ORAS February Meeting Features Talk on Managing Invasive Plants to Benefit Birds

Please join us for our monthly meeting at 7 p.m., Thursday, February 6th at Sandy Creek Nature Center where Gary Crider, Northeast Georgia Invasive Plant Cooperative member, will discuss the most insidious invasive plants in the Georgia Piedmont and what you can do to help native birds. See below for details.

 

Invasive non-native plants can overwhelm native flora, threatening the viability and diversity of our native plant communities, pollinators, birds, and other wildlife. Gary Crider will list and describe the “dirty dozen” worst invasive plants in the Georgia Piedmont, along with best management practices and control measures.

 

Gary Crider is a steering committee member for the Northeast Georgia Invasive Plant Cooperative and volunteer leader with the Memorial Park/Birchmore Trail Weed Warriors, working to limit the spread of invasive plant species and to restore wildlife habitat on public and private land. In recognition of his environmental stewardship and activism with the Weed Warriors, the local Audubon Society and similar organizations, Gary received the 2013 Alec Little Environmental Award.

 

 

(photo credit: Ed Wilde)

 

The meeting will be held in the Nature Center’s Education and Visitor Center, 205 Old Commerce Road off U.S. Highway 441 north of Athens. To reach the center from the Loop 10 bypass, exit at U.S. Highway 441/Commerce Road and turn north toward Commerce. Go approximately a mile, turn left at the Sandy Creek Nature Center sign and go to the end of the road. Turn left at Old Commerce Road; parking for the Education and Visitor Center will be on the right.