by Marsha Gebhardt
President, Wild Ones St. Louis Chapter
Photo by Kathy Bildner
The Wild Ones St. Louis Board had been closely monitoring the evolving situation with COVID-19 (coronavirus) across the St. Louis metropolitan area and the nation. A week ago this post would have included specific cancellations. Now, after the 30-day stay-at-home order issued by St. Louis City and County,
it’s obvious to all that none of our April group events will occur.
You will be the first to know when we resume any of our scheduled activities.
MDC Seedlings
The one exception t
o the cancellations is the bundling and the distribution of the MDC seedlings on April 5th. Tessa Wasserman, our chapter’s coordinator of this project, will email our members who ordered seedlings to remind them what they ordered and how much they owe. Then, within the week, she will email all members to let us know which seedling species we will have extras of. (MDC requires us to order minimum quantities of each species we order.) Seedlings will be available for members to purchase on April 5th.
Cancelled events = more time supporting Nature’s Best Hope
Meanwhile, we can still work in our home gardens! In fact, many of us now have additional time to enhance our natural habitats. I’m planning to ride the ‘high’ from the extraordinarily inspiring and affirming events provided by the Partners for Native Landscaping (PNL) events, March 6 and 7.
Doug Tallamy said this about PNL:
“There is good work going on in other cities and states. But in terms of a single city group, I don’t think anybody comes close to St. Louis. And you’ve been doing it a long time. There are so many leaders that it was hard to get to my talk because of all the sponsors and partners to be acknowledged.”
More broadly, Tallamy said:
“St. Louis is one of the premier epicenters of the native landscaping movement in the United States. The educational outreach displayed by this region’s public and private partnerships should be a model for everyone to use in creating a Homegrown National Park across America!”
Healing the Earth one yard at a time!
With pride, pleasure and purpose we’ll continue our work individually. And, eventually, many of us will celebrate and learn together at our next Wild Ones St. Louis Gathering.
