Sponsored by Blue Oak Horticulture, the Blue Oak Pawpaw Festival honors America’s largest native fruit during its peak harvest season in Upstate SC. Come taste the fruit, browse the plants, visit the greenhouse, talk natives with representatives from the SCNPS and Southern Garden Solutions, shop arts and crafts from local artisans, listen to live music from the Well Drinkers, join June Ellen Bradley for an herbal medicinal plant walk, and much more! There will also be several food and drink vendors on site, and Carolina Baeurnhaus will be brewing up a special pawpaw beer just for the festival — we can’t wait to try it!

Blue Oak’s nursery will be open for plant sales, including native plants, from 3:00-6:00pm during the festival, including both local ecotype and selected varieties of Pawpaws. They will also have a limited selection of grafted Pawpaw trees for sale.

Learn more and get all the FAQs, and purchase a parking pass, HERE.

Image Credit: Blue Oak Horticulture

Our summer vaycay continues this month, so no meeting (but definitely save the date for our spectacular September speaker!). Instead, we encourage readers to consider joining our good friends at Jocassee Wild Outdoor Education for a special introduction to the Jocassee Wild Naturalist certification program (JWN), which uses Lake Jocassee as an entryway for the study of the remarkable Jocassee Gorges.

JWN consists of this mandatory prerequisite introductory class plus twelve core classes, offered roughly every three weeks between September and May. The subjects cover all the reasons this specific eco-region was named one of 50 of “the world’s last great places” by National Geographic magazine. This is a unique opportunity for local naturalists to learn Jocassee Gorges botany with Alan Weakley (Weakley’s Flora) and Keith Bradley (SC State DNR Botanist); Jocassee Gorges geology with Dr. Bill Ranson (Geology Guide to the Foothills Trail); Jocassee history with Sheryl White, whose family history is rooted throughout the story of this region; and so much more.

The Jocassee Gorges eco-region is a little-known tract of land located at the interface between the South Carolina Piedmont and the Southern Blue Ridge Escarpment. Only a couple of highways penetrate this largely undeveloped tract, and the best access is from Lake Jocassee, which nestles into the folds of the mountains at 1100’ above sea level.

The JWN program is intended to enhance your love and knowledge of native plants and encourage a lifelong study of and appreciation of this land where temperate rainforest plants share space with desert species and alpine species. Jocassee Wild Outdoor Education is a 501c3 nonprofit organization dedicated to introducing all ages – from children to retirees – to this place known as an important refuge in times of climactic change.

The intro class will be held at Devils Fork State Park and beautiful Lake Jocassee on August 22 from 10am-2pm and will consist of a brief classroom presentation of JWN subjects, instructors, and guidelines, followed by a relaxing pontoon tour into the heart of Jocassee.

The cost of this class is $65 per person; subsequent JWN classes are $95 each. Pre-registration is required. You can learn more HERE, or register by calling 864-280-5501.

Photo Credit: Chris Sermons

By Chris Sermons

In 1999, when I moved to the family land that would eventually become Bio Way Farm, I brought two Rabbiteye Blueberry (Vaccinium virgatum) bushes that had been gifted to me. They grew well and soon thereafter I wanted to plant more. Having no suitable site in which to plant, I began clearing a very small wooded area between our two cabins.

At the time, I’d been a SCNPS member for a couple of years and had drunk the native plant Kool-Aid. The work I did with the Weed Wrench and chainsaw released plants that had been shaded and suppressed, one of which turned out to be a shrub I’d never seen before, New Jersey Tea (Ceanothus americanus).

I was also a budding permaculturist who was looking to derive a yield and I was intrigued by the new plant. And, the more I read and researched, the more intriguing and useful New Jersey Tea turned out to be!

As the name implies, it is a tea plant that tastes like true tea (Camellia sinensis) but contains no caffeine (otherwise perhaps there would be a commercial market for it like the one that’s slowly developing around Yaupon Holly [Ilex vomitoria]). Apparently, the dried leaves were used during the Revolutionary War as a replacement for British tea. (As we all learned in school, discontent was brewing but tea was not!)

Nearby the then-capital, Philadelphia, the colonists found an abundant population of Ceanothus americanus in the New Jersey Pine Barrens, which gave the plant its common name. According to Samuel Thayer, in his book Nature’s Garden, the leaves can be used dried or fresh and are best picked early in the season. He describes the flavor as being between green tea and nettle tea.

The white flowers are showy especially when massed. As a generalist nectary, New Jersey Tea attracts a diverse assortment of pollinators like flies, bees, butterflies, and some of the coolest beetles I’ve ever seen.

The red roots are used as an alterative, and have an astringency that has traditionally made it useful as a mouthwash. A tincture known as Red Root is sold commercially, but the roots can also be used to prepare an infusion or decoction. Supposedly, a lotion made from the leaves can remove freckles.

It’s also one of the few native non-leguminous nitrogen fixers! There’s no cheaper form of fertilizer than that produced by plants whose roots have nodules that shelter bacteria that fix atmospheric nitrogen. This ability coupled with its large woody roots allow it to thrive in hot, dry sunny exposures with poor soil. Thus, you can plant it in problem areas where it’s difficult to get anything else to grow.

New Jersey Tea is one of two species of the Ceanothus family in the eastern United States, but out West there are popular ornamental species as well as species that make excellent teas and other beverages.

So, that’s a glimpse at New Jersey Tea, one of the most useful plants I know!

Report from the Upstate Native Nursery: The SCNPS Native Seed Bank

The SCNPS native seed bank was started years ago at the Upstate Native Nursery as a source for seeds used in propagating stock for our plant sales. The ultimate goal of the program has long been to raise funds to support the work of the SCNPS while disseminating genetically diverse seeds from across our region.

Now, though, with the relocation and expansion of the nursery, improvements have been made to the seed bank program so that it can also be used as a tool in educating the Upstate Community about the proper collection, storage, and propagation of native seeds. A propagation guide has been developed for Seed Bank volunteers with information on the collection, storage, pre-treatment, and sowing for each of the inventoried species. This additional information was compiled from Jan A.W. Midgley’s Native Plant Propagation (fifth edition) and Prairie Moon Nursery 2022 Cultural Guide.

Plans for the further development of the program include the purchase of a temperature- and humidity-controlled refrigerator to store the seed; and organizing Seed Collecting Field Trips as a learning tool for both the general public and for future leaders of the Seed Bank program.

Once fully developed, our Native Seed Bank Program will enhance our efforts to:

• Educate and inform members and the general public about the importance of native plants.
• Support efforts by government agencies to protect habitats and endangered species.
• Encourage the use of native plant materials in public and private landscaping.
• Promote the commercial availability of native plant materials.

As if a picnic with several dozen of your native plant besties wasn’t enough, Dan Whitten will also be leading picnic participants on a “wee walk” up the Pinnacle Lake Trail during the Upstate’s special, potluck, in-person, monthly meeting.

The trail is an easy-hiking, 1.9 mile loop, which should take about 90 minutes to complete. Dan says, “We will be looking especially for the Crisped Bunchflower (Melanthium hybrid), the Small Green Wood Orchid (Platanthera clavellata), and whatever surprises we can find as well. Bring water and a camera!”