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Bats, bugs and toads good for gardens – Tribune

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As the New Year is upon us, I feel certain that many of us are about to make some sort of resolution targeted at bettering ourselves in one way or another. While weight loss and smoking-cessation resolutions are awesome, how about trying something a little different for 2014? Rather than making a resolution to better yourself, why not make one to better the world around you? Your garden is the perfect place to start!

Here are three realistic New Year’s resolutions that will not only help you cut down on pests, they’ll help you create a more beautiful garden.

• Resolve to cut down on pests … by promoting bats! A single bat can eat more than his or her own body weight in insects every night (that’s up to 4,500 mosquitoes, moths, and beetles that won’t be feasting on you or your garden!). Bat houses are flat, wooden structures positioned 15 feet above the ground and facing the southeast, where they can receive seven or more hours of direct sunlight per day. Bat houses can be located on the outside of a shed, barn, or garage and should have a good 15 to 25 feet of open space in front of them to enable the bats easy access. There are many different styles of bat houses, each with their own positive attributes, but those that are 2 feet tall with multiple housing chambers and a landing area extending below the entrance tend to shelter the greatest number of bats.

• Resolve to cut down on pests … by promoting toads! Toads are extremely adept at lapping up ants, snails, slugs, beetles and scores of other insects. These nocturnal creatures are a huge boon to gardeners. Toads take shelter during the day by hunkering down in mulch or other cool, dark places. To encourage toads in your garden, make a few “toad abodesâ€� out of clay pots. Eight-inch-diameter terra-cotta pots are perfect. Knock out two portions of the pot’s top rim with a hammer, positioning them opposite from each other to create an entrance and an exit. The entrance and exit holes should be about 3 inches wide and 2 inches high to accommodate a fully grown toad. Sand the edges smooth if there are any sharp points projecting from them. Put a few handfuls of shredded bark mulch down before inverting the pot over the top of it. If you’d like, you can recruit your kids or grandkids to decorate the toad abodes with outdoor paint, glued-on plastic “gems,â€� pebbles or seashells. Locate several inverted toad house pots in a sheltered, shady spot right in the vegetable garden.

• Resolve to cut down on pests … by promoting beneficial insects! It’s a bug-eat-bug world out there, and there are thousands of different species of predatory and parasitic insects that feed on pest insects or use them to house their developing young. Beneficial insects like ladybugs, lacewings, syrphid flies, tachinid flies, non-stinging parasitic wasps, and minute pirate bugs need nectar, pollen and shelter to do their best work. Attract these and other pest-controlling beneficial insects by planting a large diversity of flowering plants in and around the vegetable garden. As they do not have specialized mouthparts, these small, beneficial insects prefer to source nectar from members of the carrot family, the daisy family, and the cabbage family. Plants like black-eyed-Susans, cilantro, Shasta daisies, sweet alyssum, dill, fennel, cosmos, coreopsis and others are perfect for supporting beneficial insects as well as much-needed pollinators.

Horticulturist Jessica Walliser co-hosts “The Organic Gardeners� at 7 a.m. Sundays on KDKA Radio. She is the author of several gardening books, including “Grow Organic� and “Good Bug, Bad Bug.� Her website is www.jessicawalliser.com.

Send your gardening or landscaping questions to tribliving@tribweb.com or The Good Earth, 503 Martindale St., 3rd Floor, D.L. Clark Building, Pittsburgh, PA 15212.

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Christmas Angels: Memory Gardens ladies

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KENNEBUNK — With the help of these Christmas Angels, Kennebunk’s downtown and Lower Village have the finishing touch that they need to pop.

“I like a lot of color,” said Joanna Sylvester of Memory Gardens, who with Julie Dunlap works through the spring, summer and fall to landscape and line the downtown with colorful, vibrant plantings throughout the seasons. “Even if they’re not flower people, they respond to color and I think it’s done the job. We’re just lucky to be a part of it.”

This is Memory Gardens’ second season beautifying the downtown. The company started as a retail greenhouse and transformed into landscaping, planting, pruning and otherwise beautifying local businesses and residences, Sylvester said. She has been doing the landscaping for Kennebunk Savings for the past 12 years, Sylvester said, before taking on Main Street, under a long-term contract with the town.

The ladies also fill the dories in Lower Village and plant flowers along the Mathew J. Lanigan Bridge. This fall, the women planted the flowers along the bridge three times after they were vandalized. An anonymous donor paid for the flowers.

“For me, it’s a dream job. A lot of people probably think I’m crazy,” Sylvester said.

In the spring, summer and fall, Sylvester and Dunlap can be found on Main Street from the all-too-early morning to late afternoon, rain or shine, working to keep the finishing touches of the downtown perfect. In Lower Village, they work between 4 and 6 a.m. to beat the traffic.

Sylvester said passerbys often honk and wave in support of their work.

“One woman said I used to walk down on the beach, now I walk down Main Street,” Sylvester said. “I consider it an honor. It makes me want to work even harder. It inspires you.”

Linda Johnson of the Kennebunk Downtown Committee said, “all we get is compliments” about the landscaping work.

“The timing worked well with the revitalization of the downtown,” she said. “It was a no-brainer adding Joanna and Julie to the mix of the downtown. They make it look so easy. It’s a seamless process and we don’t even have any snags.”

Looking at the revitalization of the downtown, Johnson said the landscaping and plants add the finishing touch and that she “couldn’t be more proud.”

“Downtown is everything to me, and this just adds a whole new level,” she said.

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Garden Calendar: Learn to use native plants in landscaping

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LANDSCAPING WITH NATIVES: The course will explore native trees, shrubs and perennials. Participants will learn how to use drought-tolerant plants to add interest and color in the landscape year-round. 10 a.m. to noon Tuesdays and Thursdays Jan. 14-23. Collin College Courtyard Center, 4800 Preston Park Blvd., Plano. $59. Register at collin.edu/ce. 214-740-6252 or 972-985-3711.

MASTER NATURALISTS: The Indian Trail Chapter of the Texas Master Naturalists will hold its annual training classes next spring. Classes will meet 6 to 9 p.m. Tuesdays Feb. 25 to May 27. First United Methodist Church, 505 W. Marvin Ave., Waxahachie. Applications are due Feb. 1-972-825-5175.information@itmnc.com.

Event details are due at least 14 days before the Thursday publication date. Send to garden@dallasnews.com.

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The Garden Guru: Don’t count out non-Texans

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By Neil Sperry


Dr. Omer E. Sperry taught me, as a very young horticulturist (actually, a Cub Scout), that “a plant is native where you find it growing in nature.” I’ve never forgotten that little lesson, and it has kept me from making some very bad gardening decisions.

My dad had the credentials. He grew up in Oklahoma and eastern Nebraska. His Ph.D. in botany was from the University of Nebraska, but his thesis research work was done in the Rocky Mountains west of Denver. He and Mom moved to Alpine in the early part of the Depression, where he founded the biology department at the new Sul Ross State Teachers College. He continued his botanical research in the Chisos and Davis Mountains of West Texas, turning to (to use the title of his book) Plants of Big Bend.

And from there, when I was only 2, our family moved to College Station, where Dad co-founded the range and forestry department at Texas AM. For the next 30 years of his career, Dad was a range ecologist and weed control specialist for Texas AM. Most would have said that he was a Texas-native-plant expert.

At parties at our house, I was surrounded by his fellow professors, who spent the night talking about native plants they had come across in every corner of Texas. It was exciting for a young kid with a natural yen toward landscaping, and it taught me what a richly diverse state Texas is.

Now I turn to my own career. My dad taught me to follow my heart and to do what I really enjoyed — that it would never seem to be work. That has evolved, over the past 43 years of living around DFW, into giving advice about the best plant selections for Texas landscaping. One of the topics that comes up very often centers on the use of native plants in our gardens. The conversation usually begins something like this: “Neil, I’m planting my landscape, and I want to use only native Texas plants,” (pause) “so I’ll have the best chance of succeeding.”

Some of those people get fiercely defensive if I try to caution them that some of their choices may not be good ones. It soon becomes obvious that they’re going to plant whatever they wish, and that’s where I use another lesson I learned from my dad: patience. As a friend of mine once told her adult son in one of his crises, “I’m sure you’ll figure it out.” I run that thought through my mind as I wish the person well and step away.

As I’ve been typing, I’ve been trying to figure ways to illustrate that simply using “native” as the main or only criterion in choosing your plants might be a mistake.

In that light, it crossed my mind that I’m a native Texan, and I’m well adjusted to my life in North Central Texas. But as much as I love my home state, there are places and environments in Texas where I don’t think I’d be very happy. I hope nobody “transplants” me to any of those.

However, I still like my old explanation of why I prefer not to use “native” as a major criterion in choosing my plants, and that is that if a plant is not native to the part of Texas where you live, there’s probably a reason.

As one example, it’s probably too wet (at some times!) in the Metroplex for West Texas natives to survive, especially in our heavy clay soils. Sure, they can survive the dry times, but they’re intolerant of waterlogged soils.

Or, on a 20-year average, it’s too cold here, which is why you don’t see Texas mountain laurel, desert willow or Texas sage growing wild locally. I’ve even seen photos of century plant agaves that froze in the recent ice storm.

Perhaps it’s our alkaline soil. Indeed, that’s why you don’t see loblolly pines, dogwoods, sweetgums, bald cypresses and American hollies growing natively around the Metroplex. That particular line of soil demarcation is amazing. It can be just a few hundred feet wide. There are places in Hunt and Kaufman counties where Blackland soils abruptly change over to East Texas sands on the same pieces of property, and the native species change with it.

So, now the big question. If you don’t use “native” as a major factor in choosing your plants, what would be better? And that answer is simple and logical. Use plants that are “adapted.” It really doesn’t matter whether the plant is native to a local hillside or to some other continent. What you want is something that will jump right in and contribute to your landscaping efforts without complaining. Your chance at success as a landscaping gardener will be greatly enhanced if you’ll use that one simple measuring stick to size up all of your plants: “How well is this plant adapted to the setting where I’m going to use it?”

Neil Sperry publishes “Gardens” magazine and hosts “Texas Gardening” from 8 to 10 a.m. Sunday on WBAP AM/FM. Reach him during those hours at 800-288-9227.


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The Lawn, the Enduring Feature of the Romantic English Garden, Also Stars on …

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ATHENS, Ohio, Dec. 26, 2013 — /PRNewswire/ — When “Downton Abbey” returns for its fourth season Sunday, January 5, millions of American property owners will see the opening shot of the lawn as a reminder of what their own lawn could look like. The lawn, that green expanse of turf that frames the castle, represents the essence of the English garden.

(Photo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20131226/PH38324-a) (Photo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20131226/PH38324-b)  

Today American homeowners love their lawn. They spent almost $40 billion last year on lawncare.

As people mow, fertilize, aerate, and—for some obsessives in the thick of facing the summer’s dry heat—spray paint their yards, they may wonder how the lawn took center stage on the American home landscape.

A new, illustrated book, now in its second printing, by author Thomas Mickey, America’s Romance with the English Garden, digs to the root of the story of how the American lawn originated in the nineteenth century.

“We love the lawn because the garden industry sold it to us,” says Mickey, a master gardener and professor emeritus of communication studies at Bridgewater State University, who researched the book at Washington’s Smithsonian Institution.

Mickey suggests that Americans were “seduced” by the idea of the romantic English garden style of landscape (noted for its trim, green lawn) thanks to the marketing efforts of nineteenth-century seed companies and nurseries.

In their richly printed catalogs—which had become possible thanks to advances in printing—and with mass mailing—which became possible due to cheap paper and railroad transportation—these businesses sold not only plants and seeds, but an image, a landscaping style.  

“Though the company owners knew the French, Italian, Spanish, and Dutch gardens, the English garden, with its signature lawn, became the brand to sell seeds and plants in the nineteenth century,” says Mickey.

Thanks to the efforts of the seed companies and nurseries, the lawn would become one of the most noted features of the American landscape, appearing across the growing country from Maine to California.

Garden blogger Jane Berger says, “Mickey has done a tremendous amount of research to tell us the story of the spreading popularity of English garden style in America during the 19th century. Nurserymen and seed merchants sold the English style to America in their publications. It’s an engaging story.”

Ohio University Press published America’s Romance with the English Garden. The book features more than forty illustrations and has a retail list price of $26.95. It is available through Amazon and other booksellers and also online. Check out the Ohio University Press website about the book for images, reviews, interviews, and more at: http://www.ohioswallow.com/book/America’s+Romance+with+the+English+Garden and Mickey’s blog “American Gardening, with a love for the English Garden” at: http://americangardening.net

Media Contact: Ohio University Press Jeff Kallet Phone: (740) 593-1158 Email

Read more news from Thomas Mickey.

SOURCE Thomas Mickey

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Christmas Angels: Memory Gardens ladies

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KENNEBUNK — With the help of these Christmas Angels, Kennebunk’s downtown and Lower Village have the finishing touch that they need to pop.

“I like a lot of color,” said Joanna Sylvester of Memory Gardens, who with Julie Dunlap works through the spring, summer and fall to landscape and line the downtown with colorful, vibrant plantings throughout the seasons. “Even if they’re not flower people, they respond to color and I think it’s done the job. We’re just lucky to be a part of it.”

This is Memory Gardens’ second season beautifying the downtown. The company started as a retail greenhouse and transformed into landscaping, planting, pruning and otherwise beautifying local businesses and residences, Sylvester said. She has been doing the landscaping for Kennebunk Savings for the past 12 years, Sylvester said, before taking on Main Street, under a long-term contract with the town.

The ladies also fill the dories in Lower Village and plant flowers along the Mathew J. Lanigan Bridge. This fall, the women planted the flowers along the bridge three times after they were vandalized. An anonymous donor paid for the flowers.

“For me, it’s a dream job. A lot of people probably think I’m crazy,” Sylvester said.

In the spring, summer and fall, Sylvester and Dunlap can be found on Main Street from the all-too-early morning to late afternoon, rain or shine, working to keep the finishing touches of the downtown perfect. In Lower Village, they work between 4 and 6 a.m. to beat the traffic.

Sylvester said passerbys often honk and wave in support of their work.

“One woman said I used to walk down on the beach, now I walk down Main Street,” Sylvester said. “I consider it an honor. It makes me want to work even harder. It inspires you.”

Linda Johnson of the Kennebunk Downtown Committee said, “all we get is compliments” about the landscaping work.

“The timing worked well with the revitalization of the downtown,” she said. “It was a no-brainer adding Joanna and Julie to the mix of the downtown. They make it look so easy. It’s a seamless process and we don’t even have any snags.”

Looking at the revitalization of the downtown, Johnson said the landscaping and plants add the finishing touch and that she “couldn’t be more proud.”

“Downtown is everything to me, and this just adds a whole new level,” she said.

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B&D Rockeries Releases New 10-Step Guide to Landscaping with Rock Gardens

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BD-rockeries-landscaping-rock-garden

Rock gardens are an easy and creative way to add texture to any yard scene.

Rock gardens have increased in popularity as a creative landscaping tool due to the character and texture they contribute to a yard scene.

Seattle, WA (PRWEB) December 26, 2013

Rock gardens have increased in popularity as a creative landscaping tool due to the character and texture they contribute to a yard scene. Installation is simple, materials are readily available, and maintenance is minimal. BD Rockeries recently published a 10-step guide to landscaping with rock gardens that is providing tips to homeowners and gardeners. To view the article, click here.

Rock gardens are a clever and cost-effective option that will enhance a monotonous or mundane yard setting. These simple, picturesque rock gardens are composed of various sized rocks artistically arranged on a plot of ground and accented by plants and small flowers.

The BD Rockeries article emphasizes how installing a rock garden is conveniently simple. The best place to build one is on a patch of ground on a slight slope, either natural or built using small retaining walls. The foundation below the rocks is composed of various mineral layers in order to provide enough water drainage, and topsoil is selected specifically for the greenery and flowers that will be planted among the rocks.

The rock garden should look natural in order to compliment the landscape scene. Typically, it is best to select rocks from the yard itself. BD Rockeries suggests that the rocks be arranged in an ordinary manner; avoid symmetrical formations that look unnatural. After the rocks are placed, let the garden sit for a couple of weeks, giving the formation time to settle into the soil before the flowers and greenery are planted.

Rock gardens are a versatile landscaping tool that can be customized to fit the needs of any yard scene. Each one is unique and can contribute aesthetically to any landscape by adding personality a lonesome flower garden cannot offer on its own.

About BD Rockeries:

BD Rockeries has been serving in the Snohomish and King county areas for over 35 years. Owner, Neil Eneix, has a capable and skilled knowledge of rock retaining wall development that will help you accomplish any rock garden design that you need. Whether you’re looking for rocks or blocks, Neil has been helping homeowners carefully plot out their landscaping projects for years.

http://www.bdrockeries.com/

1249 NE 145th St

Seattle, WA 98125

206-362-4022

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Marana Heritage River Park to proceed with construction

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Members of the Marana Parks and Recreation Department gave a presentation to the council on Dec. 17 regarding the development and construction of the Marana Heritage River Park. 


“It’s going to be a park that reflects a much broader sense of where our community came from,” said Town Manager Gilbert Davidson. 

Marana Heritage River Park is west of the Interstate 10 on Tangerine Farms Loop Road and south of Gladden Farms.

This year, the council adopted a budget authorization for the 2014 fiscal year, which will allow for the Parks and Recreation department to begin on the first modules. Right now, the department will address three of the five focus areas that are outlined in the town’s strategic plan.

One of the focus areas is Heritage Farm, which will be built to celebrate the culture of farming in Marana. The farm currently has a sewer connection, community garden and demonstration garden. The gardens are an area for residents to learn about Marana’s farm heritage through planting, working and eating the locally grown food. The next step for construction at Heritage Farm is the building of restrooms, parking, lighting and access areas, which is projected to cost around $278,000 and if approved would be completed in 2015. Looking to the future, the department would want commercial farming, retail and a farmer’s market in the area.

The second focus area is Heritage Park where a heritage themed splash pad, Ramada, parking, lighting and access area would be built. The goal of the Heritage Park is to create an area where residents can play and be together. The estimated cost for construction is around $747,000 and if approved would be completed in spring 2015. The park would be open during warm weather months.

The last focus area is Heritage Ranch, which is meant to bring different regional areas to the community. The ranch will have two arenas, each 150 by 300 feet that will hold different sporting events. The area will include lights, speakers, concessions stands, restrooms, a maintenance facility, stalls for the horse, parking, landscaping and the use of a utility line. The estimated cost is $7.9 million and if approved would open in summer 2015.

The budget requested for this next year is an estimated $8.9 million. Right now money would primarily come from the town’s savings, but in the future, other opportunities such as commercial vendors, ticket sales and more would generate revenue, said Davidson.

If all the aforementioned is completed and approved, the Parks and Recreation department hopes to construct a plaza, amphitheater and the Producers Cotton Oil Building. 

Parks and Recreation will meet with the council in a January study session where they will give more definitive cost estimates for park construction.

Also in the meeting, the town council voted 4-3 to approve a railroad quiet zone for all current private and public railroad crossings in Marana. The quiet zone will reduce the horn noise when a train approaches a railroad crossing. If there is no vehicle, people, wildlife or anything that would cause a collision the train will not be required to sound its horn. The quiet zone and cautionary signs for residents will be implemented around February 2014.

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Green thumbs up!

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SPACES was born out of a creative and social agenda. Fresh out of college and taking their baby steps in the corporate world, Shainika, Uma, Varsha and Swathi, formerly IT professionals, decided to follow their passion for gardening. Their desire and urge to make, perhaps a small, but significant difference to the city’s green cover brought forth SPACES, a gardening venture that is innovative, affordable and one might even say, revolutionary.

How did SPACES come to be?

Uma: Well, all of us have a common interest in gardening. We wanted to do something different with a social objective. Shainika and I wanted to learn more about gardening and would attend seminars and workshops, and take part in competitions. With a background in IT, I wanted to bring a technological aspect to gardening.

Swathi: I was actually bored with my job. It gets a little dull when all you’re doing is sitting in front of a system and working in shifts. I was introduced to Shainika by my uncle and we realised that both of us loved nature and gardening and wanted to do something along that line.

Shainika: We knew we had to cater to a crowd that wanted gardens at affordable rates. We gave away pamphlets, put up stalls and did some heavy promotion through Facebook and seminars. Once all of us were on board, it just happened.

How is SPACES different from other such businesses?

Shainika: Everyone can have a garden. Our aim is to provide our services, not to rich corporates, but to the middle class people, who want to create and maintain a space without spending too much, and keeps them in touch with nature. We do consultancy and give horticultural advice like what properties certain plants in their garden have, what plants go where etc. We give the customers a design idea, followed by a detailed description about what can be done. We have also worked with schools to develop herbal gardens and get children involved.

Uma: For us, more than a business, SPACES is an idea that inculcates the passion for gardening and plants and not simply about extravagant landscaping. We have learned a lot about organic farming and don’t encourage the use of pesticides. It’s all about making a greener space. It is evident that Chennai is losing its green cover rapidly. We only want to stress on the fact that people need to coexist with nature.

SPACES is an all-women team. Was that a deliberate decision?

Uma: No, not at all. We just happened to find one another at the right time and simply connect the dots. Anyone can join the team!

It is almost a year since you started out. What would you say was the highlight of SPACES so far?

Uma: Definitely the kitchen gardens! It is one of the most demanded services and we have done a couple of them. Every household now wants to have a kitchen garden and grow their own vegetables. These require a lot of maintenance and it is really rewarding to see people wanting to grow it on their own.

Tell us about the innovative techniques you use, namely hydroponics and aquaponics.

Shainika: Aquaponics and hydroponics is basically growing plants with just water. There is no soil involved. It is an ecosystem by itself. For people who already have fish tanks at home, it is easier to set up a plant grow tank above it. Water is circulated from the fish tank to the grow tank through a pump.

Fish waste gets accumulated in the grow tank and supplies the nutrients to the plants while the fish tank need not be cleaned at regular intervals. It is slightly expensive and not fully commercial as of now.

Uma: These are established concepts and Varsha is the one who is constantly experimenting and designing these techniques.

What are your long-term plans?

Uma: I don’t know if you would call it a long-term plan, but we want to encourage citizens to grow indigenous variety of plants. These plants are dying out as people try to grow exotic plants which may not survive Chennai’s weather. We have a lot of ideas in the pipeline. We want to be more than just a landscaping business.

Shainika: We are currently in the process of expanding. We have tie-ups with nurseries and are thinking of opening a retail outlet sometime soon.

Swathi: We haven’t thought that far ahead. But we intend to stick to it as long as possible.

What advice or tips would you give amateur gardening enthusiasts?

Just go ahead and do it!

Website: www.gardeningredefined.com

Facebook page: www.facebook.com/Spaces.Gardening

Blog: www.spacesgardeningredefined.wordpress.com/

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New Airfield Falls trailhead pays tribute to aviation history

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By Sandra Baker

sabaker@star-telegram.com


WESTWORTH VILLAGE —

The Tarrant Regional Water District’s newest trailhead gives a nod to Fort Worth’s military aviation history.

Two years ago, the water district paid to have a McDonnell-Douglas C-9 from Naval Air Station Fort Worth disassembled, keeping the wings and tail section to become the centerpiece of the park. The plane section has sat at the new trailhead, just outside the gates to the base on Pumphrey Drive, where the Trinity Trails now reach.

Airfield Falls, designed by Kevin Sloan Studio in Dallas, also gives the water district a unique opportunity to display native plants in a demonstration garden, showing Tarrant County residents how water conservation can work in their own yards and gardens.

The trailhead project has been in the works for more than three years, said Linda Christie, the district’s community and government relations director.

The 2.5-acre site provided enough land to do a good-size project, she said. It’s known as the place where folks have jumped the curb and parked cars on the grass for years to gain access to Tarrant County’s only natural waterfalls, along Farmers Branch Creek, fed by the Trinity River.

A couple of years ago, the district connected the site to the Trinity Trails, more than 40 miles of recreational trails along the Trinity River and its tributaries.

The trailhead is currently closed for construction. The $1.2 million project, which includes the cost to disassemble the plane, is scheduled to be completed next fall. It will have a 30-space parking lot, restrooms and picnic facilities.

“This is the perfect spot for the gardens we wanted to do,” Christie said. “It’s really an important and great educational project. It’s a lot of pluses.”

Westworth Village owns the property, but the water district has an interlocal agreement with the city to build and maintain the trailhead and trails there.

A large portion of the trailhead will focus on water conservation education, including the placement of four 5-by-5-foot educational signs highlighting sustainability features along the trail.

Features include landscaping and drip irrigation. The conservation garden will have a series of native plants and flowers, each specifically placed to meet its needs for sun or shade.

Beyond the garden, the parking area will use pervious paving to prevent storm water and pollutants from running off into the creek. It will also feature a water retention area that naturally filters storm water pollutants with vegetation.

A play area with Habiturf will be added. Habiturf is a mix of native grass species developed by the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center in Austin as a durable low-maintenance grass that requires less water and mowing.

The aircraft will be rebuilt and mounted in an abstract manner on steel supports, and in a position to look like it’s taking flight. From the back of the plane, a sidewalk will wind to the trail, resembling a vapor trail. The original lights on the aircraft will be refurbished and used to light the monument when approached. Lighting will also be placed along the sidewalk.

Tom Struhs of with Struhs Commercial Construction is handling project construction.

Struhs, the developer behind the Trinity Uptown development on the north edge of downtown, said he was an avid model plane builder as a kid, so this project is right up his alley. He said he’ll have to work with steel tubing to make a fuselage and nose section.

“There’s a lot of cleverness about the design,” Struhs said.

According to military records, the C-9 was delivered to Iberia Airlines in 1972 and was flown commercially in Europe for 18 years. In 1990, it was sent back to McDonnell Douglas and converted for military use, providing Navy cargo and passenger transportation.

Afterward, it was delivered to NAS Memphis and was used there until about 1996, when it was decommissioned, eventually making its way to Fort Worth, where it was used for training. The Navy scapped it in September 2011, a few months after the water district approached the service about obtaining an aircraft for the Airfield Falls project.

Sandra Baker, 817-390-7727 Twitter: @SandraBakerFWST


Filed Under: gardens and landscaping
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