On Saturday May 5, volunteers from the Owasco Watershed Lake Association joined the Friends of Fillmore Glen State Park, other community volunteers and the park staff to establish a new native plant garden there. This event was part of the 2024 I Love My Park Day where volunteers carried out a number of events to benefit the park, including improving the trails, removing invasive species and clearing the grounds of sticks and other debris. We planted a 75-by-3-foot walkway garden along the pavilion at the entrance to the park.
We used 40 herbaceous perennial plants of 10 native species. Native plants evolved in this area over time and are ideally adapted to climate, soil, moisture, insects and bird life. This project is part of OWLA’s efforts to raise awareness about practices in the watershed we can all use to help project Owasco Lake.
Planting native gardens is helpful because these plants require no fertilizer or pesticide support to thrive in local conditions. Reducing use of these materials in the watershed is right in line with the Lake Friendly Living Coalition of the Finger Lakes' May awareness month (visit flrwa.org/lake-friendly-living ).
A list of common plant names of the 40 native species we used, with names as beautiful as the physical plants, includes the following: wrinkle leaf goldenrod, narrow leaf and blunt leaf mountain mint, pearly everlasting, golden alexander, blazing star, beardtongue, Helen’s flower, bee balm and cut leaf coneflower. Please contac.