Wednesday, May 16, 2012

New garden director has big plans

Kathryn Goldman pursues new programs for nonprofit organization

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By TONY EVANS
Express Staff Writer

Executive Director Kathryn Goldman has plans to further engage the Sawtooth Botanical Garden in the local business community. Photo by David N. Seelig

The five-acre Sawtooth Botanical Garden along state Highway 75 south of Ketchum is a showcase of gardening and landscaping expertise. What many people don't know is that it is also an educational and research garden that could soon have an increased impact on the surrounding community.

For 17 years, the garden, which is open year-round from dawn to dusk, has provided raised garden plots for growers to raise vegetables and other plants while sharing gardening ideas.

In recent years, the garden has been expanded into one of the valley's most impressive parks, featuring a Tibetan prayer wheel and pagoda, examples of Idaho's diverse ecological communities, and public art sculptures made by local artists.

Executive Director Kathryn Goldman recently took charge of the garden, which has a $275,000 annual budget. The garden is a non-profit organization funded by donations, grants and individual memberships.

Goldman is a nine-year valley resident with a master's degree in environmental studies from the University of Montana. She worked for five years at the nonprofit Wood River Land Trust, and as campaign director for the Idaho Conservation League and the Blaine County Pesticide Action Network, before taking the helm of the Sawtooth Botanical Garden this past winter. Goldman has plans to expand the garden's programs to include professional certification training and tie-in promotions with the landscaping industry.

But on Wednesday, May 9, Goldman first had to adopt away a few more millipedes and daddy long-legs spiders that remained unsold after the garden's recent "Bug Zoo" event. The Bug Zoo each year draws hundreds of kids to the greenhouse and classroom complex at the heart of the facility. Nearby is a terrarium with Venus flytrap and pitcher plants, used during the garden's carnivorous-plant terrarium-building workshop last winter.

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"Kids loved it. It sold out," said Goldman.

The Sawtooth Botanical Garden also provides year-round educational opportunities for adults, including a certification program for arborists that will be available this fall. Grown-ups can also attend cooking classes and get a heads-up on which plants are likely to survive in the Wood River Valley's sage-steppe and mountain environments.

Goldman said the garden will soon roll out a Sawtooth Botanical Garden-approved list of plants that do well in this region, tagging them at landscaping companies in the area.

"Local resources are where it's at," Goldman said.

Testing the vigor of local and introduced species has long been a part of the mission at the garden. Six raspberry species were tested a few years ago in the site by University of Idaho agricultural extension service, to see which of them would be viable as a commercial Idaho food crop.

"Raspberry species K-18-6, a nova variety, tested as the most viable," Goldman said. "Another species won as best tasting."

In order to find new ways to interact with communities in the Wood River Valley, Goldman said she will attend public meetings and seek input from the public on how to develop garden programs.

She is set to roll out a new smart-phone garden tour application that can be used either on-site or remotely.

The tour includes about a half-hour walk through examples of four of the five biomes, or ecosystems, in Idaho, from sage steppe to alpine.

"It will give people an idea of what to expect when they come here," she said.

Tony Evans: tevans@mtexpress.com

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