educational course

Come be introduced to some common native plants, see examples of their preferred growing conditions, and get tips on successfully planting and caring for a thriving and diverse native landscape.

Learn the basics of designing and maintaining a landscape that is beautiful and diverse while also conserving water, building soil, and creating habitat for birds and pollinators.  Make a positive impact on your watershed with your landscaping decisions -and save time, money and energy doing it!  The workshop includes a field trip to a nearby naturescaping project.

Learn step-by-step how to plan, design, and build your own rain garden!  Topics include determining the right size and location for a rain garden, how to build it, and advice on choosing plants that will thrive in it.  The workshop includes a field trip to a nearby rain garden.

Weeds - we all have them. Learn how to identify common garden and landscape weeds along with some other notorious plant invaders of the region. Gain an understanding of how these aggressive plants take over - and how to get the upper hand controlling their spread without turning to synthetic herbicides.

This is a three-day training on August 25, 27 & 29. Training Schedule: Tuesday, August 25, 6-8:30 pm at the SOLVE office: stewardship, watershed basics, restoration strategies, and examples. Thursday, August 27, 6-8:30 pm at the SOLVE office: community involvement, working w/ volunteers, work-party management, and leadership techniques. Saturday, August 29, 10am - 3pm: FIELD DAY - Location To Be Determined: project examples, planting techniques, invasive plant removal techniques, and native plant identification. Stream Team Captains lead volunteers on stream restoration and enhancement projects throughout the Portland-metro area. SOLVE adopts restoration sites for three to five years working with volunteers, community groups, crews, agencies and other non-profit partners to improve the health and function of stream corridors and wetlands. Stream Team Captains provide leadership, organization and supervision to volunteers for Saturday morning events. Stream Team Captains also instruct volunteers in invasive plant removal techniques and proper planting techniques while working closely with SOLVE staff to fulfill stream restoration and enhancement goals. Upon completion of this training, Stream Team Captains commit to lead at least three Team Up volunteer events involving planting native species, invasive plant removal, native plant identification, mulching, and watering. Additional training in basic botany, bioengineering, advanced classes in native and invasive plant ID, as well as winter twig ID are also available to Stream Team Captains during the course of the year.

Register online here: http://solveoregon.org/get-involved/events/stream-team-captain-training