Kris and I have been talking a lot about pollinators to anyone who will listen. Yesterday that resulted in an interview with local NPR…a story about bats! They do not function as pollinators around here (they do in the SW

A lot of my musings in the past year have been in the form of blog posts for Lake County Visitors Bureau and, more recently, Lake County Historical Society.

Here is a link to my article about the closing of

Last spring I received a troubling email from John Pogacnik, long-time biologist with Lake Metroparks. John lives at the Lakeshore Reservation in North Perry, overlooking Lake Erie. He asked if I had noticed a problem with our local beech trees

In late-October I participated in an Immigration Reform Fly-in to Washington DC with six hundred representatives of business, law enforcement and clergy. I traveled with Bob Lyons, never an easy experience, and eight others from Ohio. We listened to speakers,

The Asclepius tuberosa, native to Ohio, have finished their show of orange blossoms in NE Ohio. I’ve traveled by a patch at the edge of Rt 2 in Painesville for years. This month I finally made the time to leave

The Ohio Chautauqua Festival was presented in Madison over the July 4th week. I got roped into helping Bob Endebrock, retired ODA inspector, put together a local nursery history display. It turned out great and I’m proud of being able

Immigration Reform is finally on center stage in Washington DC! I was involved in three different meetings trying to influence the result with our Ohio legislators.

First, we hosted Caryn Candisky, NE OHio Coordinator for Senator Rob Portman, at Sunleaf

Whoa! Where did the Spring go! The Milky Way Kousa is blooming outside my office…many of the Rhodys are done! But here we go into the Summer Perennial Season! Salvias! Dianthus! Thymes!

We took 24 Master Gardeners on a wagon

Spring is slowly sneaking up on us in NE Ohio! Two weeks ago…the spring peepers began their late-afternoon chorus. Today I noticed the Kingfisher is back. In addition to the big guy who patrols our middle pond, there is a

My brief career in Live TV began and ended today. I was an ‘auctioneer’ on our local Ideastream Public TV auction. My first appearance went okay…hawking some donated items before the camera. I was introduced as a representative of Ohio

Below is one of my rants that got published as a letter-to-the-editor in the News-Herald. So far it’s getting rave reviews from the check-out ladies at our local IGA.

Minimum Wage Debate

Ohio Senator Sherrod Brown is championing a substantial

Below are links to an article I wrote for Greenhouse Grower magazine about Invasive Plants.

http://www.greenhousegrower.com/article/33219/the-invasive-plant-issue

The second link is to the Editor’s Article in which she comments on my article.

http://www.greenhousegrower.com/article/33650/slowing-the-spread-of-invasive-plants-opinion

Last night Kris and I did our first dynamic duo Powerpoint Presentation! Our audience, Gardeners of Greater Cleveland, a long-standing and prestigious group, seemed to like it! They served us dinner at the Bratenahl Towers and then took us upstairs

When did the winter get so busy for nurserymen? We need an extra month in the winter to get our work done!

During January, CENTS and the 85th OSU Short Course provided a lively week. Sunday Night at Barley’s Brewery

This was a very productive year for Ohio Invasive Plants Council with the development of an Assessment Protocol and Assessment Policies for Ohio. We were able to do this in conjunction with Ohio Nursery and Landscape Association, which formally endorsed

This letter of mine was posted in the Lake County Development Council (LCDC) March 2012 Newsletter:

H2A Guest-Worker Program: a regulatory nightmare for local employers

With all the hue and cry regarding undocumented workers, you would think our country would

What a busy Fall!

Many of our greenhouses have white poly on them and we’re preparing to do our ‘hardwood cuttings’ of things like Juniper, Boxwood and Arborvitae. We’ll stick these cuttings by Christmas and they’ll stay in the sand-flats

This was the last week for most of our student workers and we’re going to miss them! We’ve had good crews and not-so-good crews over the years…several hundred local students have stood in line in front of the Gilson time

We entertained the Mayfield Garden Club this week with a Powerpoint presentation about local nursery history, juice/coffee/donuts/fruit, a hay-wagon tour of the nursery, and a shopping spree in our garden center. Eighteen great ladies! We almost lost one on the