The Plant People is a profit-oriented group with objectives of preserving and protecting plants of the region, advancing knowledge of plants and their role in the ecosystem, encouraging diverse wild-plant-related recreation, encompassing responsible ecotourism, encouraging restoration of plant communities, and encouraging responsible wild plant gardening in the region.
The activities within the group, in no particular order, are:
- Creating a membership
- Publishing a newsletter
- Making phenology studies (timing of plant changes such as bud break)
- Creating county and regional plant occurrence checklists
- Conducting surveys and tours
- Participating in joint biodiversity surveys
- Managing special wild-plant-emphasis trails
- Selling books
- Selling checklists
- Conducting poisonous-plant surveys
- Conducting wildlife food (mast) surveys
- Encouraging Rural System, Inc. gardens
- Studying limits of the non-timber forest resource (decorative plants, etc.)
- Selling maps (especially of frost periods and suitability zones)
- Selling related software
- Encouraging plant-related art
- Maintaining a web site
- Holding an annual conference
- Encouraging and selling photographs
- Helping to develop a local herbarium
- Develop a seeds collection and wildlife food analysis system
- Developing files on medicinal plants
- Exploring commercial potentials in dyes, medicinals, and preservatives
- Reviewing plant and plant ecology related books
- Developing local plant identification aids and a training course and walkway
- Developing a wild garden where "gleanings" from developed areas are placed
- Writing and developing books and CD-ROMs (See Ken Stein's Appalachian plants CD)
- Creating a game and regional contest related to plant identification
- Sponsoring photograph display events
- Creating a book or information system on plant and insect relations
- Mapping wild plant locations with GPS locations
- Sponsoring research on all aspects of the region's The Plant People
- Participating in comprehensive modeling effort, simulation and optimization
- Developing thoughtful papers on plant diversity; viability of populations; plants in ecosystems; plant-to-plant, plant-to-animal, and plant-to-geology relationships
- Working to achieve knowledge of and engaging in practical efforts to manage fires as they effect The Plant People
- Assisting in baseline descriptions
- Promoting special studies of the roots and plants in the root-zone of The Plant People
- Developing cost-effective rare-species recovery plans, especially those related to probability of occurrence using logistic regression with GIS information and GPS located sample plants
- Encouraging contributions of time, money, and knowledge to wildland studies
- Encouraging ecological tours throughout the world
- Promoting interest of minorities in The Plant People and their systems
- Promoting and developing a computer wild plant information system and web site
- Working with the Fire Force in describing effects of wildfires on plants and top soil
Other ideas include sponsoring garden tours; developing gardens with places (alcoves) for many people to sit and rest, perhaps with tea service; expert systems for plants and plant diseases and pests; a county-fair weekend presentations of topics, publications and CDs; e-commerce with many suppliers, and a botany school resulting in special honors, awards, and knowledge competition. It also includes working with AOL or others for percentages on book sales.
Sample 2004 email note for aid in developing similar local programs:
FREE Native Plant Conservation Workshops: April 2004
Throughout April 2004 the Carlsbad Caverns/Guadalupe Mountains Association will sponsor the second-annual free programs for the public focusing on native plant conservation. With trailside workshops taking place each weekend, visitors and amateur and professional naturalists, artists, and writers will be converging at the park to participate in interactive workshops lead by professionals, to learn more about park flora, from wildflowers to desert cacti. In addition to its many caves, the Carlsbad Caverns National Park preserves one of the few protected portions of the northern Chihuahuan Desert ecosystem. The desert reveals, upon close examination, complex natural processes that yield an astounding abundance and diversity of plant and animal life. The area is vital habitat for approximately one thousand species of flowering vegetation. >From the upper reaches of Walnut Canyon Drive where the red, tri-lobed Woolly Paintbrush and White-Eyed Phlox thrive, along the extensive Visitor Center Nature Walk with its profusions of Claret-Cup Cacti and deep into some of the most picturesque canyons in the Chihuahuan Desert Region, participants can look forward to exciting hands-on activities suitable for most ability and fitness levels. All events are free, except the college credit field course. Space is limited, so advance registration is advised. For the latest updates and to register, please contact Paula Bauer at 505-785-3131 or via e-mail at paula_bauer@nps.gov. For schedule of events and background information: http://www.ccgma.org/indexnew.htm
See Herbage( Fourth Edition contains 30,523 Plant Species, 18,200 Common Names, and 312,079 links to current internet resources, including 9,341 links to scientific abstracts on PubMed. All of the internet resources, which are new in this edition, were compiled in April of 2004. Herbage was first initiated in 1992.
This may be the group from which a "climate-friendly farming" project is initiated. This includes the major GIS components that allow animals, trees, and crops to be carefully placed to receive optimum water and temperature and insolation during a growing season (See a related project at http://cff.wsu.edu/)
See Flora of Virginia Project
Estimates
A special botanist will need to be recruited and part time help developed with others in the region. As many of the other groups, each requires one or more people with special knowledge as well as enthusiasm for a topic. The search may be difficult but it may inform botanists (with limited employment options) that there is valuable work to be done that can pay its way.
See Invasive Plants
(Development costs: $50,000). Estimates of profits for Rural System, Inc.:
- Low - $ 1000
- Mod - $ 5000
- High -$10,000