Native Plants Seminar Sunday October 18 @1Pm Save Your Spot

Dr. Shelley Ball is a biologist, educator, photographer and storyteller. She has worked as a research scientist and university professor in Canada, the U.S., and New Zealand, studying evolutionary ecology and population genetics of insects. She is also a TEDx speaker, a member of the inaugural Homeward Bound Women In Science Leadership Expedition to Antarctica, and a Fellow of the Royal Canadian Geographical Society. Her passion for connecting people to nature and inspiring them to care about it and protect it led to her creating Biosphere Environmental Education (BEE). Her two main activities with BEE have been creating and running a youth environmental leadership expedition program and creating her Ontario native plant nursery, Biosphere Native Plants, which opened in spring 2025.  From the age of 8 Shelley spent hours each day wandering hundreds of acres of woods around the family cottage near Westport, with a plant ID guide in hand, learning to identify native wildflowers, trees and shrubs. Over 50 years later, Shelley returned to her native plant passion when she began winter sowing native plant seeds and eventually started up the nursery, from her home in Westport.

In her presentation, Shelley will talk about the benefits of integrating native plants into our gardening. She will share stories of the incredible roles native plants serve in our ecosystems, including the wonderful White Turtlehead, an Ontario native plant whose nectar naturally contains a compound that kills intestinal parasites in native bees who drink the nectar. Who thought native plants served as a ‘pharmacy’ for our native bees? Shelley will also talk about how we can create beautiful traditional gardens using native plants.