The Land Clearing

The land clearing is proceeding quickly and is plainly visible from the Garden’s backdoor. You can see the progress that’s been made from the attached aerial photo. Staff have captured wonderful photos and video of specimen trees coming out. One is a beautiful laurel fig (Ficus nitida), which is headed for a temporary home near Gumby (the gumbo-limbo from Marco) but ultimately it will preside over the future children’s garden. A giant black mangrove (Avcennia germinans) is being rescued and later will be positioned near the birding tower at end of the river of grass.

The butterfly house is quickly being transformed into a temporary shade and orchid house. Work started on the far end, potting up bromeliads from the conure area. Now it’s home to valuable Brazilian palms from the Windstar Garden Room. The rainforest plants in the honeycreeper section are next to come out.

Most of the remaining birds from the Butterfly House are on their way to Miami. Our finches, honeycreepers, and cardinals are actually returning home--that’s where they came from in the first place. We have two saffron finches and one red-capped cardinal who are playing hard to get. We’ll try again to outwit them next week.

Two interns have joined the horticulture staff for the summer. Eric Van Arsdale, a sophomore at Brown University studying environmental science, is working with Chad Washburn. Kelly Cadenas has a PhD in neurobiology and is working with Carolyn Miller.

George Wilder updated staff recently on his work. He has been exploring the Panhandle, documenting vegetation for the herbarium. Another ongoing project is studying plants on Marco Island. He’s fascinated by this coastal community and is working with Mike Owens to identify and document their finds.

Windstar Garden Room has a new look--blank. The Brazilian rainforest is gone and on the sidelines are some fresh plants that will soon be installed. For this go-round, we chose durable plants that will be at home in low light conditions.

You should have your NBG newsletter this week in the mail. It has more details on Garden activities and the schedule of events. Don’t forget Sue Gallagher’s plant sale June 28. She always has an amazing selection of plants at reasonable prices.

I’ll be vacation next week so I’ll miss sending this email on June 20^th. I promise to catch you up with the news in the following week’s email!

Regards,

Linda Coyner

Horticulturist

Naples Botanical Garden

4820 Bayshore Drive

Naples Florida 34112-7336

239-643-7275