTATION, THAT
SHOULD BE FINE.
>> AND KAREN IS WONDERING, IS IT
OKAY TO MULCH A RAIN GARDEN?
IS THAT SOMETHING WE CAN DO OR
SHOULD DO WITH THIS TYPE OF
GARDENING?
>> THE FIRST COUPLE OF YEARS IT
DOESN'T HURT, BUT WHAT TENDS TO
HAPPEN IS IF YOU HAVE A FAIRLY
FAST FLOW, IS THAT THAT STUFF IS
GOING TO FLOAT.
SO IT MAY NOT BE PARTICULARLY
USEFUL.
BUT THE FIRST COUPLE OF YEARS
WHEN YOU'RE TRYING TO KEEP WEEDS
DOWN BEFORE THE PLANTS FILL IN,
IT'S NOT THE WORST IDEA.
THAT'S WHAT WE ENDED UP DOING
THE FIRST COUPLE OF YEARS,
BECAUSE WE WERE HAVING TROUBLE
KEEPING UP WITH THE WEEDS.
NOW, OF COURSE, THAT OUR RAIN
GARDEN IS MATURE AND I HAVE SUCH
AN AWESOME TEAM TAKING CARE OF
IT, THAT'S NOT SOMETHING THAT I
NEED TO WORRY ABOUT, IS HAVING
TO MULCH.
>> NOW, IF SOMEONE IS MAYBE
STARTING A RAIN GARDEN ON A
BUDGET, WOULD YOU ADVISE SOWING
SEEDS DIRECTLY, GIVEN THE NATURE
OF IT BEING A WATER-COLLECTING
SPACE OR ARE TRANSPLANTS THE WAY
TO GO, THINKING ABOUT SORT OF
THE BUDGET IN MIND.
>> CERTAINLY.
YOU COULD START YOUR SEEDS IF
YOU WANTED A LOT OF THESE
PLANTS, COULD BE STARTED WITH
THE WINTER SOWN METHOD, AND
THAT'S SOWN, WINTER SOWN.ORG.
AND AND THEN YOU WANT TO
TRANSPLANT BEFORE THE ROOT
SYSTEMS GET TOO BIG.
BUT I DON'T RECOMMEND USING
SEEDS IN A RAIN GARDEN BECAUSE
IF YOU GET SOME GULLY WASHERS,
ALL THE SEEDS ARE GOING TO GET
WASHED TOGETHER IN A BIG CLUMP
AND IT'S PROBABLY NOT GOING TO
BE VERY SUCCESSFUL.
SO I RECOMMEND TRANSPLANTS.
>> THAT'S A GREAT FOLLOW-UP
QUESTION TO MARY.
SHE HAS A FEW AREAS WHERE IT
WASHES OUT SOIL.
SO ARE THERE THINGS THAT FOLKS
CAN DO TO MAYBE TEMPORARILY
STABILIZE THESE AREAS AS
TRANSPLANTS ARE GETTING
ESTABLISHED?
>> THAT'S A REALLY EXCELLENT
QUESTION.
AND I WOULD TRY USING SOME RIVER
ROCK TYPE OF STUFF, AGAIN, TO
SLOW DOWN THAT FLOW AND PLANT
SOME OF YOUR TRANSPLANTS KIND OF
AMONG THOSE ROCKS SO THAT THE
ROOT SYSTEMS CAN GET GOING BUT
THEY DON'T WASH OUT SO EASILY.
>> SO SINCE RAIN GARDENS ARE
SORT OF UNIQUE ECOSYSTEMS, THEY
AREN'T IN OUR TRADITIONAL
LANDSCAPES, AS MORE PEOPLE START
TO GARDEN WITH RAIN GARDENS, CAN
THEY EXPECT TO SEE CHANGES IN
WILDLIFE, SOME THINGS TO LOOK
FORWARD TO?
>> THAT'S A GREAT QUESTION AS
WELL.
YOU'LL GET DRAGONFLIES.
YOU MIGHT GET TOADS.
YOU MIGHT GET SAL MANNED SALAMANDERS,
LEOPARD FROGS OR THINGS LIKE
THAT, DEPENDING ON THE SIZE OF
THE GARDEN.
YEAH.
YOU COULD CERTAINLY.
IF YOU'RE USING ANY KIND OF
NATIVE PLANTS, YOU'LL BE SEEING
A LOT OF BUTTERFLY SPECIES AS
WELL AS OTHER TYPES OF
POLLINATORS.
SO THEY'RE REALLY GREAT AT
SUPPORTING WILDLIFE AS WELL.
>> AND, AGAIN, MY PERSONAL
EXPERIENCE I CAN SHARE ALL OF
THOSE BENEFICIAL ORGANISMS YOU
MENTIONED BRING BENEFITS TO THE
REST OF OUR GARDEN.
TOADS WILL EAT SLUGS.
THERE ARE A LOT OF BENEFITS
BEYOND THE RAIN GARDEN ITSELF.
ALSO ON THAT NOTE, TOO, ARE
THERE HAPPY MOMENTS.
WE SORT OF TALKED ABOUT RAIN
GARDENS FROM A PRACTICAL
STANDPOINT, BUT ARE THERE OTHER
SIDE BENEFITS PEOPLE CAN LOOK
FORWARD TO, MAYBE GROWING
INTERESTING PLANTS THAT WE
WOULDN'T OTHERWISE BE ABLE TO
GROW OR OTHER BENEFITS WE CAN
LOOK FORWARD TO OVER TIME.
>> YOU KNOW, IF YOU CHOOSE YOUR
PLANT PALATE CAREFULLY, YOU CAN
HAVE COLOR IN IT ALL SEASON
LONG.
SO THERE'S ALWAYS GOING TO BE
SOMETHING TO ENJOY IN THE SPRING
AND IN THE SUMMER AND IN THE
FALL.
A LOT OF THESE SPECIES DO TEND
TO BLOOM MID-SUMMER, BUT THERE
ARE SOME THAT YOU CAN ALSO
CHOOSE THAT WILL BLOOM IN THE
EARLY PART OF THE YEAR.
I CAN TELL YOU, IT JUST REALLY
MAKES ME HAPPY TO SEE THE BUT
FER
BUTTERFLIES AND OTHER
POLLINATORS ENJOYING THE PLANTS.
SOME OF THESE FLOWERS MAKE VERY
NICE CUT FLOWERS AS WELL, SO YOU
CAN ENJOY THEM INSIDE AS WELL.
>> SO WE HAVE A QUESTION FROM
DAN HERE.
HE'S WONDERING CAN WE USE SHRUBS
AND WOODY PLANTS AS PART OF OUR
RAIN GARDEN?
>> CERTAINLY YOU COULD.
THERE ARE A NUMBER OF SHRUBS
THAT YOU MIGHT BE ABLE TO USE,
LIKE MAYBE NEW JERSEY TEA OR
POSSIBLY IF YOUR RAIN GARDEN IS
BIG ENOUGH TO ACCOMMODATE IT,
BUTTON BUSH WOULD BE ANOTHER
ONE.
ALSO WINTER BERRY HOLLY.
THAT'S ANOTHER NATIVE SHRUB THAT
ACTUALLY PRODUCES BERRIES IF YOU
HAVE BOTH THE MALE AND THE
FEMALE.
NOW, ALL OF THESE ARE DECENT
SIZE, SO YOU WOULD NEED TO MAKE
SURE THAT YOUR RAIN GARDEN IS
BIG ENOUGH TO ACCOMMODATE THEM.
>> SO A QUESTION FROM JODY.
SHE DOESN'T HAVE A DOWNSPOUT OR
MAYBE NOT GUTTERS ON THE HOUSE.
IS THERE ANOTHER OPTION THAT SHE
COULD THINK ABOUT, OTHER PLACES
TO LOOK TO FIND THE WATER SHE
NEEDS?
>> SURE.
ANY LOW SPOT IN YOUR YARD SHOULD
WORK FOR THAT, WHERE YOU ALREADY
HAVE A LITTLE BIT OF THAT GOING.
BUT YOU DON'T WANT A PLACE WHERE
WATER SITS FOR A LONG PERIOD OF
TIME, BECAUSE THAT'S KIND OF A
RED FLAG THAT IT DOESN'T DRAIN
WELL ENOUGH HERE.
ON THE OTHER HAND, OUR RAIN
GARDEN AT THE TEACHING GARDEN I
TOLD YOU ABOUT OUR STRUGGLE TO
ACTUALLY DIG IT OUT AND WE HAD
TO GET A DARN BOBCAT OR WE'D
STILL BE OUT THERE WITH PICK
AXES.
IT DID.
IT TOOK THE PLANTS ABOUT THREE
YEARS TO START TO GET
ESTABLISHED.
I WAS WORRIED THESE POOR LITTLE
TENDER THINGS WEREN'T GOING TO
MAKE IT BECAUSE THEY WERE SO
SMALL WITH THAT HEAVY, HEAVY
CLAY.
BUT THEY DID.
AND THEY INFILL INFILTRATED VERY
NICELY.
THEY'RE VERY DETERMINED PRAIRIE
PLANTS.
SO I THINK YOU COULD PROBABLY
FIND THAT SOMEWHERE ON YOUR
PROPERTY.
HEAVILY-SLOPED AREAS, THOUGH,
THAT ARE REALLY STRONG SLOPES
ARE MAYBE NOT THE BEST AREA
BECAUSE THEN YOU'RE JUST
ENCOURAGING MORE RUNOFF.
YOU MIGHT NEED TO DO SOME ACTUAL
GRADING TO ACCOMMODATE THAT KIND
OF PROBLEM.
>> SO FROM A FUNCTIONAL
PERSPECTIVE, SO, AGAIN, IF WE'RE
LOOKING AT INFILTRATION RATE,
WILL OUR RAIN GARDENS CHANGE
OVER TIME, SAY AS PLANTS GET
ESTABLISHED AND BUILD ROOT
SYSTEMS?
CAN WE EXPECT TO SEE THE RATE OF
INFILTRATION CHANGE OR THINGS
LIKE THAT?
>> YES.
GOOD QUESTION.
AND, YES, THE RATE OF
INFILTRATION DOES DEFINITELY
CHANGE OVER TIME, ESPECIALLY IF
YOUR PLANTS WHEN YOU PUT THEM IN
ARE FAIRLY SMALL.
THE RAIN IS GOING TO STAY IN
THAT RAIN GARDEN AREA FOR A FEW
DAYS LONGER THAN IT WILL ONCE
THE GARDEN GETS ESTABLISHED AND
YOU GET MORE PLANT ROOTS GOING
THERE.
>> WELL, LISA, WE'RE COMING INTO
OUR FINAL MINUTES HERE, BUT WE
COVERED A LOT OF EXCELLENT
INFORMATION.
WHERE CAN FOLKS GO?
YOU SHARED SOME RESOURCES AT THE
END OF YOUR PRESENTATION, BUT
WHERE CAN THEY FIND YOU AND
REACH OUT WITH QUESTIONS OR
OTHER GENERAL RESOURCES YOU'D
LIKE TO SHARE?
>> SURE.
THERE IS -- IF YOU TYPE INTO
YOUR BROWSER SOUTHEAST WISCONSIN
RAIN GARDENS, THERE IS AN
EXTENSION WEBSITE THAT I JUST
CAME ACROSS RECENTLY THAT I WAS
KIND OF SURPRISED I DIDN'T KNOW
ABOUT, BUT IT'S FAIRLY
COMPREHENSIVE, AN EXTENSION
RESEARCH IN THE SOUTHEAST PART
OF THE STATE.
AND IT HAS EVERYTHING FROM A
LIST OF PLANTS TO OTHER
RESOURCES THAT YOU CAN USE.
AND IF YOU'RE WANTING TO GET
AHOLD OF ME, I'M FAIRLY EASY TO
FIND.
I'M AT THE DANE COUNTY EXTENSION
OFFICE AND YOU CAN SEND ME AN
EMAIL, WHICH IS PROBABLY THE
EASIEST WAY TO REACH ME RIGHT
NOW, BUT YOU CAN ALSO LEAVE
PHONE MESSAGES.
>> LISA, THANK YOU SO MUCH AGAIN
FOR JOINING US.
STEERCHSTEPHEN APPRECIATES YOU SHARING
YOUR KNOWLEDGE WITH ALL OF US.
THANK YOU FOR BEING ABOUT US.
>> THANKS, BEN.
APPRECIATE THAT.
>> WELL, WE'RE ENTERING THE
FINAL STRETCH, BUT THERE IS
STILL MORE COMING UP FOR
EVERYONE TO ENJOY AND LEARN.
RIGHT AFTER THIS OUR EXHIBITOR
BOOTHS WILL CONTINUE LIVE
STREAMING.
WE HAVE MORE EPISODES OF
WISCONSIN GARDEN GARDENER COMING YOUR
WAY AND A SEGMENT ABOUT JUMPING
WORMS.
IF YOU HAVE IDEAS FOR WHAT WE
HAVE COVER IN FUFT FUTURE EPISODES,
DROP US A LIEFNLT YOU NEVER
KNOW.
YOUR IDEA MIGHT MAKE IT INTO ONE
OF OUR SHOWS THIS YEAR.
THANK YOU ALL SO MUCH FOR
JOINING USMENT PLEASE STICK
AROUND AND WE'LL SEE YOU SOON.