Big, Green, Cleaning Machines
Plants are incredible. We may seem biased in saying so, but we figure if you’re reading this, you probably have an idea of this yourself. Over the last century, humans have caused a global pollution problem, releasing large amounts of chemicals and other toxic compounds into the biosphere. These include inorganic pollutants, such as heavy ...
2020 Winter Gardener’s Corner
As the plants become dormant and hibernation falls on the land, I become aware of how automated the ecosystems are. Despite the harsh winter conditions headed our way, native plants are prepared for the weather both physically and morphologically. I am always amazed by how cold hardy plants do not freeze and or die in ...
Using Our Senses
What was your first memory of ‘being’ in nature? The first recollection of sitting back, looking around, taking a deep breath, and connecting? In recent decades, fewer and fewer children have experienced the oneness that comes from feeling nature. This is in part due to technology, schedules, and expectations. But, perhaps, it is also because ...
Wild Collecting in North Carolina: Southern Highlands Reserve and the Arnold Arboretum partner for plant conservation
by Sean Halloran, Plant Propagator, The Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University In September, the Arnold Arboretum once again visited Southern Highlands Reserve as part of a 3-week long plant collections trip, continuing our on-going partnership for plant conservation started in 2016. All seven 2019 North American-China Plant Exploration Consortium (NACPEC) scientists were graciously hosted by ...
Gardener’s Corner with Eric Kimbrel
Nature’s schedule is always interesting to observe—it pays no mind to our calendar. The trees filled up with webworms early this year, and yet current warm temperatures are pushing fall back. Precipitation also plays a part in when the seasons change, with more rain causing plants to go dormant earlier than usual. Fall is a ...
Finding Beauty In the Familiar
“hu·man be·ing noun 1. a man, woman, or child of the species Homo sapien, distinguished from other animals by superior mental development, power of articulate speech, and upright stance.” In the strictest sense, we are homo sapiens, but this simple fact leaves out the core for most of us—that we distinguish ourselves from other animals by our superior ...
SHR Receives Commendation from The Garden Club of America
The Garden Club of America recently presented Southern Highlands Reserve the Zone VIII Horticulture Commendation. The commendation was awarded with appreciation for SHR’s dedication to horticulture, preservation, conservation and education in the uniquely beautiful native plant gardens of the Southern Appalachian Mountains and beyond. Lifelong outdoor enthusiasts, Reserve founders Betty and Robert Balentine aspired to ...
Seed Collecting: A Shared Experience
The world of botanists, horticulturists and landscape architects is a tight knit community, one in which conversations often result in tracing back crossed paths and common friends while sharing favorite plants and gardens with one another. One of the greatest benefits of such intersections are the opportunities that spring forth. The majority of plants at ...
Springing into New Life
As spring advances, signs of renewed life are appearing at the Reserve in each of the four elements. Amphibians have laid their eggs in the water, insects are hatching and beginning to fill the air, buds are swelling along with new growth appearing from the earth and we recently performed the annual prescribed burn of ...
Gardener’s Corner with Eric Kimbrel
I always eagerly await this time of year when leaves emerge and plants begin to flaunt their flowers. A truly magical transformation happens all around us. This is also the perfect time to dig into gardening and get plants in the ground and established for several reasons. First, the ground has thawed after the harsh ...
Change: A Perspective on Aesthetics and Climate in the Garden
Written by Matt Sprouse, PLA, Sitework Studios – Principal and Amy Fahmy, PLA, Sitework Studios – Landscape Architect This past year brought us to Southern Highlands Reserve to talk about water. We were eager to once again revel in this wonderful garden, designed to inspire appreciation for the diversity of native plants of the highlands. No better example ...
Ephemeral Magic
Written and Photographed by Caleb Melchior Southern gardens are known for their big charismatic flowers: sugar-pink rhododendrons, peppermint domed mountain laurels, wedding cake layers of American dogwood, giant lemon-scented magnolias. These flowers are exciting, but don’t forget to look down at what’s growing closer to ground level. When I was a kid in the ...
Gardener’s Corner with Director of Horticulture Eric Kimbrel
Much of this season at the Reserve has been spent inside enhancing our digital plant database in preparation for it to be shared with the public, as well as making plans for the coming growing season. On warmer days, we have been able to get outside for some much-needed landscape maintenance including cleanup after winter ...
Southern Highlands Reserve’s Volunteers of the Year
Southern Highlands Reserve is pleased to announce the 2018 Volunteers of the Year! Volunteers are vital to our success as a growing non-profit organization and we’re pleased to honor these individuals for their exceptional commitment and support of our mission. The Volunteer of the Year Award recognizes an outstanding volunteer for his or her valuable ...
Sprucing Up the Forest for Fairy Diddles
Commission biologists lead habitat restoration projects to benefit the Endangered Carolina Northern flying squirrel Written by Christine A. Kelly / Photos by Melissa McGaw and submitted © N.C. Wildlife Resources Commission “It won’t bite. It just needs a launch point,” I say. The flying squirrel scurries up the front of the kid’s sweatshirt to ...
What is SASRI and Why Do We Care?
The Southern Appalachian Spruce Restoration Initiative (SASRI) 2018 annual meeting took place on Thursday, November 8 at the Bent Creek Experimental Forest outside of Asheville, North Carolina. This partnership of people from diverse interests was formed in 2013 for the common goal of restoring spruce-fir ecosystems across high elevation landscapes of the Southern Blue Ridge. ...
Southern Highlands Reserve Helps Rescue Native Plants at High Hampton Resort
Southern Highlands Reserve recently had the opportunity to assist in a local native plant rescue at the historic High Hampton Resort in Cashiers, NC. A redesign of its golf course by award-winning course designer Tom Fazio involved expansion into previously wooded and undeveloped areas. As such, a wide variety of native plants and wildflowers needed ...
Gardener’s Corner
Autumn, marked by cooler weather and shortening days as Earth’s axis begins to tilt away from the sun, transitions us from summer’s lush abundance to winter’s quiet dormancy, and refers in its origins to the passing of the year. Once commonly referred to as harvest, western cultures have lost that broader association with the land ...
German Forestry Society Visits Red Spruce Restoration Site
Southern Highlands Reserve was honored to join the United States Forest Service (USFS) on Friday, October 5, to welcome 17 members of the German Forestry Society (GFS), led by Hans C. Rohr, to Flat Laurel in the Pisgah National Forest. The group included a wilderness researcher, high-ranking government forestry officials, and an advisor to German ...
How You Can Help Grow a Greener World
Biodiversity refers to the diversity, or variety, of living organisms on the planet within a given ecosystem, as well as the variety of ecosystem types. This diversity is indispensable to the dynamic processes that keep ecosystems healthy. The wider the range of species, the more resilient an ecosystem is in the face of stress and ...
Gardener’s Corner with Director of Horticulture Eric Kimbrel
With its warm weather and long days, summer beckons us outside and into its fruits of full bloom. We have been adding to the abundance by planting perennials for more even color throughout the garden. Another object of plenty has been rainfall. Few days have been without any, and many days have been filled with ...
Cultivating Reciprocity: Plants and Animals in Your Garden
Cultivate is an active verb. We cultivate our gardens, among other things; it’s human endeavor. As such, it involves not only physical labor, but also planning, strategizing. Specifically, what to plant and how to arrange and design those particular species are among the first decisions that must be made. This decision-making process can be as ...
Being There: The Benefits of Being in Nature
Stop what you’re doing. Get up. Walk outside. Chances are, depending on where you are at the time, you will immediately feel a little bit better—your mood may lighten, your thoughts may free up and your perspective may shift just a bit. Physical movement and change of light alone can account for some of this, ...
Gregory Bald Azaleas: Hybridization at its Finest
Every year in early June, visitors to Southern Highlands Reserve are rewarded with an especially vibrant range of color offered by our Gregory Bald Azalea collection. A magnificent display of reds, yellows, pinks and whites is a highlight to all who visit. Although SHR’s collection is a little more than a decade old, these gorgeous ...
Learning from History: The Importance of Genetic Diversity
“History doesn’t repeat itself, but it does rhyme” ~ Mark Twain The Irish Potato Famine has gone down in history as one of the worst tragedies of the 19th century. In 1845, a fungal infestation, Phytophtthor infestans, reduced half of the potato crop in a single year into an inedible slime. In a very Biblical, ...
2018 Native Plant Symposium: The Role of Pollinators in the Landscape
Southern Highlands Reserve will host its 2018 Native Plant Symposium on Saturday, May 19. This year’s topic is “The Role of Pollinators in the Landscape.” Dr. Larry Mellichamp will return to the Reserve as the keynote speaker, lecturing on the tantalizing topic of floral sex. Dr. Larry Mellichamp is recently retired Professor of Botany and ...
Southern Highlands Reserve Launches Digital Database to Advance Native Plant Research
Southern Highlands Reserve (SHR) is pleased to announce the development of a digital database to advance its work in native plant research and education. The database is a powerful tool for SHR to conduct research on more than 10 years of plant observation data, weather data, and plant accession records. The research database will further ...
SHR Welcomes Two New Staff Members and Celebrates Retirement of Inaugural Greenhouse Manager
2017 was a banner year for the Reserve in many ways. SHR made its mark by changing the mountain landscape, planting over 900 red spruce trees on public land near Black Balsam with the first ever restoration project for the endangered Carolina Northern Flying Squirrel. The organization’s landscape changed in 2017 as well, welcoming two new staff members and celebrating the retirement of our inaugural Greenhouse Manager, Sue Owen....
Carbon and Climate: Forest Management Strategies for Climate Change
The carbon cycle is a part of our daily lives, although most of us probably wouldn’t realize just how personally it affects us. The carbon cycle is directly linked to the food we eat, the air we breathe, the electricity that powers our lights, televisions, and computers, the fossil fuels that power our cars, even ...
Connecting People, Places and Trees: SHR Shares Red Spruce Restoration Best Management Practices at High Elevation Forest Restoration Workshop
When people aligned in the same mission gather together and work cooperatively towards a common goal, an interconnectivity emerges. Linking pieces of information, relationships and people together begins to form one larger, more valuable picture. Each individual piece of the puzzle is important alone but when connected, as the great philosopher Aristotle observed, “the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.” ...
Red Spruce Restoration Program Grows New Roots: Partners in Restoration Plant 900 Red Spruce Near Black Balsam
On September 18th and 19th, representatives from the Southern Appalachian Spruce Restoration Initiative (SASRI) gathered in Black Balsam to restore red spruce on public lands in Western NC. Over 900 young red spruce trees were carried on foot and horseback by dozens of volunteers and members of SASRI to their new home deep in the woods on public lands. In two days, these dedicated conservationists made at least seven trips down the Flat Laurel Branch Trail, some logging 14 miles for the day. The red spruce trees were grown by Southern Highlands Reserve as part of a larger long-term effort to restore red spruce to its high-elevation native habitat on public lands in the Southern Blue Ridge Mountains....
Gardening for a Changing Climate: How Shifts in Climate Should Guide our Conservation Practices
The onset of hurricane and fire season this year has brought an alarming degree of destruction to communities across the planet and disruption to the delicate balance of ecosystems. Record-breaking precipitation levels, fires, storm intensity, and storm frequency parallel the predictions of climate scientists for the past two decades: as oceans warm, we will observe increased storm activity, frequency, and intensity. In light of the devastation of recent extreme weather events from Hurricane Harvey and Irma on such a harrowing scale, we ask ourselves: are we powerless to stop this kind of catastrophic damage from happening again? What can we do at home to reduce our ecological footprint and adapt to the predicted long-term weather conditions? Further, what can we do to help strengthen the resiliency of our ecosystems and empower others to leave this earth better than we found it for future generations?...
Gardener’s Corner – Fall Edition
As the summer comes to a close for fall, we prepare for winter by helping the gardens go into a hibernation of their own, tucked into their beds and ready for a long, dormant season. Throughout the year, SHR staff prepare for the next generation of native plants to adorn the landscape. After bearing summertime fruit, plenty of seeds are ready for harvest throughout the gardens. Our gardeners are busy collecting seeds from our native plant collection, storing the genetic programming for the coming years. Seeds are stored in the Chestnut Lodge, each labeled to identify species, date and location they were collected. This information will then be added to our accession records once these seeds germinate and are planted back into the gardens. SHR takes great pride in our meticulous data collection as this is the lifeblood of the landscape; knowing where we come from will help steer us where we are going in the future. ...
Soils: Nourishing Gardens from the Ground Up
Soils are the backbone of the landscape, nurturing gardens from the ground up. As we transition from warm late summer months into the harvest of fall, now is the time to evaluate your garden’s soil conditions and plan for next year. The health of your gardens is determined by the health of your soils. Understanding ...
Gardener’s Corner: Summer Edition
With the onset of the warm summer months, the gardens are at their fullest and our gardeners are busy adding new native plants to our garden rooms and maintaining them daily, preventing pests and weeds from encroaching into the landscape. We are pleased to see a positive impact on the gardens from the implementation of our most recent water mitigation best management practices. By controlling the direction of water flow and rate at which water moves across the landscape, we are able to minimize the need for maintenance following heavy precipitation events. We’re adding mulch and soil to low areas that have been washed out by rainfall. In the Vasyei creek, we’re adding additional rock to slow the flow of water and prevent further washout. The increase of intensity and frequency of precipitation events is a by-product of climate change. By planning ahead and implementing measures now, we mitigate the negative effects of climate change at the Reserve....
“Women of the Woods” Write New Chapter in a Multi-Generational Story of Conservation in Partnership with Southern Highlands Reserve
The Waighstill Avery Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR) have played a role in conservation spanning over 100 years in Western North Carolina, from a pre-war forest once forgotten and now found, to nurturing the future of spruce-fir forests in our region today. Once carpeted with red spruce and fir, our high elevation mountain landscapes ...
Where the Wild Things Are: Annual Symposium Addresses the Role of the Wild in Garden Design, Invasive Species Management and Human History
On May 13th, 2017, SHR’s Founders and staff welcomed a sold out crowd to learn from renowned experts in horticulture at our seventh Native Plant Symposium. Following a brief welcome by one of SHR’s Founders Robert Balentine and Executive Director Kelly Holdbrooks, keynote speaker Claudia West gave an engaging lecture based on her recent publication ...
Celebrating National Pollinator Week at Home and in Your Garden
Although pollinators are busy year-round, the third week in June is celebrated as National Pollinator Week, this year falling on June 19-25, 2017. If you’ve eaten today or enjoyed the view in your gardens, you’ll understand why people dedicate a whole week to celebrating pollinators: they provide invaluable services most of us take for granted ...
Southern Highlands Reserve Awarded a $16,000 Open Space Preservation Grant from the Blue Ridge National Heritage Area to Restore Red Spruce in Western North Carolina
Southern Highlands Reserve (SHR) is honored to announce that it has been awarded the Open Space Preservation Grant from the Blue Ridge National Heritage Area (BRNHA). SHR will use this $16,000 grant to help restore red spruce to endangered spruce-fir ecosystems on public lands in Western North Carolina. BRNHA is a nonprofit organization charged with ...
Library of American Landscape History Presents Betty and Robert Balentine with its Prestigious “Preservation Heroes” Award
On Friday, April 8th in Atlanta, Georgia, members of the Board of Directors from the Library of American Landscape History (LALH) along with friends and colleagues of the Southern Highlands Reserve and its staff gathered to present Betty and Robert Balentine with the annual LALH Preservation Heroes Award. The LALH Preservation Hero Award is presented ...
Green Infrastructure: Designing with Best Water Management Practices to Conserve Resources
Water is our most precious resource. We’ve all heard this phrase before, but it always seems the things that are a part of our lives every day are the things we most often take for granted. Access to clean water is a vital part of our lives that would not be possible without the services provided by the ecosystems that support our global habitat. Forests and soils provide filtration services, plants participate in the transpiration process, pulling water out of the soil and releasing it into the atmosphere through their leaves and needles. Perfectly balanced by nature over eons, these processes are now being disrupted by a changing climate and human development....
Women of the Woods: How the Daughters of the American Revolution Found a Forgotten Forest
On October 14, 2016, the clouds parted to cast a few glimmers of sunlight on a special ceremony taking place on the Blue Ridge Parkway. Honoring nearly 100 years of conservation, members of the Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR) gathered together to commemorate a forest once forgotten to the light of knowledge. The forest of 50,000 red spruce was planted in 1941-1943 by the Civilian Conservation Corps and dedicated to the deceased daughters of the American Revolution, but its location and existence was almost completely forgotten. As if illuminated by a divine mirror to commemorate the moment the forest was remembered, the sun shone down through the clouds on the unveiling of the memorial wayside sign honoring the rediscovery of the DAR Jubilee Memorial Forest. ...
Stanley Smith Horticultural Trust Awards Southern Highlands Reserve with a $20,000 Grant to Build Digital Native Plant Research Database
Southern Highlands Reserve is honored to announce the award of a $20,000 grant from the Stanley Smith Horticultural Trust. The grant will support SHR’s development of a customized digital database to store the Reserve’s plant accession records, phenology, weather data, and more. The research database will further enhance the Reserve’s capacity of native plants in the Southern Appalachian Mountains, one of the world’s biologically significant hot spots. With the database, horticulturalists can conduct research on our native plant collection from anywhere in the world....
Southern Highlands Reserve Featured in Franklin Press
Southern Highlands Reserve was recently featured in the Franklin Press thanks to columnist Bob Gilbert, who visited the Reserve for its Annual Symposium. Gilbert writes about the Reserve, its Founders, gardens, and purpose....
Southern Highlands Reserve Partners with Harvard University’s Arnold Arboretum, Contributes to “The Campaign for Living Collections”
In early October, Southern Highlands Reserve had the distinct honor of welcoming Robert Dowell and Jenna Zukswert, Fellows of the Campaign for Living Collections at Harvard University’s Arnold Arboretum for a tour of the Reserve and to share seeds for native plants grown on the Reserve. Established to expand the Arboretum’s collection through exploration, collection and ...
Cullowhee Native Plant Conference Attendees Experience SHR’s Rich Biodiversity during Conference Field Trip
For nearly two decades, the Cullowhee Native Plant Conference at Western Carolina University has been a long-time favorite educational conference of landscape professionals across the country. With over 20 field trips, this 5-day conference hosts many types of in-depth opportunities to learn about native plants from experts including lectures, workshops, and field trips. The Cullowhee ...
Southern Appalachian Spruce Restoration Initiative (SASRI) Signs Charter Agreement with SHR for Red Spruce Restoration Projects Across Southern Appalachian Mountains
Southern Highlands Reserve is proud to announce its formal long-term partnership with the Southern Appalachian Spruce Restoration Initiative (SASRI) to restore red spruce and the vitality of spruce-fir forests in the Southern Appalachian Mountains. This summer, SHR signed a charter with organizations and government agencies such as The Nature Conservancy, U.S. Forest Service, U.S Fish ...
Plant with Natives in Your Garden at SHR’s Annual Plant Sale
Our seasonal Native Plant Sale is coming up just around the corner! Join us on August 19th and 20th and bring home a few of the native plants featured in the gardens of Southern Highlands Reserve. We will have available many of the azaleas and other shrubs you have seen at the Reserve for sale ...
SHR Announces the Installation of its View Site Sculpture by Wesley Wofford Studios
This year’s visitor season marks a milestone for SHR – its second art installation in the gardens! Inspired by the maps used by the National Parks Service along the Blue Ridge Parkway to help park goers identify mountain peaks along the horizon, SHR installed a bronze bas relief map naming the mountains seen from the ...
Cherokee Garden Club of Atlanta Coordinates “Partners for Plants” Wetland Revegetation Project at Great Smoky Mountains National Park with SHR, National Parks Service, Volunteers
On the weekend of June 10-12, SHR founders and staff joined members of the Cherokee Garden Club of Atlanta, Peachtree Garden Club, French Broad Garden Club, public land managers with the National Parks Service, and other dedicated native plant lovers for a special weekend to help revegetate a wetland area near the southern entrance to ...
SHR Presents its First Feature Film: “Genus Loci: Southern Highlands Reserve”
During this year’s Symposium, SHR premiered the final version of “Genus Loci: Southern Highlands Reserve,” a 17-minute feature film three years in the making. Featuring interviews with the Reserve’s founders Betty and Robert Balentine, landscape architect Gary Smith, and consultants, artisans, and key partners, the film the story of how the Reserve was created. As ...
Native Plant Experts Speak at Southern Highlands Reserve’s Annual Symposium: “Balance and Function: The Role of Native Plants in our Ecosystems”
On Saturday, May 14th, horticulturalists, gardeners, landscape designers and plant lovers gathered on Toxaway Mountain at Southern Highlands Reserve’s Native Plant Symposium to learn about gardening with plants that are native to the Southern Appalachian Mountains. This year’s theme “Balance and Function: The Role of Native Plants in our Ecosystems” showcased how native plants provide ...
Southern Highlands Reserve Participates in National Public Garden Day Celebration with Gardens Across the U.S., Gives Native Plant Seedling to Visitors
Visitors to Southern Highlands Reserve on May 3rd celebrated National Public Gardens Day with a garden tour and took a part of the garden home with them. Every year, gardens like the Southern Highlands Reserve celebrate National Public Gardens Day to raise awareness about the importance of environmental stewardship and conservation. This year, Southern Highlands ...
Native Plant Experts to Speak at Southern Highlands Reserve’s Annual Symposium: “Balance and Function: The Role of Native Plants in our Ecosystems”
On Saturday, May 14th, horticulturalists, gardeners, landscape designers and plant lovers will gather on Toxaway Mountain at Southern Highlands Reserve’s Native Plant Symposium to learn about gardening with plants that are native to the Southern Appalachian Mountains. This year’s theme “Balance and Function: The Role of Native Plants in our Ecosystems” will showcase how native ...
Wet and Wild: A Partners for Plants Wetland Revegetation Weekend and Optional Camping Trip
As a member of Garden Clubs of America, the Cherokee Garden Club is pleased to present “Wet & Wild: A Partners for Plants Wetlands Revegetation Weekend” to be held on June 10-12, 2016 in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park to celebrate the 100 year anniversary of the National Park System. The purpose of the event is to revegetate a marshy site cleared of invasive exotics in 2014 with genotypes of native sedges, rushes, alders, swamp roses and other select native plants collected by the National Parks Service....