How glad I am that spring has come, and how it calms my mind when wearied with study to walk out in the green fields and beside the pleasant streams! … The older I grow, the more do I love spring and spring flowers. Is it not so with you?
– Emily Dickinson
(Letter of May 16, 1848 to Abiah Root. Pictured is a page from Emily Dickinson’s herbarium, Houghton Library, Harvard University)
ONLINE | Asynchronous Class Open through May 30
Poet and journal keeper May Sarton wrote, “Everything that slows us down and forces patience, everything that sets us back into the slow circles of nature, is a help. Gardening is an instrument of grace.” Enjoy the grace of each season in the garden with Clara Curtis, the Arboretum’s Senior Director of Mission Delivery and designer of many of our cultivated spaces and seasonal landscape exhibits. In a slide presentation, Clara shares the beauty of plants that are at their best with the emergence of spring in the mountains. Join us for a garden stroll with Clara to take an in-person close look at the landscape in Spring Plants of Interest Garden Walk (register separately).
ONLINE | Four Sessions: Tuesdays & Thursdays, May 30 – June 8, 10 – 11 a.m.
Water flow across a diverse geological framework shapes the Earth’s surface. The process of surface water flow and the earth’s response to this flow is investigated across three physiographic provinces, including the Blue Ridge, Piedmont, Coastal Plains/Continental Shelf. Processes and responses include erosion, sediment transport, and formation of associated depositional environments.
Online registration for this class is closed online. Contact adulteducation@ncarboretum.org with your interest to join.
ONLINE | Asynchronous Class Open through August 31
Poet and journal keeper May Sarton wrote, “Everything that slows us down and forces patience, everything that sets us back into the slow circles of nature, is a help. Gardening is an instrument of grace.” Enjoy the grace of each season in the garden with Clara Curtis, the Arboretum’s Senior Director of Mission Delivery and designer of many of our cultivated spaces and seasonal landscape exhibits. In a slide presentation, Clara shares the beauty of plants that are at their best with summer’s growing season in full bloom. Join us for a garden stroll with Clara to take an in-person close look at the landscape in Summer Plants of Interest Garden Walk (register separately).
ONSITE | Three Sessions: Sundays, June 4 – 18, 10 a.m. – 4 p.m.
Come gather wisdom in a woodland setting for fun and effective activities, games, and facilitation skills that are proven tools for teaching about nature connection and ecology. You will learn playful and experiential ways to connect individuals and groups of all ages with native plants, animals and ecosystems. Explore techniques for making these experiences meaningful and memorable.
ONSITE | Tuesday, June 6, 8:30 – 10:30 a.m.
The Blue Ridge Mountains are a beautiful place to be in the any season and this walk has been designed to visit some of the best spots to enjoy early birding at the Arboretum. Bring your binoculars to explore the area’s avian bounty. Open to beginning and experienced birders alike.
FIELD | Friday, June 9, 10 a.m. – 12 p.m.
Understand the importance of healthy natural water systems through application of learning about processes and responses in the field. Participants will meet and travel to different locations to consider processes and responses such as erosion, sediment transport, and formation of associated depositional environments.
ONSITE | Saturday, June 10, 9 – 11:30 a.m.
Be present in the moment and deepen your connection in nature and in community with this immersive experience set in the Arboretum forest. Certified forest therapy guide Christa Hebal will extend a series of invitations, instructing participants in mindful practices that encourage deepening levels of awareness of inner and surrounding landscapes. Inspired by Shinrin-Yoku, the Japanese art of immersing oneself in a forest environment, a forest bathing walk can invite healing on many levels, starting within and moving outward in the renewed intention to protect where we are in place and on the planet. It is nature as therapy! Presented through Adult & Continuing Education Programs in collaboration with Asheville Wellness Tours.
ONSITE | Sunday, June 11, 10:15 a.m. – 12 p.m.
Let’s enjoy a quiet, mindful stroll through the forest together. A silent hike takes us to scenic treasures on the Arboretum trails where we will pause to do a restorative qigong practice. Qigong is a series of simple movements that supports the body’s natural healing processes, promotes healthy circulation, invites inner calm, and releases tension from the body. Hikes will be mindfully-paced and qigong practices easy and accessible. Participants should feel comfortable covering about 2.5 miles of trail-walking, including some gradual inclines.
ONLINE | Two Sessions: Wednesdays, June 14 & 21, 1:30 – 3 p.m.
The process of transforming a landscape into a sustainable, ecologically-sound garden that you love is a rewarding aspect of being a gardener. Understanding plants and their inter-relationships is key to creating a landscape that’s a joy, not a chore. In this two-part class, Lisa Wagner will help you better understand how to assess the ecological robustness of your landscape and how to incorporate those observations in your long-term garden planning. We’ll talk about the components needed to create a resilient ecological food web of largely native trees, shrubs, and perennials which will work over the seasons (and years), as well as creating a welcoming landscape. The second session will allow us to collectively re-envision our landscapes and incorporate the features we’ve discussed. We’ll talk about how to incorporate a year-round perspective, as you choose and combine trees, shrubs that provide sustenance throughout the year.
ONLINE | Thursday, June 15, 6 – 7 p.m.
A local birding patch is a fairly small area that you bird regularly. Birding your local patch is important for learning the seasonal movements of common species and becoming familiar with the appearance and vocalizations of the birds of the area you claim as your special place. We will learn about several great local birding locations and also how to use eBird to keep track of your sightings.
ONLINE | Five Sessions: Tuesdays, June 20 – July 25, 10 – 11 a.m.
NOTE: No class on Tuesday, July 4 — class will meet online on Wednesday, July 5, 10 – 11 a.m.; No class on July 18
Learn to identify native mountain flora using a non-technical keying system, while studying the characteristics of plant families, the basics of plant community and the natural and the cultural history of the flora of the Blue Ridge. Presented online with resources, quizzes and exercises provided for conducting observations in the “field,” meaning your own yard or neighborhood, the Arboretum or other trails in the region. A field version of this class and additional botanizing walks are available separately.
FIELD | Five Sessions: Wednesdays, June 21 – July 26, 9 a.m. – 12 p.m.+
NOTE: No class on Wednesday, July 5 — class will shift to Thursday, July 6, 9 a.m. – 12 p.m.+ No class will be held on July 19.
In this entirely field-based class led by Naturalist Scott Dean, you will learn to identify native mountain flora on the trail by training your eyes and using a non-technical dichotomous keying system. You will study the characteristics of plant families and the basics of plant communities all in place. While the focus is on summer wildflowers and trees, you will also pick up a wealth of information on the natural and cultural history of the native flora of the Blue Ridge. Participants in the field class have access to the online class and may attend the live-time meeting or access course materials and recordings on their own time. Newcomb’s Wildflower Guide and Wildflowers of Tennessee, the Ohio Valley and the Southern Appalachians are recommended as references.
ONSITE | Wednesday, June 21, 1 – 2 p.m.
Join Clara Curtis, the Arboretum’s Senior Director for Mission Delivery, in this walk through the summer landscape. With decades of design and horticulture oversight at the Arboretum, Clara is our walking institutional memory for how plants came to be chosen for the gardens and what transformation the landscape has seen over 35 years of growing in place. You can have no better informed guide and no one who makes plants more interesting! This class is designed to provide a small-group experience to complement our online Plants of Interest course, which is a Blue Ridge Eco Gardener requirement.
FIELD | Thursday, June 22, 9 a.m. – 4 p.m.
This small-group experience is limited to ten participants and is now sold out. Please indicate interest on the Adult Ed Wait List for any spots that might come open. Thanks for your interest!
The Highlands of Roan: The very name sounds like something out of yore. Straddling the border of Tennessee’s Carter County and North Carolina’s Mitchell and Avery Counties, the Roan Highlands region is a showcase of biological diversity, punctuated by grassy balds, rhododendron gardens, high-elevation rock outcrops, southern Appalachian bogs, and rich spruce-fir forests. The Roan’s ecosystem, with more than 800 plant species and over 188 bird species, is one of the richest repositories of temperate zone biodiversity on earth, including more federally listed plant species than the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. While home to many distinctive and fascinating species, Roan Mountain is perhaps most famous for its stands of Catawba rhododendron (Rhododendron catawbiense) and flame azalea (Rhododendron calendulaceum), considered the largest natural rhododendron garden in the world and celebrated for spectacular June displays of purple and gold. Naturalist, wildflower expert, and veteran guide Scott Dean and horticulturist Carson Ellis, curator of the Arboretum’s National Native Azalea Garden, are hike co-leaders. Together they pack an encyclopedic knowledge of local flora.
ONSITE | Saturday, June 24, 9 – 11:30 a.m.
Be present in the moment and deepen your connection in nature and in community with this immersive experience set in the Arboretum forest. Certified forest therapy guide Christa Hebal will extend a series of invitations, instructing participants in mindful practices that encourage deepening levels of awareness of inner and surrounding landscapes. Inspired by Shinrin-Yoku, the Japanese art of immersing oneself in a forest environment, a forest bathing walk can invite healing on many levels, starting within and moving outward in the renewed intention to protect where we are in place and on the planet. It is nature as therapy! Presented through Adult & Continuing Education Programs in collaboration with Asheville Wellness Tours.
ONSITE | Saturday, June 24, 10 – 11:30 a.m.
Naturalist Scott Dean leads this wildflower walk through the Arboretum gardens and forest, pointing out the array of wildflowers emerging to bloom in early summer. Learn some basics of wildflower ecology and identification while taking in the beauty of the season.
ONSITE | Saturday, June 24, 10 a.m. – 12 p.m. & 2 – 4 p.m.
Watch your Step! Don’t touch that! Is it poisonous? This day-long field experience meets onsite in the Arboretum forest. You’ll learn to identify those plants and animals that could be harmful or unpleasant should you get too close! Some of the hazards we’ll see and discuss include bees and other stinging insects, venomous snakes and spiders, ticks, and poisonous plants and mushrooms.
ONSITE | Sunday, June 25, 9 – 10:15 a.m.
Connect with nature in place at the Arboretum. Join Instructor Jenne Sluder for a morning of relaxation and quiet meditation in our garden setting. The session begins with gentle breath-based movement and tension-release practice. These gentle yoga and qigong movements are easy and calming, and they can be done standing or seated in a chair (your preference). A silent walking meditation through the garden allows us to be fully present to the wonders of nature. The session closes with a relaxing sound bath that can be enjoyed either seated or lying-down (your preference).
ONSITE | Thursday, June 29, 2 – 4:30 p.m.
Correctly pruning woody trees and shrubs improves their general appearance and promotes plant health. Professional horticulturist Ben Pick leads this workshop that combines demonstration of various types of pruning — structural, aesthetic, regenerative, and corrective — along with a comprehensive overview of tools, techniques and timing, for successful pruning of small trees and flowering shrubs. Though it can be hard to know where to start, what to cut and what to leave, to keep trees and shrubs in your landscape healthy and beautiful, this interactive class will help provide a thorough and practical approach to pruning, while instilling confidence with some up-close examples in the garden.
ONLINE – Year Two Registration Underway! Learn from Arboretum Bonsai Curator Arthur Joura
The Curator’s Journal moves into its second year of offering weekly entries by Bonsai Curator Arthur Joura for the ultimate insider’s view of bonsai at The North Carolina Arboretum! Regular entries chronicle growing an art and growing an enterprise. Subscribers will have exclusive access to all-new original content generated by Joura and will be notified each week when a new entry is posted.
Preview free entries on the Curator’s Journal site and join us for this learning journey. With Joura as a knowledgeable guide, Journal subscribers forgo the map and travel in time to meet remarkable trees, each with stories and life lessons worth sharing.
ON DEMAND
Arboretum Production Greenhouse Manager June Smathers-Jolley leads this engaging and packed-full-of-useful-information class on how to be a good plant parent to your houseplants. June shares on-trend resources from the horticulture industry, popular magazines, and social media that will make you want to adopt a few new family members of the botanical variety. Topics to be covered include selecting the best plants for different locations and conditions in your home, proper watering techniques, repotting, fertilizing, and pest identification/management.
ON DEMAND
Want to rejuvenate an older houseplant or share your plant with a friend? Arboretum Production Greenhouse Manager June Smathers-Jolley covers the basics of propagating houseplants through seeds, cuttings, division and air layering in this informative video, produced in-house by the Education Department’s creative team and available to watch “on demand” at your own convenience. Whether you have a colorful coleus, an aging aglaonema, a peppy peperomia, or a savvy succulent, you will pick up some proven techniques for expanding your houseplant collection.
For more information, contact Adult & Continuing Education Programs at AdultEducation@ncarboretum.org