Beth Chisholm
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Sustainable Gardening Green Team
(Left to right) Sue Blake, Susan Taylor, Jill Cotton, Anitra Accetturo
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I am thrilled to see one of our fellow Master gardeners was selected as a 2015 Environmental Hero. I met Sue many years ago when I worked for the Whatcom Conservation district and she was a teacher at Ten Mile Elementary. We worked on salmon education and restoration at the school. She has done so much in our community and she is a tireless educator. Gardening Green Class is one of many of her accomplishments
Susan is recognized for her efforts to change residential landscape practices that have a negative impact on water resources and the environment. Gardening is not a benign activity and landscape choices matter. Residential landscapes offer a significant opportunity to restore critical ecosystem functions that are lost when wild lands become towns and suburbs. Traditional landscapes with large lawns have been identified as contributing to excess storm water runoff and phosphorus and nitrogen loading to sensitive watersheds and the Puget Sound. In 2009 Sue developed a sustainable landscape class called Gardening Green as a Master Gardener volunteer project.
This class heightens awareness of negative environmental impacts of many common gardening practices and provides the knowledge and skills needed for individuals to take actions to protect and improve the quality of area waters, manage storm water on-site, and create wildlife habitat. WSU Whatcom Extension, City of Bellingham, and Whatcom County have supported the continuation of the class for the past seven years. Participants have been inspired to adopt stewardship behaviors, make on-the-ground changes to their landscapes, and become partners in outreach education about water quality issues and sustainable landscaping. Neighbor teaching neighbor builds community, personal relationships, and a healthy environment.
Sue served on the Bellingham Park Board, Lake Whatcom Watershed Advisory Board, several Greenways levies, and helped start the Students for Salmon educational program for the Nooksack Salmon Enhancement Association. Sue developed curricula and created an outdoor environmental classroom along Ten Mile Creek. This work earned her the honor of being the 1995 National Conservation Teacher of the Year by the National Association of Conservation Districts.
Congratulations Susan!!
Learn more at: http://www.re-sources.org/environmentalheroes