Challenge the convention of the monoculture lawn. Less lawn means more life. Join the movement to give part of your lawn back to nature. With bird and insect species declining, rewilding is a proven method to bring biodiversity back. We have seen it with our own eyes at Darden Towe Park!
Join Piedmont Discovery Center’s David Bellangue and Peabody School’s Amy Lastinger as they share the journey of restoring a once monoculture grass field into 20,000 square feet of native plants. The Darden Towe Park Patch Prairie project is an ongoing effort to replace a species-poor no-mow lawn with a diverse planting of native wildflowers, grasses, and shrubs that mimics a natural old-growth Piedmont grassland.
During this interactive session, you will learn the methods used, the hurdles jumped, and the native plant species we have reintroduced. Peabody students’ work will take you through the prairie, where you can read myth-busting signs about the fears that keep many from going wild in their own yards. We will provide you with a timeline, methods you can use, and a general plant list. Finally, there will be an opportunity to join this restoration effort and dig in the dirt to complete phase 2 of this project. Native plants from Hummingbird Hill will also be available for purchase, so you can GO WILD!
Location: Darden Towe Patch-Prairie Restoration Site
If traveling by car, please park by the soccer fields or pickleball courts.
The GPS points for the restoration are 38.040847, -78.448991.
RSVP to [email protected]
A special thank you to our sponsors: The 14th Annual Tom Tom Festival is presented with the University of Virginia, Virginia Tourism, R.L. Beyer Custom Homes, Ludwig Kuttner, and The City of Charlottesville
