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Seeking to arouse public awareness of the fragility of our natural environment…and providing information about ways to conserve and protect it.
Conservation and Restoration
Brooklyn Botanic Garden is deeply committed to conservation at the local, regional, and global levels, as well as to educating the public about the importance of plant diversity to ecosystem health and human life. Over the past year, BBG has played a major role in building coalitions among organizations dedicated to conservation and restoration.
BBG’s summer interpretive program, Quest for Plant Survival, educated visitors about the threat of plant extinction.
From July to September, BBG presented Quest for Plant Survival, a special summer-long interpretive program on plant conservation that featured a self-guided interpretive brochure, conservation-themed children's activities, and a special website. Focusing on such species as the maidenhair tree (Ginkgo biloba), the Amazon lily (Eucharis amazonica), and the dawn redwood (Metasequoia glyptostroboides), the summer highlight was open to all Garden visitors, giving them tangible lessons in plant conservation and informing a diverse audience of all ages how crucial it is to rescue endangered species from extinction.
This year BBG again hosted the U.S. office of Botanic Gardens Conservation International (BGCI-US). By bringing together the world's botanic gardens, BGCI-US seeks to create a broad community that works in partnership to achieve conservation and education goals—in particular, to raise awareness of the importance of plant conservation among the 200 million people who visit botanic gardens every year. The Investing In Nature program funded by HSBC Bank came to a close at the end of December 2006.
BGCI-US staff completed the North American Botanical Garden Strategy for Plant Conservation, which was published in spring 2007, and launched the plan at the American Public Garden Association conference in June. Dr. Steven Clemants spoke about this strategy at the 3rd Global Botanical Garden Conference, held in Wuhan, China, in April.
In collaboration with the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation, BBG is a partner in the Seeds of Success program, coordinated by the Plant Conservation Alliance and the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. Seeds of Success coordinates seed collection of native plant populations in the United States to increase the number of species and amount of native seed available for use in stabilizing, rehabilitating, and restoring land. BBG and the City's Department of Parks and Recreation are responsible for collecting seed of 100 native species from local populations. In August, BBG staff attended a seed collecting workshop at the Mt. Cuba Center in Greenville, Delaware, sponsored by the U.S. Bureau of Land Management and the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew.
The Garden, in partnership with the Center for Plant Conservation (CPC), is also responsible for collecting seed for five globally rare species: sea beach amaranth (Amaranthus pumilus), sensitive-joint vetch (Aeschynomene virginica), chaffseed (Schwalbea americana), Kniekern's beaked-rush (Rhynchospora knieskernii) and flowering pixiemoss (Pyxidanthera barbulata). In the past year, BBG staff established populations of flowering pixiemoss (Pyxidanthera barbulata) and sickleleaf silkgrass (Pityopsis falcata), a rare Long Island native, in the Native Flora collection.
Dr. Clemants continued as chair of the Invasive Plant Council of New York State over the past year and was master of ceremonies of "Invasive Plants on the Horizon and More," a two-day conference held in Albany. The large attendance at the conference—over 250 people—is a testament to how seriously invasive species are taken by New York State.
The Center for Urban Restoration Ecology (CURE), a joint venture between BBG and Rutgers University, continued to provide protocols for successful restoration of degraded urban environments. CURE is a partner with Field Operations, which won the New Jersey Urban Parks Master Plan Design Competition for Great Falls State Park in Paterson, New Jersey, sponsored by the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection, the New Jersey State Council on the Arts, and the New Jersey Institute of Technology's School of Architecture. Work has begun on a master plan for the site.
CURE is also working with the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation to determine if native plants that have adapted to survival in urban environments have distinct "urban" genotypes. This project is in its third year and will be complete in spring of 2008.