Horticulture Training Program: Information Session on March 23, 2013
We are now accepting applications for the Horticulture Training Program 2013-2014 at UBC Botanical Garden.Â
Information Session
Date: Saturday, March 23, 2013
Time: 3:00 p.m.
Location: UBC Botanical Garden
Running from September to May, the fullÂtime Horticulture Training Program is designed to give students the skills and experience necessary for entering the field of horticulture. Completion of 1100 hours of classroom and hands-on practical instruction and supervised practical work will lead to Levels I & II Apprenticeship technical training credit.
For more information on the Horticulture Training Program, click here.
New Volunteer Opportunities
Here at the Garden, we are beginning to think about spring and summer. We are looking for volunteers to guide tours and assist with special events.
Guides
Volunteer guides play a vital role in bringing the collection to life through engaging educational interactions with garden visitors. We are seeking volunteers who are passionate about ecology and botany, eager to share their knowledge with others, and interested in learning more about the plant world and biodiversity.
Events Volunteers
Events volunteers play a vital role in providing support to the garden staff and interacting with visitors during events. We are seeking volunteers who are interested in learning more about the biodiversity, ecology and botany, and sharing this interest with visitors.
Visit our website to learn more on our volunteer opportunities and how to apply.
Visit us all year long, and take advantage of discounts on our courses and lectures.
Get 10% off at the Shop in the Garden and Plant Centre when you present your membership card. You can buy or renew your membership in person, or online on our website. Thank you for your support.
Not sure if your membership has expired? Give us a call at 604.822.4208.
About the Garden
Established in 1916, UBC Botanical Garden curates a collection of ca. 12,000 plants, representing approximately 8,000 taxa from temperate regions around the world. The Greenheart Canopy Walkway offers an umparalleled aerial view of the west coast forest canopy ecosystem 15 metres above ground.
A message from our friends at Wesbrook Village:
Hop on down to Wesbrook Village for a free Easter egg hunt on Sat. Mar. 23, 2013. Details here. While you are there, purchase a full sized wrap or flatbread at Jugo Juice and receive a FREE 14oz. Smoothie*.
*Must purchase a full sized wrap or flatbread to receive a free 14oz smoothie. Valid at the Wesbrook Village location only. Offer expires April 30, 2013. No cash value. Not to be combined with any other offer.
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Continuing with the theme of gardens being held hostage by the vagaries of winter weather, I dare not predict which magnolias or rhododendrons will be early this year. Magnolia sargentiana flower openings, for example, can vary by more than six weeks (we know, because our volunteer FOGs have been recording this in the garden for more than twenty years). On the other hand, flowering in our Crocus and Narcissus seldom varies more than a week or two from one year to the next. Bulbs are significantly more reliable with respect to opening dates and most people have few reservations in making predictions about them.
In the E.H. Lohbrunner Alpine Garden, where most of the bulb diversity is found—indeed, where most of the Botanical Garden’s overall species diversity is found—there are hundreds of smaller bulbs swarming about the continental plantings. The majority of the spring bulbs produce their flowers in March. Getting a head start on March is Iris ‘Katherine Hodgkin’, a 10-cm-tall standout with pale liquid blue flowers with brilliant gold highlights. These bulbs are planted among the tufa in the Asia Minor section. Nearby are the brilliant cerise pink flowers of Cyclamen coum. The Europe section also has its share of bulbs, including a variety of Galanthus (snowdrops), Narcissus (daffodils), Leucojum (snowflakes) and Crocus.
Speaking of crocuses and daffodils, visitors to the garden in March will undoubtedly notice that the expanse of lawn in front of the Garden has been transformed by a newly naturalized bulb display. The inaugural class of UBC Botanical Garden Horticulture Training Program students planted nearly 10,000 of them last autumn. The bulbs, a generous gift to the program from Elizabeth Haan, include equal numbers of Crocus chrysanthus ‘Ruby Giant’ and ‘Cream Beauty’ (snow crocuses), Narcissus poeticus (pheasant’s eye) and N. bulbocodium (hoop petticoat daffodil).
Please come and enjoy these cheery flowers, as well as what other surprises might also be blooming in the Botanical Garden in March.
Nature and Culture:
Reflections on the Journey from Biodiversity and Culture to Biocultural Diversity (with Nancy Turner)
Thursday, March 7, 2013Â |Â 7:00 p.m.
UBC Earth Sciences Building, Room 1013 (2207 Main Mall, Vancouver)
By donation ($5 suggested)
Predominant in western thinking, at least for the past few centuries, is the dichotomy between “nature†and “cultureâ€, with humans seen to be above and dominant over nature. This perception, leading to particular behaviours and assumptions of those who adhere to it, it can be argued, has resulted in increasing degradation of natural systems, and an escalating loss of biodiversity the world over.
What is less recognized is that not all human cultures embrace this philosophy. For many Indigenous societies, for example, there is a predominant belief that humans are part of nature, close relatives of other species, and that not only do we depend on these other species, but we have responsibilities towards them as we do to our own kin.
This leads to a different kind of relationship with the natural world, and may give us clues about more sustainable ways of interacting with nature. However, these cultures with alternative views of the human-nature relationship are themselves widely threatened, and their knowledge and perspectives are being overrun by those of mainstream societies. Nevertheless, increasingly we are realizing that these differing cultural perspectives may be critically important in providing us with alternative models of relationships with other species and environments.
Join Nancy Turner as we explore why thinking of the importance not only of biodiversity but of biocultural diversity can help us to frame our attitudes, our governance systems, and our very understandings of what it is to be human, and may help us to become responsible players in the world’s ecosystems.
This lecture is made possible by the Wharton Memorial Fund. Donations are graciously accepted.
About the Speaker
Nancy Turner is an ethnobotanist, Distinguished Professor and Hakai Professor in Ethnoecology in the School of Environmental Studies, University of Victoria. She has worked with First Nations’ elders and cultural specialists in northwestern North America for over 40 years documenting and promoting their traditional knowledge of plants and habitats. She has authored or co-authored over 20 books and over 125 book chapters and papers. Nancy received an Honorary Doctoral Degree of Science from the University of British Columbia in 2011. Her awards include membership in the Order of British Columbia (1999) and the Order of Canada (2009).
Peter Wharton Memorial Fund
Peter Wharton had a long and productive career with UBC Botanical Garden. For 30 years, he was instrumental in developing the David C. Lam Asian Garden, one of the highlights of the Botanical Garden. In honour of his contributions to horticulture and plant conservation, and in consultation with his family, the Botanical Garden established the Peter Wharton Memorial Fund to support an annual lecture on plant conservation and biodiversity.
Parking
The nearest parking is in West Parkade, two blocks south of the Earth Sciences Building on Lower Mall. For more information on how to get to the building, please click here. Fine Print: Groupons, discount coupons or other promotional offers cannot be applied to the ticket price when purchasing tickets for special lectures/events.
Pruning Course (Space is still available!)
Saturday, March 2, 2013, 10:00 am – 1:00 pm
UBC Botanical Garden Reception Centre
$45 public, $35 garden members & UBC students
A blend of classroom and field discussion with hands on learning of the basics of pruning.
Drawing Nature Course (NEW!)
Sunday, March 24, 2013, 10:00 am – 4:00 pm
UBC Botanical Garden Reception Centre
$100 public, $90 garden members & UBC students
This one day class we will cover basic drawing techniques and how a limited number of watercolours can create a wonderfully full palette!
Tuesday, April 9, 2013, 6:00 – 9:00 pm
UBC Botanical Garden Garden Pavilion
$48 public, $43 garden members & UBC students
Learn to grow fresh fruits and veggies the city dweller’s way, with containers!
Urban Organic Gardening Course
Saturday, May 4, 2013, 9:30 am – 4:30 pm
UBC Botanical Garden Reception Centre
$60 public, $50 garden members & UBC students
Are you an urban gardener? Join Linda Gilkeson for a class focussed on intensive food production in small spaces.
Espalier Course – June 7
Friday, June 7, 2013, 12:00 – 3:00 pm
UBC Botanical Garden Reception Centre
$45 public, $35 garden members & UBC students
Espalier is a pruning technique of training fruit trees into interesting shapes. Learn the basics with Brendan Fisher, our food garden horticulturist.
Espalier Course – June 14
Friday, June 14, 2013, 12:00 – 3:00 pm
UBC Botanical Garden Reception Centre
$45 public, $35 garden members & UBC students
Espalier is a pruning technique of training fruit trees into interesting shapes. Learn the basics with Brendan Fisher, our food garden horticulturist.
Lecture
Tuesday, April 23, 2013, 5:30 pm – 6:30 pm
UBC Botanical Garden Reception Centre
Free
Join our Curator of Collections for a talk on how complexity and biodiversity make gardens more resilient.
For more information on our courses and lectures, please click here.
Spring has sprung in the Shop in the Garden since we are receiving exciting new merchandise weekly.
Budding beauties in the Garden Centre are forsythia and Corylopsis pauciflora. Flowering right now is a nice selection of Sarcococca, and Kerria japonica ‘Pleniflora’ is in glorious yellow bloom!
Native delight Ribes sanguineum is loaded with buds. Rare, special rhododendrons are in and we have received some gorgeous pink and white paeonia trees. For those of you who are rare plant collectors, we have a very limited amount of Hepatica transsilvanica as well as a special variety of Chrysoplenium macrophyllum!
In the Shop, some of our new giftware themes are owls: antiqued iron fence post sitters, ceramic votives with cut-outs that will flicker beautifully when lit, whimsical wooden ornaments and cute little wrought iron owls in various sizes.
Insect motifs are elegantly beautiful on matte white porcelain votives and little bowls in both round and elliptical shapes. You will also find a pretty dragonfly bell to suspend in your garden. A staff favourite is a white ceramic French Bulldog watering can.
For more information on the Shop in the Garden, click here. To see more photos from the Shop, visit our Flickr page. Books at the Shop
The Shop has just received Saanich Ehtnobotany, the most recent book of Nancy Turner, ethnobotanist and professor of Ethnoecology at the University of Victoria. Nancy has worked closely with First Nations Elders for many years to record their knowledge, use and understanding of plants. We carry her two classics in the field: Food Plants of Coastal First Peoples and Food Plants of Interior First Peoples, as well as her more recent Plants of Haida Gwaii and an edited collection of essays entitled Keeping it Living: Tradition of Plant Use and Cultivation on the Northwest Coast of British Columbia. Don’t miss her upcoming lecture, Nature and Culture: Reflections on the Journey from Biodiversity and Culture to Biocultural Diversity on March 7.
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