2023 Impact Report

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8 | Our 2023 Impact

Long Branch

Nursery Expansion

When Cincinnati Nature Center says

“plant native,” we mean all natives

and we are willing to do the hard

work to make sure people can do

just that.

ADAPTATION POSES CHALLENGE

One of the challenges in propagating native plants

is that many of them, particularly spring ephemerals

(forest wildflowers), have evolved diferent strategies

to propel their seeds far from the mother plant. Curious

adaptations like exploding seed heads means the

seedlings won’t have to grow in the shadow of their

parents, giving them an early head start. These same

adaptations, though, also reduce the number of seeds

to seed eating animals. Unfortunately for well-meaning

nursery staf, though, these adaptations make it difcult

to collect seeds for propagation.

Even when the seeds are collected, creating a sustainable

way to harvest the seeds from spring ephemerals is

tricky because the plants need full sun when they begin

blooming, but they continue to grow in the shade as the

canopy above fills with leaves. Trying to simulate this in

the confines of a greenhouse can be maddening. This is

one of the primary reasons that spring ephemerals are

not more popular in the horticulture industry.

FREE-RANGE WILDFLOWERS

Instead of trying to simulate Mother Nature indoors, we

have trained a stand of Boxelder Maples (Acer negundo)

to do the work for us. In February 2023, we pollarded a

few dozen Boxelders growing along a wooded boundary

of our nursery. That is, we cut the tops of the trees to

encourage the side branches to grow—and they quickly

did. Then, with strategically placed braces and strings, we

were able to create a bonzai-like stand of short Boxelders

with right-angled branches. In efect, we created an

open-sided shelter with a roof made of leaves. The

understory of this new shade nursery is being filled with

various species of spring ephemerals. The pollarded trees

will lose and grow leaves at precisely the time the flowers

need to grow and bloom.

CONTROLLING THE EXPLOSIONS

The last challenge we needed to overcome was how

to collect seeds from plants that evolved to cast their

seeds in all directions. If you’ve ever participated in the

wedding tradition of showering the happy couple with

rice (now seeds), you have likely seen the solution—

organza bags, i.e., small mesh bags. By carefully placing

small mesh bags over the flowers’ seed heads before they

are fully ripened, we’re able to collect the seeds without

fear of setting of the seed heads. If we accidentally kick

a plant while collecting seeds, it doesn’t matter because

the seeds get caught in the bags.

This type of ingenuity is important when you’re

among the first organizations to focus exclusively on

propagating native species. Even fewer organizations

have tried to propagate spring emphemerals because

of the very specific challenges they present to

horticulturists. But, when Cincinnati Nature Center says,

“plant native,” we mean all natives. And we’re willing to

do the hard work to make sure people can do just that.

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