By Andrea Thunem
First off, our entire editorial team wants you, our readers, to hear how delighted we are with someone whose behind the scenes contribution to our newsletter affects you directly. Sue Stephenson, as technical editor for the Native Plant News, handles all the design and layout to make it visually attractive, easy to read, and easy to navigate. In this role, she combines her technical skills with her long-time interest in native plants. We’re in new territory here, with a digital only format. Our newsletter team will continue to visually and editorially shape your newsletter so you, the reader, get the information you want. We thank Sue–who puts it all together.
And Now, What’s this Newsletter’s Theme?
Here we are, native planters celebrating summer and enjoying North Carolina’s spectacular natural areas. We readily acknowledge plants move people; plants make us feel good. But it’s not only native plant enthusiasts and it doesn’t only happen in summer. Plants move people in all seasons, indoors and out.
Yes plants move people; people also move plants. Sometimes for better. Sometimes for worse. We can and do with plants as we like.
In this issue some of our authors write about how, why, and where plants move them. On hikes, at a hospital healing garden, at a mixed-use development, at workshops and conferences. Other authors write about why controlled burns are important and how a rain garden and other gardens help protect the ecosystem.
We also have a story about a major award given to a mainstay of our native plant community, one who is a Charlotte original. The award reflects the measure of this person who has done so much for the Charlotte native plant community and beyond. We are lucky. This person has moved us, influenced us, touched us.
Our stories are by people who enjoy plants, study plants, connect with plants on all levels. At the NC Native Plant Society, we are people who actively promote, educate, and advocate all things native plants.
And yet we need to do more to help sustain the environment. We all want to be one who will make a difference. We move plants and plants move us. We’re all connected: us, plants, the land, our ecosystem, our sustenance, our one world. There is a growing movement of native plant enthusiasts. Join us!
By Andrea Thunem
Native Plant News – Summer 2022
Andrea Thunem is editor of the North Carolina Native Plant Society’s Native Plant News and a member of the NCNPS Southern Piedmont chapter. A retired journalist and landscape designer with a passion for native plants and environmental sustainability, she loves working with people to present their stories about the holistic nature of people, plants, earth, and connections.