October 26 @ 10:00 am – 1:00 pm
Franklin County
Florida Wildflower Foundation members can register for this field trip starting Monday, September 8. General registration opens Thursday, September 18. Become a Florida Wildflower Foundation member today for early access!
Join us for the final event of the Botany in Context webinar series with Jim Folsom, PhD on Sunday, October 26, at 10am EST. Throughout the series, Jim has guided us through a crash course in basic botany, from plant anatomy and physiology to learning how plants are named and botanical jargon. This culminating field trip will bring all of that into practice with an on-the-ground exploration.
On this guided walk through St. George Island State Park, we will explore its fall wildflowers and diverse habitats. The park features sandy beaches, coastal dunes, salt marshes, maritime forests and pine flatwoods, each supporting a unique mix of native plants and wildlife. The field trip will take the Gap Point trail through pine forest and coastal scrub to the bay. Fall blooming highlights will include False rosemary (Conradina canescens), October flower (Polygonum polygamum), Blazing stars (Liatris spp) and Goldenrods (Solidago spp).
This trip will entail up to 3 miles of hiking along board walks and sandy trails.
Whether you’ve followed the series or are joining us for the first time, this trip is an opportunity to see ideas from the webinars come alive in the field. You can view all the past webinar recordings at Botany in Context.
Difficulty: Moderate
Please pack snacks/lunch and bring a refillable water bottle.
The trip meet-up location will be emailed a few days before departure.
Registration is free for Florida Wildflower Foundation members and $15 for nonmembers. Email Rose Kinane to find out if your membership is current or needs to be renewed. To join as a member, visit www.FlaWildflowers.org/membership.
About our Guide:
Jim Folsom rides the demographic peak of baby boomers, having been born in southeastern Alabama in 1950. His lifelong love of plants is reflected in a BS in botany from Auburn University, an MA in biology from Vanderbilt University, and a PhD in research botany from the University of Texas at Austin. Though his research has centered largely on the orchid family, with much of that time spent in tropical America (including a year in Colombia on a Fulbright Pre-Doctoral Fellowship), Jim’s botanical interests are wide-ranging. For 35 years before his retirement in 2021, as curator/director of the Botanical Gardens at The Huntington in San Marino, CA, he dedicated much of his effort to educational programs that increase public interest and understanding of the science, culture and history of plants and gardens, topics reflected in his website botanyincontext.com as well as his TikTok channel, @botanyincontext. He lives on Saint George Island, FL, with his wife, Debra (also a botanist); they have two adult children, Molly and James. Jim currently serves as an incoming member of the board of the American Horticultural Society.