Bestselling author to present “A Chickadee’s Guide to Gardening” at Riverbanks Botanical Garden on May 16th

COLUMBIA, SC (WOLO) — Calling all nature enthusiasts! A special presentation on the importance of native plant gardening at the Riverbanks Botanical Garden may be just for you.

On May 16th, New York Times Best Selling Author, Dr. Doug Tallamy from the University of Delaware will present his latest findings which he calls, “A Chickadee’s Guide to Gardening.”

The event is a collaboration between Riverbanks and Wingard’s Market in Lexington and will take place at 7 p.m. at the Magnolia Center inside the gardens (A link to ticket purchase is located at bottom of article).

Naturalist Zach Steinhauser with Wingard’s says Tallamy’s coming is a big deal for garden and animal lovers.

“He is literally the guy that wrote the book. Not just ‘the’ ‘book, he wrote multiple books, all about just the unique relationships native plants in gardens have with the insects we have in our ecosystem, and how all the birds rely on those insects and everything that eats insects relies on those native plants because that’s what the bugs depend on,” says Steinhauser.

He discussed Tallamy’s findings by saying, “He studied an active chickadee nest during nesting season, and found that for a chickadee family to successfully raise a nest of chickadee babies, it takes about 9,000 caterpillars. And so he made that discovery with all the native plants, and when he went and studied all the horticulture and ornamental plants that we like to decorate in our gardens, he found that there were no caterpillars on them. And therefore the bird life and bug life and diversity of wildlife in those neighborhoods was very minimal compared to when you saw native plants on the landscape.”

By adding more native plants to your garden, Steinhauser believes you can help with conservationism right in your own backyard.

“So we’re seeing huge declines in our songbird population, and part of that is due to habitat loss, part of that is food loss, and bringing Dr. Tallamy to town, he talks about what you can do to provide those food sources,” Steinhauser says.

Melodie Scott-Leach is the Horticulture Design and Operations Manager at Riverbanks Botanical Garden.

She says certain insects have host plants that they have to be able to reach in order to reproduce and feed their young.

This presentation to encourage pollinators and native plants, she says, is very important to our local ecosystems.

“When Zach approached us with this event to have Doug Tallamy come and talk, we were very excited, because we have a signature conservation program that we have put together called planting with a purpose where we have been trying to encourage homeowners, business owners, everyone to plant for pollinators. So this tied right in with it and Doug Tallamy is such an authority on the subject that we were excited to partner with Wingard’s and do this together,” Scott-Leach says.

Tickets are $40 a person and can be purchased here.