Design & Beyond 2014 

    David Culp is the creator of the gardens at Brandywine Cottage in Downingtown, Pennsylvania.  David has been lecturing about gardens nationwide for more than 15 years.  His  articles have appeared in Martha Stewart Living, Country Living, Fine Gardening, Green Scene, and many other publications.  He is a former contributing editor to Horticulture magazine and served as chairman of the Mid-Atlantic Hardy Plant Society.  David is Vice President for Sunny Border Nurseries in Connecticut.  He is author of the book The Layered Garden:  Design Lessons for Year-Round Beauty from Brandywine Cottage published by Timber Press. Culp is an herbaceous perennials instructor at Longwood Gardens in Kennett Square, PA.  In 2013, The Layered Garden won the coveted Best Overall Book by the Garden Writers Association. He has developed the Brandywine Hybrid strain of hellebores and was recently cited in the Wall Street Journal for his expertise on snowdrops.  His garden has been featured several times in Martha Stewart Living and on HGTV.  Brandywine Cottage is listed in the Smithsonian Institution Archives of American Gardens.  Culp is a recipient of the Distinguished Garden Award from the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society.  He has also been awarded the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society Award of Merit.  He serves on the Pennsylvania Horticultural Societies Gold Medal Plant Selection Committee.  For more about David L. Culp, please visit www.davidlculp.com 

In the presentation The Layered Garden: Design Lessons for Year-Round Beauty from Brandywine Cottage, David will show us how to recreate the majestic display of his beloved two-acre Pennsylvania garden, Brandywine Cottage. It contains a basic lesson in layering—how to choose the correct plants by understanding how they grow and change throughout the seasons, how to design a layered garden, and tips on maintaining it. To illustrate how layering works, David will take you on a virtual tour through each part of his celebrated garden: the woodland garden, the perennial border, the kitchen garden, the shrubbery, and the walled garden. The lecture culminates with his signature plants for all four seasons.  His second presentation will be 50 Perennials I Cannot Live Without. 

Debra Knapke, the self-described "Garden Sage"

  Debra Knapke has loved plants as long as she can remember, from helping in her father's vegetable garden as a child, to filling her college apartment with plants, and now gardening at her own home on almost an acre of land.  After two other careers, in 1992 Debra turned her avocation of plant study and gardening into her full-time career.     

  

Known as the Garden Sage, Knapke is passionate about gardening and the natural world and enjoys sharing knowledge through her books, magazine and newsletter articles, guest appearances on the radio program All Sides with Ann Fisher, and teaching in the Landscape Design and Management Program at Columbus State Community College.   As part of her commitment to engage with and teach about the natural world, she was one of the founding members of the Stewards of Metro Parks; an organization that supports the mission and work of the Columbus and Franklin County Metropolitan Park District.  Another passion is sustainable garden design and the history of gardening.  In addition to her many private clients, Debra has been involved in public garden design in the Central Ohio area.  She was on the Design Committee for The Sister’s Garden at Inniswood Metro Gardens, a children’s garden that combines cultivated gardens with natural spaces. Currently she is involved with the design of Flint Cemetery in Worthington, Ohio. Her books, written with Allison Beck, include Perennials for Ohio, Annuals for Ohio, Gardening Month by Month in Ohio, Best Garden Plants for Ohio , and Herb Gardening for the Midwest, written with Laura Peters.  For more information, please visit her website: www.DebraTheGardenSage.com

 Debra will present: Simplifying Your Garden without Diminishing Your Joy. There are many reasons to simplify your garden: moving to a smaller home and yard, physically not being able to maintain a larger garden or just making the choice to define what you want from your garden instead of trying to have it all. True success in simplifying your life and subsequently your garden, depends on understanding its parts, and how they fit within the bigger picture. And, the way to find joy in your garden is to know what you want from it and not going crazy trying to achieve it. Debra will use her own garden and others’ to provide inspiration for the creation of a simpler, blissful garden.

Jim McCormac, Ohio Division of Wildlife

  

   Jim works for the Ohio Division of Wildlife, specializing in nongame wildlife diversity issues, especially birds. Prior to that, he was a botanist with the Ohio Department of Natural Resources.  He was inaugural president of the Ohio Ornithological Society and was the 2009 recipient of the Ludlow Griscom award, given annually by the American Birding Association to individuals who have made significant regional contributions to ornithology.  He is author of Birds of Ohio (Lone Pine 2004); The Great Lakes Nature Guide (Lone Pine 2009); and Wild Ohio: The Best of Our Natural Heritage (Kent State University Press 2009). The latter won the 2010 Ohioana Book award. Jim writes a column, Nature, for the Columbus Dispatch, has authored or co-authored over 100 scientific and popular articles in a variety of publications, and has delivered hundreds of presentations throughout the eastern United States. He is at work on a book about wood-warblers, which is slated for release in 2014. 

 

Jim will share a presentation on Butterflies and Their Darker Side, the Moths.  Our enchantment with butterflies isn’t surprising. They fly, are easily observed, collectively encompass a rainbow palette of colors, and are adorned with ornate patterns. Increasing the allure of butterflies is the fact that we can draw many species to our gardens by planting appropriate host and nectar plants. Moth species outnumber butterflies by a factor of twenty, and are equally fascinating. Most moths are nocturnal and largely out of sight, out of mind. Nonetheless, they are arguably even more important than showy butterflies. This program will explore the amazing four-part life cycle of butterflies and moths, their ecological roles in the environment, and practical ways that we can support them.

 

Danae Wolfe, Extension Educator, Agriculture and Natural Resources, Summit County, Western Reserve EERA

  Danae started with OSU Extension in June 2012 as Summit County's Agriculture and Natural Resources Extension Educator. Before coming to Extension, Danae worked for the National Park Service as an interpretive park ranger in Cuyahoga Valley National Park. As a park ranger, her primary role was to educate the public about the threat of invasive plants. Danae has continued educa  ting the public about invasive plants in her new role as an Extension Educator. She has also begun teaching the community about the importance of sustainable gardening and incorporating native plants in the home landscape. In her free time, Danae is an avid macro nature photographer. As part of her OSU Extension program, she teaches photography workshops as a way to increase environmental awareness and stewardship.

Last year, Danae gave a crash course in identifying and removing invasive plants from your home landscape. This year, she will follow up with a short presentation about native gardening - Go  Native!  Explore the many benefits of incorporating native plants into your garden and learn about a new way of designing your home landscape.