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2008 Fall Gardening Symposium>
Speaker Biographies
2008 Fall Gardening Symposium
Jim Collins, ASLA - "Landscaping with Native Plants"
- UGA grad with degrees in Horticulture, Landscape Architecture, and Forestry.
- Owner and Principal Landscape Architect of referral only Landscape Design company.
- Designs have won many awards for excellence.
- Instructor of residential landscape design classes at several Art Centers since 1981.
- Former Board Member of the Spruill Center for 12 years and now serving on the Advisory Committee.
- Author of book 'Green Side Up, the Landscape Survival Guide for the Homeowner.
- Author of weekly Landscape email of information to students and clients as well as referrals.
- Pretty good cook.
- Strange sense of humor.
- Drives a Jeep.
- Has a BIG dog.
- Has a multitude of adopted felines.
- Married to Pat and have three kids James, Alan and Gina; a recent grandad.
- Loves to fish with a flyrod.
Mary Donovan - "Redesigning & CreatingGardens for the Baby Boomers"
Donovan Design, LLC is a full service design firm handling projects throughout the northern suburbs of Atlanta, Georgia, including Alpharetta, Buford, Cumming, Dacula, Duluth, Dunwoody, Hamilton Mill, John's Creek, Lawrenceville, Roswell, Suwanee, and Sugar Hill.
Mary Chapman Donovan, The Color Authority, began her design career handling only interior design projects. Over time, her clients convinced her that they needed her help with all areas of their properties. First it was, "Mary, can you tell us what colors to repaint the house?, then it was "Mary, can you tell us what plants and plant colors we need in our containers?", "How about our annual flower beds?", then it was "Mary, can you help us with our entire landscape?". At that point Mary returned for her second college degree, this one in Environmental Horticulture with a specialty in Landscape Design.
Address: #140 400 Peachtree Ind. Blvd. Suite 5 ~ Suwanee, GA 30024
Telephone: 770-614-1600
E-mail: Mary at Donovan Design or Mary at The Color Authority www.thecolorauthority.net
Topics: Curb Appeal; Four Seasons in the Garden; Creating Harmony Indoors and Out; Dealing with Drought Conditions; Color in the Landscape; Creating New Landscapes or Remodeling Older Landscapes to meet the needs of Today's Baby Boomers & Retirees
Background: College Degrees in Home Economics (Design) and Environmental Horticulture (Landscape Design); state licensed interior designer, certified Aging-in-Place specialist and member of the Universal Design Alliance; educator/lecturer for college level courses (GTC), professional CEU seminars (Chicago Botanic Garden), community adult education classes (Gwinnett) and area garden/church/HOA/women's clubs; writer for LandShapes Magazine and APLD's Designer Journal; interviewed by Fine Gardening magazine, MSN and Fulton County Daily Report; 2006-2008 Chapter President of APLD, Association of Professional Landscape Designers
Mike Francis - "Southern Conifers for the Shade"
Hello, I am Mike Francis. I grew up in the nursery business, as my Grandfather Henry Haralson (a great man) was a nurseryman who owned his own nursery for 35 years. He taught me how to grow things and appreciate plants.
I worked in marketing and real estate until we opened our nursery in 1988. My wife Christy (my enabler She makes my passions possible without her nothing would ever get done) and I have run two closely related businesses. Greenhouse Nurseries, which was our retail Nursery, and The Maple Farm which was the wholesale branch. In 2007 we consolidated the two into Maple Ridge Nursery.
I am a collector at heart with a wide range of interests. We collect conifers such as Chaemacyparis, Cedrus Deodara, and Cryptomeria. The # of cultivars of these is growing so fast I would hate to guess how many we have. We have over 200 varieties of hostas and of course our Maples of which we have over 350 cultivars of Acer palmatum collected. I have been speaking and writing articles on the subjects of Japanese Maples and Conifers for about 10 years. I have had talks with as many as 200 people in attendance and as few as 10, but if I can get 1 interested person to listen it makes me happy to talk about the plants I love. I also have a passion for Koi and Water Gardening.
Christy and I have 2 children Michael 15 and Alyson 4. We live next to the nursery so that we can make a living and still spend every day with our children.
Tom Goforth –
Tom’s topic at the Fall Gardening Symposium will be “A Passion for Native Ferns: Their Beauty, Diversity and Amazing History”.
Ferns are champions of evolutionary stasis in maintaining the same
lifestyle and general morphological characteristics for well over 370
million years. One species in our region, the Interrupted Fern, is the
oldest known extant fern species on earth....209 million years old. The
Carolinas, Georgia, and Tennessee have over 70 diverse native fern
species. This presentation will focus on the ecology of our native ferns
and the wonderful experience and knowledge of our own ecology gained
from including native ferns in our gardens.
Tom is the owner of Crow Dog Native Ferns and Gardens that is
located near Table Rock State Park in Pickens County, SC. He propagates
native ferns from spores commercially and conducts fern ecology and
plant community/geology correlations research in the Carolinas and
beyond. His current research includes an ecological dynamics survey of
a rich mountain cove in northern PickensCounty and a study of Wood Fern
hybrids along sections of the Blue Ridge Parkway in North Carolina. He
consults frequently with landscape designers and gardeners about
landscaping with native ferns. He has a BS degree in Geology and an MFA
in Sculpture.
Tom conducts workshops, presentations, lectures and guides field trips for symposia, botanical gardens, nurseries, societies, and classes from elementary to university settings. Tom also consults for landscapers, nurseries, and botanical gardens on fern ecology, landscaping, and spore propagation.
Crow Dog Native Ferns and Gardens, 376 Carrick Creek Road, Pickens, South Carolina 29671 (864) 878-1786
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