Sally Scalera: Feb. 8 seminar in Eau Gallie offers information on gardening in Brevard

Would like to learn how to attract birds to your yard?

Would you like to learn how to replace part of your lawn with native ground covers?

Are you interested in finding out the latest information on the health of the Indian River Lagoon?

And one last question: Would you like to learn how to grow your plants nature’s way? 

If you said yes to any or all these questions, hopefully your calendar is open for 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. Feb. 8. 

Our annual Florida-Friendly Landscaping Seminar will be at the Eau Gallie High School Auditorium that morning. Vendors will sell native plants and gardening supplies, plus there will be educational booths. The vendors will be set up by 8:15 am for any early risers.

This year, the seminar will begin with Kate Wells from the Space Coast Audubon Society, who will talk about “Attracting Birds with Native Plants.” Attracting birds is a fun and entertaining pastime, and Kate will provide suggestions of plants to add to your landscape so the birds will come serenade you.

One of the benefits that native plants provide is they support our native insects  Insects are at the base of the food chain, and if you want to attract birds, you will need the insects.  Her talk is scheduled for 9 to 9:45 am.

From 9:45-10:30 a.m., Kathy Hill of the Indian River Lagoon National Estuary Program will give us an update on the health of the Indian River Lagoon. She will cover the various projects that have been completed, those in the works and the ones planned.  Come hear the most recent update on the IRL, and if you have any questions or suggestions, participate in the question and answer session at the end.

The third session, “Turf Alternatives with Native Plants,” will be presented from 10:45 to 11:30 a.m. by Brendan "Skip" Healy of Change of Greenery. Reducing the amount of turf can be a good thing, because turf doesn’t attract wildlife and can be labor intensive, depending upon how it’s maintained. 

If you have a shady area where the grass doesn’t grow well or sunny areas, come discover native plants that will grow there.

The fourth presentation will be from 11:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. In this talk, I will discuss “Garden Nature’s Way (with the Soil Food Web).” I will cover what the soil food web is, all the services it performs, and how you can add life back to your dirt, turning it back into soil. 

You can think of it this way: Dirt is just soil particles and maybe some organic matter, but the living portion of the soil, the biology, is missing. Plants excrete root exudates of various simple sugars and other carbohydrates, in the hope of attracting bacteria and fungi. As the bacteria and fungi consume the root exudates, their populations grow. 

A special group of bacteria are the free-living nitrogen-fixing bacteria in the genera Azotobacter, Azospirillum and Azomonas. They can take atmospheric nitrogen and fix it into an inorganic form of nitrogen, which the plant can absorb. 

There should also be mycorrhizal fungi that form symbiotic relationships with plants, receiving carbohydrates from the root exudates, and in return, providing the plant with nutrients and water. Some of the mycorrhizae form relationships with specific plants and others form relationships with many plants. 

On the flip side, there are some plants that form mycorrhizal relationships with many mycorrhizal species, just like corn. If you plan on growing corn this year — and the months to plant it are now through April — be sure to inoculate the roots with arbuscular mycorrhizae (AM), which are endomycorrhizae. 

Another well-known plant that has a relationship with AM is St. Augustinegrass. Look for the AM, Glomus intraradices (now known as Rhizophagus irregularis), because this is the species that University of Florida research found living in the roots of St. Augustinegrass. 

The mycorrhizal fungi are important creators of organic matter, and they help to build soil structure deep into the soil, allowing deep root systems to develop. With the assistance of the mycorrhizae, the plant can benefit from the nutrients and water that the fungal hyphae can gather from a large area and from small pore spaces that the plant roots can’t get into. 

As fantastic as the bacterial and fungal base of the SFW is, there also needs to be the predatory protozoa and nematodes. 

Yes, there are many beneficial nematodes, though they are over-shadowed by the infamous root knot nematodes or other root-feeding types. The predatory nematodes come in a variety of types, which include bacteria-feeding, fungal-feeding and nematode-feeding, whose favorite foods are the root-feeding nematodes.

Protozoa come in the form of the aerobic amoebae and flagellates. As the predators feed on their prey, they are helping to cycle the nutrients in the prey’s body and make the nutrients and water available for the plants to absorb. 

This is how nature “fertilizes” her garden. Just small amounts, when needed, with no waste or leaching. Both that and the organic matter’s nutrient and water-holding capacity help to protect water quality.

For every gardener who wants to do his or her part to help the IRL, remember that we need to do things differently to get different results.

At the conclusion of the four talks, door prizes will be raffled off. On the way out, everyone who turns in a completed survey will receive a goody bag that contains a hose nozzle, a pair of gardening gloves and native plant seeds. 

The surveys are important, because we use them to come up with the topics covered in the next seminar. 

Free tickets can be obtained from our Eventbrite page at fflseminar.eventbrite.com.  Registration isn’t mandatory but is encouraged. So, if you’re free Feb. 8, come join us for a fun and educational event.

Sally Scalera is an urban horticulture agent and master gardener coordinator for the University of Florida’s Institute of Food and Agriculture Sciences. Email sasc@ufl.edu.