[Pollinator] POLLINATOR PROJECT: Register for Pollinators 101 and How to Plant a Pollinator Garden Webinars!

Wed Mar 6 13:58:15 PST 2013

The Tributary Fund

POLLINATOR PROJECT: Portland Launch

Contact:  Claire Baker

406-599-9457

claire at thetributaryfund.org

85% of the world's population practices a faith.  Therefore, it makes sense
to highlight the strong connections between each faith and its respective
relationship with and to the Earth.   The Tributary Fund (TTF), a US-based
non-profit, engages communities in protecting wildlife and habitat by
connecting cultural traditions, religions and conservation science.  This
year TTF is launching its US pollinator program in Portland, Oregon, with
partnership from San Francisco-based Pollinator
<http://pollinator.org/CDRC_Proposals.htm>  Partnership and Ecumenical
Ministries of Oregon.  

Free webinars will be offered on March 14 and March 21.  These are open to
anyone nationwide.  Portland-based faith groups that participate in the
webinars will be eligible to apply for seed grants for their gardens
(applications are due April 1).  On May 11, all the Portland participating
gardens will join together in Open Gardens from 4pm to 6pm.  This will be an
opportunity for congregations to celebrate their garden spaces by inviting
the public to visit.  

The project goal is to increase the number of acres of important native
pollinator habitat.  And, perhaps even more critically, TTF hopes to impart
to congregations a greater understanding of the importance of pollinators
and their healthy living environments along with the information they need
to make positive changes in their personal lives.  

Birds, bats, bees, butterflies, beetles, and other small mammals that
pollinate plants are responsible for bringing us one out of every three
bites of food. They also sustain our ecosystems and produce our natural
resources by helping plants reproduce. Unfortunately they are in trouble.
Some species have seen a 90% decline in their populations over the last
decade.  Without the actions of pollinators agricultural economies, our food
supply, and surrounding landscapes would collapse.  

PROJECT BACKGROUND: 

A year ago, TTF was asked to lead the Faith Task Force for the Pollinator
Partnership (P2), a preeminent pollinator conservation group.  Partnership
goals are twofold:  1. To expand pollinator habitat, and 2. To engage
congregants not only on the physical grounds of their faith group but to
also transfer their new understanding of pollinator protection and
conservation to their home life.  Together, P2 and TTF created four
brochures on pollinators and faith - individually oriented for Christian,
Buddhist, Jewish and Muslim faith groups - which we distributed to U.S.
eco-oriented, faith-based nonprofits in an effort to find a location for our
pilot project.  Through that process we identified Ecumenical Ministries of
Oregon as an ideal partner for our launch as they are based in a culturally
diverse city, have an established network of congregations, and already have
watershed restoration programming that can easily incorporate pollinator
habitat development.

TRAININGS

To start, we are offering two free webinar trainings in March.  Registration
information is available at www.thetributaryfund.org:  

Pollinators 101

Thursday, March 14 - noon-1pm (Pacific) 

Register:   <https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/8978517743222072064>
https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/8978517743222072064 

Vicki Wojcik, Ph.D., Pollinator Partnership, Research Program Manager

Vicki Wojcik is an optimistic ecologist and city dweller that believes human
populations and the natural world can coexist. Her graduate research focused
on understanding the factors that influence the occurrence of bees in
cities. This focus on pollinators in human-dominated landscapes has
continued into her professional career. As part of the P2 science team Dr.
Wojcik develops and manages studies that investigate how pollinators
interact with managed agriculture, industrial lands, and urban landscapes.
Dr. Wojcik also works with the P2 consulting team to restore and
rehabilitate private and corporate lands for pollinators. Vicki received her
B.Sc. Honours from the University of Guelph in 2004 and her Ph.D. in
Environmental Science, Policy, & Management from UC Berkeley in 2009. Her
work has been published in peer-reviewed journals, books, magazines, and
industry publications. Dr. Wojcik also holds an appointment as an adjunct
lecturer in biology at the University of California, Berkeley. When she
isn't professionally planning and managing landscapes for pollinators you
can find Vicki in her home garden in San Francisco helping the local urban
bee population.

How to Plant a Pollinator Garden

Thursday, March 21 - noon-1pm (Pacific)

Register:   <https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/8805132456126679040>
https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/8805132456126679040 

Mary Byrne Rager, Pollinator Partnership, Plant Ecologist 

Mary's background and interest in botany and database management has been
strengthened by her years of work with federal land managers and botanic
gardens. Most recently Mary was the National Collection Curator for the
national native seed collection program, Seeds of Success, at the Bureau of
Land Management for the Chicago Botanic Garden. She has also worked at the
USDA-ARS at the U.S. National Arboretum in Washington, DC as the Plant
Records Assistant, leading the plant inventory and mapping efforts at the
Arboretum.. In addition to working with seed and living collections, Mary
has also worked with preserved specimens at the Herbarium of Kent State
University. Ms. Rager has a Bachelor of Arts in Biology from Kent State
University and a Masters of Natural Resources from the University of Idaho.
Her professional affiliations include the American Public Gardens
Association where she serves as the Plant Conservation Section Vice-Chair,
the Natural Areas Association, the Plant Conservation Alliance and the
Society for Range Management. Mary is also the Founder and Director of
Bioloque, a collections management and ecological consulting company.

A representative from a faith-based garden group will also join in the
webinar to talk about how they mobilized their congregation to plant a
garden at their facility.  More information on this will be posted online!  

SEED GRANTS

Faith-based webinar attendees from Portland, Oregon, are eligible to apply
for Seed Grants this year.  These grants will be small (between $100 and
$500) but large enough to motivate a congregation to take the next step in
building their garden.  We request matching funds (either in-kind or cash).
Grant recipients will report on their garden (size, cost, number of
volunteers, successes, failures) and submit photos.  Applications (see
<http://www.thetributaryfund.org/> www.thetributaryfund.org) are due April
1.  

CELEBRATION

Saturday, May 11, from 4-6pm

All participating congregations will join in an "open garden" celebration.
The city-wide celebration will encourage people to visit the different
garden sites.  Some congregations will use this day to break ground while
others will be maintaining their established gardens.  A map of gardens will
be available online.  

The Celebration will take place during the same weekend as the Dalai Lama's
Environmental Summit.  

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.sonic.net/pipermail/pollinator/attachments/20130306/64fea104/attachment-0001.html>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: not available
Type: image/jpeg
Size: 429923 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <http://lists.sonic.net/pipermail/pollinator/attachments/20130306/64fea104/attachment-0002.jpe>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: not available
Type: image/jpeg
Size: 3668 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <http://lists.sonic.net/pipermail/pollinator/attachments/20130306/64fea104/attachment-0003.jpe>