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2024 Conference: Season’s End Summit

Thu, December 5 @ 8:00 am EST - 4:00 pm EST

The Brigham Hill Community Farm, 37 Wheeler Road
Grafton, MA 01536 United States
+ Google Map

Join ELA for the 2024 Season’s End Summit, in person at Community Harvest Project.

Thursday, December 5 | 8:00 am-4:00 pm EST

Registration is now open through Eventbrite

This will be a hybrid event with a virtual option for participation

Program Schedule

8:00am – Registration and refreshments

8:30am – Welcome

8:45-9:45am Nicholas Anderson, Ecological Maximalism with Kinetic Plants: Embracing co-authored forest succession with charismatic, native species that insist on working, thriving and surviving while refusing to “stay put.” Thinking alongside these wonderful “weeds” to find new metaphors and methodologies that enable us to connect with the land as it is without antagonism or despair and to recognize extant abundance. All of this is in service of aesthetically and ecologically transforming land at the pace and urgency required to confront the polycrisis while continuously learning from the process.

10:00-11:00am Rachel Lindsay, Soils for High Functioning Landscapes: This presentation will explore how implementing the 2023 Healthy Soils Action Plan (HSAP) can transform our approach to gardening and landscape design across urban, suburban, and rural settings. We’ll discuss the profound impacts of current development practices on soil health and present practical, evidence-based recommendations for improving soil functions like stormwater management, nutrient retention, and carbon sequestration before, during, and after construction. Case studies will highlight successful applications of these practices, demonstrating how they can enhance habitats for plants, animals, and insects in diverse environments.

In addition, the session will facilitate an engaging discussion on overcoming the challenges of integrating soil health practices into landscape projects. Participants will have the chance to contribute feedback and wisdom that will guide further recommendations and best practices which will be included in a “Guide for Implementing the Healthy Soils Action Plan in Design and Construction”, authored by Regenerative Design Group and other partners.

11:15am-12:15pm Tovah Martin, Unison, Creating Harmonious Combinations for Pollinators and You: Your garden has so much potential. It could become a haven where pollinators thrive, dine, and reproduce. How do you create such a place? With flowers. And while bulking up on the blossoms, you might as well make every moment beautiful. This lecture shares ideas for a pollinator-pleasing place where harmonious colors echo while textural themes reverberate and weave in and out throughout the growing season. Photographed at Furthermore—my own garden—this lecture is an intimate chronicle of a community of plants and their interrelationships. Steal these ideas!

12:15-1:15pm Lunch

1:15-2:15pm Robert Gegear, Restoring Native Plant-Pollinator System Diversity at Different Spatial Scales (and why it matters): Plant-pollinator or ‘pollination’ systems are being degraded at an alarming rate across New England, posing a significant threat to diversity and functioning of terrestrial ecosystems.  Habitat loss and degradation are widely thought to be significant drivers of pollination system decline; however, mechanistic links between habitat characteristics and species loss remain unclear due, in part, to fact that most current conservation efforts take a ‘one-size-fits-all approach rather than targeting the specific ecological needs of declining species.  In this talk, I will discuss how I am using species-level ecological data to successfully restore native pollination systems across Massachusetts.  I will also highlight how ‘eco-technology’ can be used to rapidly collect vital data on pollinator species ecology thereby dramatically reducing the amount of time required to develop and implement effective restoration strategies for imperiled systems.  My talk will conclude with an overview of how I have coordinated ‘Beecologists’ to significantly advance pollination system restoration efforts in Massachusetts over the past 3 years.

2:30-3:30pm Michael Piantedosi, The Northeast Seed Network: As demand for native seed increases, a clear lack of locally-adapted native seed has proven to be a persistent bottleneck in support of habitat restoration or nursery use. Native Plant Trust has partnered with over 20 different federal, state, and NGOs to form the Northeast Seed Network. Michael will discuss the creation of this network of seed users and producers, and the vision of supporting ecological restoration efforts with ecoregional native seed.

Speaker Biographies

Nicholas Anderson is trained as a horticulturist though he refers to his practice as that of “ecological maximalism,” which centers on seeing a broad swath of charismatic, native vegetation primarily as renewable, natural resources, rather than individualized commodities in plastic pots. He works out of Cape Ann, Massachusetts as an arborist, landscape consultant and practitioner of “ecological reparations,” and is a founding member of the group Creating Commons Collective.

Rachel Lindsay draws from her experiences in farming, community development, and graphic communication to engage people in the design process with cultural sensitivity and environmental integrity. In her role as Head of Landscape Design at Regenerative Design Group, she brings high levels of energy and creativity toward connecting people with their landscapes. Her work is informed by a passion for making art, growing food, exploring the world of native plants and local ecology, and past time living in Latin America.  

Tovah Martin | In her constant, undying pursuit of all things garden-related, Tovah gets her hands dirty both outside and indoors. She is a perennial, heirloom, vegetable and cottage gardener of fanatical proportions, and is accredited with NOFA as an Organic Land Care Professional. Beyond the garden outdoors, Tovah’s areas of specialty also include decades of experience with houseplants (she grows over 200 in her home). Most recently, a new title was added to her book publications. Gold Medal award winning The Garden in Every Sense and Season (Timber Press, 2018) describes how your garden can kindle the senses on all layers to become more meaningful. These newest publications are added to more than a dozen titles that Tovah has authored.

Robert J. Gegear is an Associate Professor in the Department of Biology at UMass Dartmouth.  He received his PhD from Western University in Canada and was a Postdoctoral Fellow in the Department of Ecology & Evolutionary Biology at the University of Toronto (Canada) and in the Department of Neurobiology at UMASS Medical School.  His research focuses on the neuroecology and conservation of pollination systems from both plant and pollinator perspectives.

Michael Piantedosi, Director of Conservation Native Plant Trust, Michael began his career in botany as a researcher in cyanobacteria and freshwater plant communities at the Univ. of New Hampshire, where he received a degree in plant biology. His botanical background includes occupation in regional herbaria, as a horticulturist, and as plant biology research technician. In 2014, he joined the Conservation Department of Native Plant Trust as manager of the New England Plant Conservation Program, Seeds of Success-East, and Native Plant Trust’s regional seed bank of rare and endangered plant germplasm. Michael has served as Director of Conservation at Native Plant Trust since 2019.

Member pricing is available for current ELA members. To check your membership status and find your Subscription (Member) number, visit your member profile.

Registration for this event is through Eventbrite and includes breakfast and lunch. Virtual registration is for virtual participation only and does not include meals.

ELA Member registration $124
Non-member registration $149
ELA Member virtual registration $74
Non-member virtual registration $89
Student registration (must be currently enrolled in a degree- or certificate-program studying horticulture, landscape architecture, or a related field $75

Are you interested in sponsoring the Season’s End Summit? All sponsorships include complimentary registrations to attend. Those registrations can be either virtual or in-person. Sponsor logos will be displayed on the event webpage, included in communications to attendees, social media posts, and displayed throughout the day during breaks between sessions.

The sponsorship levels outlined below can be purchased through the registration page

  • Conservation Sponsor (nonprofit): $250 | One complimentary registration
  • Bronze Sponsor: $750 | Exhibitor table and two complimentary registrations
  • Silver Sponsor: $1,500 | Exhibitor table and two complimentary registrations, company logo on event signage, and one banner ad in an upcoming ELA Bulletin
  • Gold Sponsor: $2,500 | All Silver benefits, plus a one year company level membership, company logo displayed on podium, and an opportunity to address the audience during the event

Details

Date:
Thu, December 5
Time:
8:00 am EST - 4:00 pm EST
Event Categories:
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Venue

The Brigham Hill Community Farm
37 Wheeler Road
Grafton, MA 01536 United States
+ Google Map