Episode 160 - Doug Oster is the Pittsburgh’s Garden Guru and host of the popular radio show The Organic Gardener on KDKA radio every Sunday morning.

Neelam Patil, M.Ed., MFA, is a Climate Literacy and Science Teacher in the Berkeley public school system.  She was awarded TIME Innovative Teacher of the Year 2022 by TIME Magazine based on her work teaching children they can do something about climate change. Ms. Patil spearheaded the planting of the first Miyawaki schoolyard forests in North America in Berkeley, California.  While teaching her students about deforestation, they wanted to do something immediate and impactful. They demanded, ‘Let’s plant trees!’, and the rest is history.  Ms. Patil has been an educator since 2000. Her work specializes in empowering children to face the most pressing challenges of our time through climate resilience, mindfulness, plant based culinary education, and youth urban forestry. She is a certified SKY Breath instructor and recently founded a non-profit, Green Pocket Forests, whose mission is to green urban spaces using the Miyawaki method. --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/plantatrilliontrees/message Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/plantatrilliontrees/support

Robert Lundgren has a Bachelor of Plant Science and Fine Arts minor from the University of Delaware, and a Master of Landscape Architecture from the University of Pennsylvania. He worked at landscape architecture firms, Olin and Andropogon and is now at Penn working as the University Landscape Architect within the Facilities & Real Estate Services Division, shepherding a variety of landscape projects on the 300-acre campus arboretum. He is an artist, an award-winning designer, and an avid naturalist. His responsibilities at Penn include research, campus planning, tree care and management, garden design, ecological and environmental initiatives, and maintenance protocols. --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/plantatrilliontrees/message Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/plantatrilliontrees/support

Dave Muffly has been planting trees (especially oaks) in the Bay Area and other California locations for more than 30 years. Dave began his tree career when he received his undergraduate degree in mechanical engineering, at Stanford University. Moving from engineering to ecology, Dave managed native oak plantings at Stanford with the non-profit Magic, in a project that has yielded more than 4,000 established oaks in 40 years. Dave then branched into fruit trees, and urban tree plantings, with a special focus on street trees. Dave subsequently became a Board Certified Master Arborist and designed/oversaw the 101 Freeway Soundwall planting as part of the East Palo Alto Tree Initiative led by the non-profit Canopy. This radical and experimental 1000-tree drought adaptation planting succeeded far beyond expectations and laid the foundation for the changes reverberating through the California tree nursery industry today. The East Palo Alto Tree Initiative became the proof of concept for the even more radically diverse plantings at Apple Park in Cupertino, where Dave spent seven years as Apple's Senior Arborist. Today Dave works as a senior arborist and horticultural futurist.                       --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/plantatrilliontrees/message Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/plantatrilliontrees/support

Daniel Hinkley is a plantsman, author, lecturer, nurseryman, and horticultural consultant.  He earned a B.S. in Horticulture and Horticulture Education from Michigan State University and an M.S. in Urban Horticulture at the University of Washington.  His first garden, Heronswood, near Kingston, Washington is now owned and operated by the Port Gamble SKlallam Tribe and is open to the public throughout the year.  Dan's current garden, Windcliff, is just a few miles from Heronswood. It sits on a high bluff overlooking the Salish Sea.  For forty years, Hinkley has traveled the globe to similar climates to observe and preserve plants that deserve recognition as possible new additions to landscapes worldwide.  He has written four books and has been recognized by his peers in receiving numerous awards for his work, including the Liberty Hyde Bailey award from the American Horticulture Society, the Scott Gold Medal from the Scott Arboretum, and the Veitch Memorial Medal from the Royal Horticultural Society.  --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/plantatrilliontrees/message Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/plantatrilliontrees/support

Mr. Al Key has been involved in the green industry for 30 years as an owner of DeepRoot Green Infrastructure, LLC. Together with his partners, he co-invented the SilvaCell® and has received several patents for his inventions which address trees and stormwater management in the urban setting. He has written for a wide range of publications, including the Journal of Arboriculture and Civil Engineering News. As Vice President, he established a representative network nationwide, set up major distributorships, and has been instrumental on projects such as the Metropolitan Museum of Art, USTA Billie Jean King Tennis Center, and the MIT SOMA Center at Kendall Square, Cambridge MA.  Mr. Key is a former Board Member of TreesNY, a Bronze Level Sponsor of the American Chestnut Foundation, a Forestry Committee member of the Wantastiquet Trout Club, and an Affiliate Member of the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE). --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/plantatrilliontrees/message Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/plantatrilliontrees/support

Doug Oster is Pittsburgh’s GardenGuru and is host of the popular radio show The Organic Gardener on KDKA radio every Sunday morning. He writes a gardening column for The Green Voice, the newsletter for Pittsburgh Earth Day. Oster appears on KDKA-TV’s Pittsburgh Today Live as a contributor. He’s also the host of the Talking Trees podcast for the Davey Tree Expert Company along with starring and producing In Doug’s Garden, a weekly television show for CBS/KDKA Streaming. Oster is proud to work as a consultant for Farm to Table of Western Pennsylvania/Buy Fresh Buy Local. In that capacity he teaches organic gardening classes, helps in the creation and maintenance of local gardens, and works with the team to help underserved communities. In addition, Doug hosted, produced, and wrote the one-hour special “The Gardens of Pennsylvania” for PBS which won the Emmy for Outstanding Documentary. His fifth book, “The Steel City Garden; Creating a One of a Kind Garden in Black and Gold” demonstrates how to create a garden using Pittsburgh’s favorite colors. The garden personality has a strong following on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. Oster’s most satisfying accomplishment was founding Cultivating Success, a garden program for foster and adoptive children.     --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/plantatrilliontrees/message Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/plantatrilliontrees/support

John Grimshaw has been interested in plants his entire life, as both gardener and botanist. He holds a first class degree in botany and a doctorate in the ecology of the forests of Mt Kilimanjaro from Oxford University. His Tanzanian connections remain important, and he’s proud to be an honorary elder of the Maasai community of Lerang’wa, Tanzania. African plants remain an important botanical interest, but he is fascinated by all plants and has grown a huge diversity in his gardens. He has travelled widely to see plants growing in habitat. His first book was The Gardener’s Atlas (1998), recounting the journeys plants have made from their source to our gardens. Working in The Netherlands for the seed company K. Sahin, Zaden. B.V., John was responsible for developing perennials and other plants for the seed trade. This gave him invaluable experience of commercial horticulture and management. Following that he joined Colesbourne Park in Gloucestershire as Gardens Manager, where he was responsible for maintaining and developing the historic Elwes family garden, especially the snowdrop collection. He co-authored the monograph Snowdrops (2002) with M Bishop & A Davis, published by Griffin Press. Between 2004-2009 he was lead author of a major book on trees introduced in the past 35 years, entitled New Trees, Recent Introductions to Cultivation, with co-author Ross Bayton. It was sponsored by the International Dendrology Society and was published by RBG Kew, in May 2009. In August 2012 he became Director of The Yorkshire Arboretum, North Yorkshire, with responsibility for the 120-acre arboretum and 20-acre Ray Wood, on the Castle Howard estate. This involves a wide range of management and administrative duties, fundraising and networking as well as active curation of the extensive collection. In 2021 the arboretum opened the country’s first dedicated Tree Health Centre, to raise awareness of the problems facing trees from diseases, pests and climate change. He was appointed MBE for ‘services to tree health and plant conservation’ in the 2024 New Year Honors List.   John is a member of the Royal Horticultural Society’s Nomenclature and Taxonomy Advisory Group, the RHS Woody Plant and Gardens Committees, and in 2012 led the RHS review of the Award of Garden Merit. He speaks and writes widely on horticultural and tree-related subjects. Other interests include the arts, cookery and poultry-keeping. --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/plantatrilliontrees/message Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/plantatrilliontrees/support

Richard McCoy is a 30-plus-year green industry professional, American Green Zone Alliance (AGZA) Northeast Regional Representative and owner of Richard A. McCoy Horticultural Services Inc. established in 1995 and incorporated in 1998 as a conventional landscape company. McCoy’s company began a transition to become one of New Jersey's first completely organic, ecological, and low-impact land care companies in 2005. Currently, McCoy Horticultural offers organic lawn and land care solutions, native plants, and green infrastructure design and installations. McCoy’s off-the-grid battery electric landscape maintenance is powered by a prototype self-designed solar trailer, and he uses autonomous robotic lawn mowing.  Richard is a NOFA Accredited Land Care Professional, holds a Rutgers Organic Land Care Certificate and is an AGZA Certified Service Pro. McCoy is also an active New Jersey Nursery and Landscape Association member. In addition, Richard is an advisor to many professional groups as well as being an organic, ecological, and low-impact land care educator to contractors, municipal and institutional workers on how to transition to alternative land care methods. --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/plantatrilliontrees/message Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/plantatrilliontrees/support

Mark Richardson is the Director of Horticulture for the New England Botanic Garden at Tower Hill in Boylston, Massachusetts. He leads a team of horticulture staff and oversees a living plant collection that spans sixteen distinct garden spaces, two conservatories, and over 100 acres of surrounding woodlands and wetlands. He has a passion for ecological horticulture and native plants, and he lectures on various topics including “How to Kill Your Lawn.” He is the co-author of the book Native Plants for New England Gardens (Globe Pequot, 2018). --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/plantatrilliontrees/message Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/plantatrilliontrees/support

Tim Boland is the Director of the Polly Hill Arboretum on the island of Martha’s Vineyard, West Tisbury, Massachusetts. Tim moved with his wife Laura and two children to the Vineyard in 2002. Before his move to the Vineyard, he was Curator of Horticulture at the Morton Arboretum in Lisle, Illinois.  A plantsman with wide-ranging interests, he is a nationally recognized author, photographer, and lecturer. Tim has an undergraduate degree in Landscape Horticulture and a master’s degree in Botany and Plant Pathology from Michigan State University with a specialization in Plant Ecology and Systematics.   Tim studies oak trees and has traveled the world to see oaks in their natural habitats. He is a board member of the International Oak Society, and Chair of the Oak Conservation and Research Committee.   Tim is also active in assembling a modern flora for Martha’s Vineyard and adjacent islands. He is a plant collections advocate and serves on the Living Collections Advisory Committee of the Arnold Arboretum, Boston, MA. In his position as director of the Polly Hill Arboretum, Tim guides the principal program areas of Living Collections, Education, Plant Conservation, and Community Ecology. He is thrilled to see the transformation over the last several years of the Polly Hill Arboretum from a private garden to a community, regional, and national resource. A big part of this transformation is the dedicated work of the board, staff, and volunteers who so generously support the Polly Hill Arboretum through their time, and enthusiasm! --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/plantatrilliontrees/message Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/plantatrilliontrees/support