2012 Mueller Prairie and Garden Workshops - Austin, TX

May 12, 9am – 10:30ish– Butterfly Walk & Talk.  Meet at the Wildflower Terrace Community Room, 3801 Berkman Drive, Austin, TX 78723 to see fantastic photography by Val Bugh, then walk the prairie to see and identify the latest lepodoptera visitors.  Discussion will focus on butterfly gardening for adult butterflies and providing habitat for the entire life cycle of local butterflies.
Our guest expert is Val Bugh, an entomologist, photographer, naturalist and frequent lecturer for The Wildflower Center, National Wildlife Federation, Native Plant Society of Texas and many others.  Her many guides to Butterflies, Moths and other Insects of Texas are available through Barnes & Noble (http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/butterflies-of-central-texas-valerie-g-bugh/1100004773; see also: http://www.austinbug.com/index.html, and http://mothphotographersgroup.msstate.edu/VGIndex.shtml). 

For more information contact David Boston at .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).

June 2, 9am-Noon – 3rd Annual Mueller Garden Walking Tour.  Join other avid small-space gardeners for a walking tour of nine Mueller gardens.  These pocket-sized landscapes make use of every square inch for flowers, fruit and vegetables.  Featured gardens include an ingenious access ramp beautifully-integrated into the front home landscape, several grass-free landscapes, and four gardens featured on Central Texas Gardener (www.klru.org/ctg  Nov. 5, 2011, and March 21, 2012).  All of the gardens feature native and adapted plants.  The gardeners will be on hand and happy to answer questions from visitors.
Maps will be available at Ella Wooten Park (on Antone Street between Pinckney and Mendez).  Volunteers to hand out maps and such are welcome!

For more information contact Helen Mason at .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).

July 28, 10-11am – Psycho Light & the Plants that Love It.  Guest speaker Linda Lehmusvirta is the producer of KLRU’s Central Texas Gardener and an Austin garden blogger.  In her own garden, Linda copes with the same tough lighting conditions that Mueller gardeners do:  Psycho Light.  Psycho Light exists when a garden gets shade most of the day with 2 to 4 hours of blazing sun, often at noon or late afternoon.  Although this is fatal to many plants, Linda has discovered a number of beautiful and tough adapted plants that flourish in this light.  Linda will also answer questions about container gardens that suffer from Psycho Light … like those on the balconies of the Wildflower Terrace, the Mosaic and the Greenway Lofts.  Linda’s talk will be illustrated with mouthwatering photos of her own East Austin garden.  Meet at the Wildflower Terrace Community Room, 3801 Berkman Drive, Austin, TX 78723.

For more information, contact Janelle Dozier at .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).

August 18, 11am-Noon – The Photography of Steven Schwartzman.  Steven Schwartzman is a nature photographer whose images have appeared in magazines like Texas Highways and Wildflower (a quarterly publication of the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center).  He is the author of the folding field guide to central Texas wildflowers available in local stores and at http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/wildflowers-of-central-texas-steven-schwartzman/1100004944.
Steven specializes in photographing species that are native to Texas, often taking close-ups of them as if he were making a portrait of a person.  In this presentation he’ll show images of some of the native plants he’s photographed at Mueller in the last few years, and perhaps some of the little creatures that live on and near those plants.  Participants are welcome to ask about his photographic techniques and of course the plants themselves.  In the meantime, you may wish to visit his daily nature photography blog at http://portraitsofwildflowers.wordpress.com.

For more information contact Bobby Gierisch at .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).

October 6, 5-7pm – Bird Talk, Walk and Viewing.  Meet at the picnic area on the east bank of the lake in the Southwest Greenway for a hands-on bird talk and walk combined with gardening for wildlife, and a conversation with outstanding guest speakers.  These include Jake McCumber, biologist and naturalist for Camp Mabry, a lifelong birder and naturalist, Audubon member and consultant to Mueller Prairie for habitat improvement; Meredith O’Rielly National Wildlife Federation Habitat Steward, Master Gardener, Organizer of numerous School Habitat gardens, guest speaker for Central Texas gardener and frequent Garden Blogger (see:http://www.greatstems.com/”> http://www.greatstems.com/; http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5dRmfvvhTCE; and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XIgiDDQ5LEw);  Adrian Johnson, Travis County Audubon Society, Master Naturalist/Master Gardener, and Amy Tsay, who holds a Masters in Wildlife Ecology and currently works as an Ecologist for Cox|McLain Environmental Consulting where she performs wildlife surveys and prepares environmental documents.
This is a family-friendly event, so bring your binoculars and folding chair, and enjoy some snacks while watching and learning about our fine feathered friends.

For more information, contact David Boston at .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).

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