In April 1926, following the first Board of Trustees meeting at Blaksley Botanic Garden (renamed Santa Barbara Botanic Garden in 1939), a leaflet was published to announce the inception of a new garden to the community. It noted that the donation of 15 acres (6 hectares) in Mission Canyon from Anna Dorinda Blaksley Bliss “makes possible the realization of dreams and plans that lovers of plants have cherished in Santa Barbara.” 

What strikes me about that sentence is its humility. It does not describe a finished institution or a guaranteed success. With 15 acres and a vision, Mrs. Bliss founded the first botanic garden in the United States devoted exclusively to native plants. She could not have known that this gift, in honor of her father, would grow from those first acres into 78 (31.5 hectares), or that a garden tucked into Mission Canyon would one day influence conservation across the central coast.

But that is the nature of generosity. What begins with an idea can grow into something transformative.

In 1926, pioneering ecologist Dr. Frederic Clements set out to create a garden that would celebrate California’s remarkable plant life. It’s unlikely he could have imagined that nearly a century later, his vision would evolve into a dynamic living laboratory powered by a team of over 20 scientists, including a dedicated ecology team. Today, their work explores the complex relationships among native plants, pollinators, beneficial insects, birds, and terrestrial invertebrates — strengthening food webs, building fire resilience, conserving water, and restoring ecosystems.

Under Dr. Katherine K. Muller’s leadership from 1950 to 1973, the Garden strengthened its identity as a place where research and education meet. That legacy lives every day. Thousands of schoolchildren walk our trails each year, many encountering native landscapes for the first time. Through our Museums for All partnership, families of all economic backgrounds can experience the Garden, ensuring that a connection to nature is not a privilege but a shared opportunity. Just last year, over 3,000 individuals were welcomed to the Garden through this program. This is noteworthy because the children exploring here today are the conservation leaders of tomorrow.

And behind the scenes at the Garden today, thanks to ongoing generosity and support, there’s even more happening.

In our Clifton Smith Herbarium, more than 230,000 preserved plant specimens, some dating back to the 1800s, quietly tell the story of California’s changing landscape. Together, they form an irreplaceable scientific record used by researchers around the world to understand how plant populations are shifting in response to climate change. What may look like a single pressed plant is, in truth, a data point in a 150-year timeline of change. It is how we measure loss, guide restoration, and prepare for what comes next.

Beyond the Garden grounds, our work continues to expand. Through our Landscape Transformation Project, native plant demonstrations take root from Elings Park to the Cuyama Valley. We are partnering with communities, farmers, businesses, and policymakers to increase biodiversity, conserve water, and strengthen climate resilience across our region.

Just as it began with a generous gift in 1926, the Garden’s work today continues because of supporters like you. 

While admission fees and memberships help open our gates each day, it is philanthropy that makes our conservation, research, and education programs possible. Here’s what your gift today enables the Garden to do:

• Protect endangered species before it’s too late
• Welcome school groups and families who might not otherwise experience nature
• Maintain irreplaceable seed collections and herbarium specimens
• Conduct cutting-edge research on plant-wildlife relationships and ecosystem restoration
• Train landscaping professionals to care for native plants in private spaces
• Partner with communities, businesses, farmers, and policymakers to create measurable conservation impacts across our region 
• Grow the native plant movement to spread our impact farther and faster with the help of our community

As we celebrate the Garden’s centennial, I invite you to see your support as a continuation of the generosity of our original visionaries—and recognition that aspirational ideas can become reality. Because a small group of believers invested in an idea 100 years ago, we now steward 78 acres, advance globally relevant research, educate thousands of children, and help shape a more resilient California landscape.

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In September 2025, I was sitting in a quiet campground in Crawford Notch, New Hampshire reading. As the acorns of red oak (Quercus rubra) bounced off my head, I realized how fitting it was that the book was Elspeth Hay’s recently released Feed Us with Trees. Acorns and their suitability as a food crop was the starting point that launched Elspeth, writer and host of The Local Food Report—a weekly feature that has aired on Cape Cod’s NPR Station since 2008—into researching the fading history of a time when humans harvested food in synergy with the land, rather than in competition with it.

Elspeth’s introduction to acorns as a food crop started in 2019 when she watched “Acorn Ambassador” Marcie Mayer’s TEDx Talk on eating acorns. To her surprise, she learned something as abundant as oak (Quercus spp.), which can be found everywhere from forests to parking lots, could provide nutrition. Acorns have been valued for centuries. With proper preparation to reduce bitterness and enhance flavor, they are now considered a source of antioxidants and are even used as a gluten free flour. For many of us in the Northeastern United States, oaks are abundant. They can be found across many of our distinct forest types, and are a keystone species that the entire ecosystem relies on.

Throughout Feed Us With Trees, Elspeth connects with individuals who not only still eat acorns, but have a deep-rooted cultural history with them as a food crop. People like Ron Reed, a medicine man in the Karuk tribe of what is now known as the Klamath Mountains in northern California. As readers, we learn about the Karuk tribe’s cultural history attached to acorns and how culturally prescribed fire shaped the forest for both their dietary needs as humans and the ecosystem as a whole.

Soon after learning about trees being able to produce viable food crops, Elspeth learned of another ecologically-minded farming practice—agroforestry. Agroforestry, or permaculture, is becoming an increasingly popular growing style as more people look for ways to grow food sustainably and in partnership with nature. There is plenty of evidence now to show that “intensive agriculture” has downstream effects on the ecosystem, including fertilizer runoff into waterways, soil erosion, and pesticide use that degrades the landscape. In the early chapters of Feed Us With Trees, Elspeth has the opportunity to meet legendary permaculture farmer, Mark Sheppard. A Massachusetts native and author of Restoration Agriculture, Mark’s book is an inspiration for many. His nursery, New Forest Farm, LLC located in the driftless area of Southwestern Wisconsin, provides many other farms with cultivated varieties of species—like chestnut (Castanea spp.) and hazelnut (Corylus spp.)—that the farm has researched over the past 20 years. Mark is one of the modern-day leaders of tree focused agriculture. The concept of restoration agriculture, a term he coined, is really just a way to grow food crops that mimics the natural ecological process seen in nature. For Mark, this was primarily the “Oak Savanna” ecosystem.

As she learned about oak savanna through Mark and the Karuk tribe, Elspeth was introduced to yet another important ecological concept. This time it was cultural fire. Fire has been used for thousands of years to help manage ecosystems, to better suit humans and their needs, and the ecosystem as a whole. For the Karuk, cultural fire in the oak savannas would help reduce the amount of weevil damaged acorns and increase regeneration. In addition to the weevil benefit, there was an ecological impact as well. Oak savanna is a globally rare fire adapted ecosystem, meaning that the species present require fire in order to thrive. Suppression of cultural fire, and natural fire events has caused many of these specially adapted ecosystems to fade away

For us in the Northeast, we have our own version of special fire adapted communities. In Massachusetts, we have Pitch Pine-Scrub Oak Communities, an S2 imperiled community. As a Massachusetts outer cape native, Elspeth had rare fire adapted ecosystems right in her backyard. As she concludes the book, Elspeth talks of her time learning about prescribed fire with Dave Crary, the long-serving Fire Management Officer of the Cape Cod National Seashore, and goes through the process of passing all of the classes required to participate in prescribed burns in Massachusetts.

Interwoven throughout the book we get to experience the learning process with Elspeth. From learning the acorns are a viable food crop and the history of intensive cereal grain farming, to how we arrived at “modern” agriculture and all the way to when she was wielding a drip torch and helping preserve rare fire adapted ecosystems. In her final words, Elspeth reflects on the state of agriculture and ecosystems today, leaving us with something to consider, “the world is on fire, yes. But we are the fire animal…we are not a plague, we are a keystone species.”

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According to a three-year trial conducted by Mt. Cuba Center, Solidago, commonly known as goldenrod, are adaptable native plants that provide beauty and ecological value to almost any garden. Goldenrods native to the eastern temperate forest region of North America can be found growing in a wide range of habitats including woodlands, rocky cliffs, bogs, and coastal sand dunes. Mt. Cuba Center’s trial evaluated 70 types of Solidago, including 50 distinct species as well as cultivars and ecotypes native to the eastern United States. The evaluated plants included goldenrods that were commercially available, wild-origin collections of commonly available species, and additional speciesthat are relatively obscure and rarely cultivated. “Goldenrods can be found in just about every corner and habitat of the Eastern Temperate Forest Region and thanks to that diversity in the wild, there truly is a goldenrod for every garden and landscape” says Sam Hoadley, Mt. Cuba’s manager of horticultural research. Results are available now in the new report, Solidago for the Mid-Atlantic Region.

Goldenrods are incredibly diverse in form and habit, and many are highly ornamental with beautiful floral displays and even fall color. Most species bloom in late summer and fall with yellow composite flowerheads consisting of both ray and disc florets. As keystone species, these plants are not only beautiful, but goldenrods are also incredibly important for supporting biodiversity. Plants in the Solidago genus are the host plants for caterpillars of over 100 different species of butterflies and moths, and the pollen and nectar are important sources of nutrition for insects such as monarch butterflies and bumblebees late in the season. The trial highlights the incredible beauty and wildlife value of the Solidago species and cultivars that thrive in average garden conditions in the mid-Atlantic region.

The Trial Garden team ranked the goldenrod species and cultivars growing in full sun based on plant vigor, foliage, form, habit, floral display, and disease resistance to determine top performers. The cultivar, Solidago rugosa ‘Fireworks’ was the highest-scoring goldenrod in the trial, with sturdy, upright stems and a spectacular fall floral display. Additionally, some lesser-known species not previously in cultivation, such as S. fistulosa (pine barrens goldenrod), proved to be top performers, and thanks to our collaboration with Pinelands Nursery, will be available to purchase. You can find the full list of top performers below, with photos and additional information about each of them on our website. Mt. Cuba’s trial also took an in-depth look at pollinator activity for these ecologically important plants. Volunteers from the Pollinator Watch Team recorded 20,000 insects visiting the goldenrods over the three years of the evaluation, including bees, butterflies, wasps, moths, flies, beetles, and true bugs. A full table of pollinator visits, with a focus on bumblebee activity can be found in the report.

Due to the inclusion of many local ecoytypes and species, the Solidago report is of particular utility not only to home gardeners, but also to land managers and large-scale restoration projects. Eleven out of the twelve top-performing goldenrods are straight species rather than cultivars, and thus suitable for mass plantings. Additionally, the report outlines evaluated species from both mid-Atlantic Piedmont and coastal plain regions, which can be helpful for selecting locally-specific goldenrod species that will thrive in these distinct growing conditions. “We are excited to shine a spotlight onto a group of plants that many know, but few grow in their home garden. Our three-year Solidago trial illuminates the incredible diversity of this genus and highlights their potential for use by gardeners, native plant enthusiasts, and natural lands managers in the mid-Atlantic region and beyond”, says Hoadley.

Key Takeaways:

• There is a wide diversity of native Solidago species and cultivars, and many are surprisingly adaptable in cultivation and can serve as both beautiful and ecologically valuable additions to just about any garden. 
• Goldenrods are some of North America’s most iconic and recognizable native plants that not only make spectacular additions to home gardens but are also well suited to support an incredible diversity of wildlife in cultivation.
• While goldenrod often has the perception of being aggressive and weedy, very few species in the trial showed these characteristics. Instead, many species make excellent garden plants.
• As keystone species, goldenrod supports a considerable amount of wildlife, including being the host plant for the caterpillars of over 100 different species of butterflies and moths, as well as an important source of late-season nectar.
• In addition to attracting many pollinators, various bird species, including warblers, ruby-crowned kinglets, and dark-eyed juncos were observed hunting for insects and seeds amongst the goldenrods.
• While most goldenrods grow best in full sun, several species, including Solidago caseia (blue-stemmed goldenrod), S. flexicaulis (broad-leaf goldenrod) and S. patula (roundleaf goldenrod) are excellent plants for shaded sites.

This research report details the 13 top-performing Solidago in Mt. Cuba’s trial. Descriptions and photos of all plants included, as well as additional information can be found at mtcubacenter.org/trials/solidago.

Mt. Cuba’s Top-Performing Solidago:

• Solidago rugosa ‘Fireworks’ (Fireworks wrinkle-leaf goldenrod)
• Solidago fistulosa Delaware ecotype (pine barrens goldenrod)
• Solidago sphacelata Tennessee ecotype (autumn goldenrod)
• Solidago rigida subsp. glabrata (southeastern bold goldenrod)
• Solidago drummondii (Drummond’s goldenrod)
• Euthamia caroliniana & Euthamia sp. (slender goldenrod)
• Solidago gigantea Delaware ecotype (smooth goldenrod)
• Solidago ohioensis (Ohio goldenrod)
• Solidago rugosa var. aspera Virginia ecotype (wrinkle-leaf goldenrod)
• Solidago mexicana (southern seaside goldenrod)
• Solidago curtsii Alabama ecotype (Curtis’s goldenrod)
• Solidago stricta New Jersey ecotype (pine barren bog goldenrod)

CONTACT: Melissa Starkey mstarkey@mtcubacenter.org

About Mt. Cuba Center
Mt. Cuba Center is a renowned botanic garden that highlights the beauty and value of native plants to inspire conservation. Once the private estate of Pamela and Lammot du Pont Copeland, Mt. Cuba opened to the public in 2013 and now spans 68 acres of gardens and over 1,000 acres of natural lands. Featuring formal and naturalistic gardens and three miles of scenic trails, Mt. Cuba’s stunning landscapes demonstrate how native plants can enrich our environment. Mt. Cuba is recognized as a leader in native plant research, education, and open space preservation, having protected 15,000 acres in the mid-Atlantic region. The gardens are open Tuesday-Sunday April through June, and Wednesday-Sunday July through November, with lively events throughout the year. Gardening, art, and conservation classes are offered year-round in person and online. Learn more at mtcubacenter.org.

Pinelands Nursery & Supply
Growing native since 1983. Pinelands is one of the largest native plant nurseries in the US, supplying millions of plants for environmental restoration throughout the Mid-Atlantic. With seed collection in New Jersey, Virginia, and New York, they are able to propagate plants that are genetically adapted to local conditions. Pinelands Nursery is a supporter of the Ecological Landscape Alliance. You can find the offerings for Solidago HERE.

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When I spoke up at the recent New Directions in the American Landscape Annual (NDAL) Symposium, I spooked a number of my fellow participants.  Toward the end of this event’s first day, I posed a question to speaker Elizabeth Kennedy. Kennedy is a landscape architect with a background in sociology, and she had just delivered a very interesting program about the intersection of nature and culture in her work. Her fresh and original perspective emboldened me to ask an unconventional question. I have become convinced, I told her that spirituality must play a role in moving the American public toward a healthier relationship with Nature; what did she think?

Spirituality may be defined in many ways. At its most fundamental it means striving for connection to something bigger than yourself, something that gives purpose and meaning to your existence. In the United States, it is mainly spoken of in connection with religion. Bringing religion into a conversation about humanity’s relationship with nature can be disturbing to ecologically based gardeners such as me, given the history of conflict in our culture between religion and science. I know I disturbed some members of the NDAL audience by following my question with a description of a conversation I’d had in late 2024 with a Franciscan Brother, James Lockman, who has taken as his ministry the restoration of wild areas disturbed by Caltrans, the California Department of Transportation. Brother James Lockman, who has a graduate degree in ecology, told me that the founder of his order, Saint Francis of Assisi, viewed the beauty and intricate grace of Nature as a reflection of divinity, and human beings as part of that order.  As such, they defaced nature at their own spiritual peril.  

Lockman also directed me to an encyclical that the late Pope Francis had published in 2015, which made a powerful case for respecting nature, while noting that because humanity is an intrinsic part of its web its communities, especially those in need, deserved to have their ecologies included in the concerns for the greater ecosystem. I told Elizabeth Kennedy that I am not a member of any religious group and that I would never urge a religious belief on anyone but asked her if she thought that spirituality could be a tool, perhaps an essential one, for reaching the majority of the population that doesn’t share NDAL’s commitment to ecological restoration.

Despite my assurance, a couple of fellow audience members told me that I seemed to be making a speech and worried that I was pushing the discussion into evangelical territory and would begin “shouting about God.” Clearly, I could have phrased my point better. A few other members, though, told me later that they found it thought provoking.

I have been involved, as have many other members of the Ecological Landscape Alliance, in pursuing nature-based gardening for much of my career, in my case since the late 1980s. My own understanding of garden-making has always been science-based. What I have promoted through writings and broadcasting has reflected that—I’ve been focused on landscape treatments that reflect a better understanding of natural systems and techniques that employ resources more sustainably.  

I’ve been frustrated, however, by my inability to make any impression on the large part of the population that values nature solely as a source of resources and cares for it only in terms of its practical (primarily economic) value to people. A little more than a year ago I encountered an especially explicit example of that attitude when I spoke to a MAGA-enthusiastic acquaintance, the acting minister of a small church, of the supreme beauty of the natural world as something we needed to cherish, even when it offered no tangible benefit to us. He responded by demanding, like some anthropocentric Zen master, if nature was still beautiful when there were no people there to see it. I suspect that his opinion makes more of an impact on his flock than mine. And the membership of such socially conservative congregations nationwide is immense.

A historian will tell you that early religions commonly sprang from a desire to appease and live in harmony with nature. More recently founded faiths also not infrequently include elements of this attitude. I’ve recently learned, for example, that Islam teaches that humanity is just one of the creatures Allah created and that the creatures who are most beloved by their creator are those that benefit all of them. 

But spirituality is not limited to the religious. My own early inspiration was Henry Thoreau’s writings. He was a close scientific observer, a proto-ecologist, and openly opposed to organized religion. Like his fellow Transcendentalists, Thoreau found his spirituality in the contemplation of nature. You’ll find the traces of this in the moments of whimsical exaltation preserved in his books and essays.  

I have never forgotten, for example, Thoreau’s account in Walden of drifting about the pond in a boat, playing his flute to attract and entertain an audience of fish. Or his affection for the least loved landscapes in his community of Concord, the swamps. As a young man of 20 he wrote in his journal, “Would it not be a luxury to stand up to one’s chin in some retired swamp for a whole summer’s day, scenting the sweet-fern and bilberry blows, and lulled by the minstrelsy of gnats and mosquitoes?” And in his last publication, an essay titled “Walking” that was published after his death at age 44, he wrote that, “Yes, though you may think me perverse, if it were proposed to me to dwell in the neighborhood of the most beautiful garden that ever human art contrived, or else of a Dismal swamp, I should certainly decide for the swamp.” A similar strain of spirituality has often overwhelmed me with awe when contemplating some detail of woods and fields—or swamps.

Not all of us trace our commitment to epiphanies of this sort. Many members of this organization came to the work of restoration through a more pragmatic recognition of the disastrous environmental path down which humanity has chosen to proceed. I’ve found, though, too many members of the general public resistant to such talk.  Sometimes they do not have the foresight or education needed to divine where our world is headed. Or they may not wish to change course because it would endanger short-term profits. They hope that a crash, if it comes, will not arrive until they have passed from the scene. Another factor is the widespread distrust of science in the United States. Why listen to the data-based warnings of environmentalists if you truly believe that facts are simply a matter of opinion?

We must convert more people to a less narcissistic attitude toward nature if society is to redirect itself toward a more sustainable and healthy relationship with the planet. The path through which we achieve this will be varied. Think of Robin Wall Kimmerer and the way that botany led her back to an exploration of her people’s, the Potawatomi’s, visceral identification with the natural world. Or of Terry Tempest Williams charting in her 1992 classic Refuge how her study of nature led her from her mother’s terminal diagnosis of cancer, which Tempest credits to exposure to radiation from atomic bomb tests, to a place of renewal and grace. These are the kind of powerful, emotionally accessible messages that can shift science-averse listeners from a transactional view of nature to embracing it as their family and aspiration.

As someone actively seeking out such messages, I would be very grateful to any readers who would care to share their own with me. For those whose interests are more pragmatic, who concern themselves purely with making our landscape ecologically healthy, I suggest they explore the tool of spirituality, one quite different from our studies and journal articles, but powerful in complementary, and I believe equally essential ways.

Thomas Christopher is a graduate of the New York Botanical Garden’s School of Professional Horticulture. He has spent the last 45 years designing and tending gardens. Although most of his experience has been in the northeast, he also gardened for a time in Central Texas (USDA Zone 8), where he was an active member of the Texas Old Rose Rustlers. He has also spent a good deal of time touring and studying gardens in other regions of the country and abroad. 

Tom’s special interest has always been in the ways that gardening brings the practitioner into contact with natural systems, and the way that working with nature can make gardening not only easier and more rewarding but also an asset to the environment. In this era of environmental challenges, he thinks all gardeners need to consider this aspect of their craft. He is also the host of the Growing Greener podcast.

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Despite the ups and downs of spring weather in the Northeast, it has arrived and it’s time to ready your landscape for the growing season. In keeping with our thoughts about ecological landscaping, here are some tips for handling spring clean-up.

In the fall we learned to leave the leaves, so now what? 

Leaves left in the fall will blow around during winter; rake and remove leaves by hand from around emerging perennials. Leave a layer of dead leaves on the garden bed as mulch. Your plants are tough enough to grow through them. You should remove more leaves from low growing 

ground covers to allow the light to reach them and encourage their spread. Leaves can be moved to areas between shrubs, in the back of beds, or use them to kill lawn and establish new planting beds. If using leaves to kill lawn in spring, it might be a good idea to mow the grass in that area very short — almost scalping the ground. It sets the grass back, allowing the thick pile of leaves to do the rest. Any excess leaves can also go into compost piles.

Remember, whole leaves harbor good insects and provided winter resting places for a variety of wildlife. Try to leave them whole — they will break down soon enough and give you the weed barrier you seek.

What do I do with the old stalks I cut back? 

Like the leaves, those tall plants with persistent stalks were left standing in the garden as habitat for overwintering wildlife. If you need to cut them back before mid-May, cut the stalks at the base and leave the long stalk whole. Consider making piles near the compost or at the back of garden beds to allow later-emerging insects the opportunity to do so. A place with at least some sunlight will be best to encourage the emergence of any native insects. The stalks will break down and disappear as the season progresses.

Is it time to mulch? What do I use? 

If you want a more finished look to your garden, you can mow excess leaves to create a finer looking mulch — remember what was stated above, so consider just using the chopped leaves at the edges for a more manicured appearance.

You can also consider using plant material like ground covers. Green mulch or low growing plants such as creeping phlox (Phlox stolonifera), moss phlox (P. subulata), and self-heal (Prunella vulgaris) can be used in place of mulch. Fill in between your plants with a variety of other plants so that formal mulch becomes less necessary. Inter-plant early spring bloomers with late spring, summer, and fall blooming perennials so that your garden changes from season to season. The early plants fade and the later ones shine as each season progresses, keeping the soil covered and the garden fresh.

Spring is also a good time to turn your compost pile and add a fresh layer of composted material to your garden. You can use the compost in place of both fertilizer and mulch! This will add not only nutrients, but also beneficial microbes to your garden.

Plant some native plants. The current recommendation is that your garden should contain 70% native species and 30% introduced plants. You don’t have to give up your favorite garden perennials, but add plants found in your region each year. Soon you will find that you have lots of native plants intermingled with your garden perennials. When selecting these plants, try to use true native plants versus cultivars of the natives, or at least try to select a cultivar where the flower parts have not been modified.

Should I fertilize the garden? A soil test will help you determine if fertilizer is necessary for your garden area. In general, for most garden beds, that layer of compost added to the garden can be very helpful and is often sufficient. Also, the decaying leaves that you have left in the garden are returning nutrients back to the soil. If you are thinking about a vegetable garden, fruit bearing plants, or things that have not performed well, it is best to use a slow-release organic fertilizer. Beware of using high nitrogen fertilizers that provide quick greening but little else. 

These suggestions make my garden look messy. Embrace the mess. Nature is not neat. The last time you walked in the woods or visited a flowery meadow, think about what you saw. Leaves and fallen branches cover the forest floor, moss starts to grow on fallen trees providing seed or spore beds for emerging wildflowers and ferns, partridge berry grows in mats between the moss and logs at the edge of a trail. The ‘mess’ is only a space for other things to grow and live. Yes, you should still weed out garden thugs or problem plants. 

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