An innovative and impactful collaboration between Denver Botanic Gardens, Xcel Energy</a>, the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL)</a> and the City of Denver’s Office of Climate Action, Sustainability & Resiliency</a> is culminating in an extensive, 4.5-acre solar array and agrivoltaics display at Chatfield Farms</a>. Agrivoltaics, also known as agrisolar, is the combined use of land for agriculture and solar power generation. The electricity produced by this renewable source will not only provide enough power to operate Chatfield Farms, but also be used to provide electricity for low-income housing in Denver. </p> This sustainable energy initiative is an integral part of the first phase of construction for the Chatfield Farms Master Development Plan, scheduled to begin in June of 2023.</p> Enough energy will be supplied through this solar array that natural gas lines will not need to be extended to power the new or existing buildings at Chatfield Farms. Electric air-source heat pumps will heat and cool all buildings powered by the renewable solar energy produced on site. </p> Chatfield Farms will receive approximately 250,000 kWh per year of discounted power from the 1.2-megawatt array, which should be sufficient to provide electrical power for all existing and new buildings on the site. The remaining 750,000 kWh per year will provide electricity for low-income housing in Denver.</p> Xcel Energy has been assisting with upgrading the existing power line into Chatfield Farms to carry solar electricity to our campus and beyond to the electrical grid. This project demonstrates Xcel Energy’s commitment to partnering with customers and communities to advance clean energy production and further reduce greenhouse gas emissions in Colorado as the company works towards becoming a net-zero energy provider by 2050.</p> Beneath the new solar array, Chatfield Farms staff will build an agrivoltaics demonstration and production farm. The agrisolar farm will produce mixed vegetables, herbs and fruit for Chatfield Farms’ many food partners and the Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) program. It will also provide educational resources and inspiration to visitors and farmers locally and globally. NREL is working to secure grants to fund research and equipment to fully develop the agrivoltaics farm. The research will enhance the energy-water-land nexus this project encompasses.</p> The solar array, along with a robust new composting program to eliminate green waste generated from farming and horticulture, puts Chatfield Farms at the forefront of sustainable operations for Denver Botanic Gardens. We are excited to incorporate these pioneering technologies on our historical farm, aligned with our five-year institutional strategic plan</a> and living out our core values of relevance, transformation and sustainability. </p>
Lore is knowledge gained through tradition or anecdote and passed down through the ages, from generation to generation. The lore of plants has long been an integral part of humanity; influencing our religion, medicinal remedies, the food we eat—and even our behaviors.</p> Can you recall lore passed down to you by an older family member or trusted teacher? Maybe something like “an apple a day keeps the doctor away” or the notion that you should “knock on wood?” Lore weaves itself into a healthy diet as easily as it does superstition.</p> Speaking of wood, the lore of elderberry</strong> (Sambucus spp.</em>) describes this woody plant as having properties of protection from witches. Early European stories attribute bad luck to cutting the wood of elderberry plants or crafting an infant’s crib from its wood. According to Grimms’ fairy tales, it is wise to keep a bouquet of elderflowers picked in midsummer on hand in case the devil wanders by. </p>
Restoration is an integral part of land management and conservation. As natural disasters and human activity continue to impact biodiversity and wildlife habitat, it is becoming increasingly important to restore degraded land back into healthy ecosystems. Here at Denver Botanic Gardens, many scientists conduct research on ways to improve how we restore native plant communities in the Front Range. This year, I conducted this type of research down at Chatfield Farms, using native plant species brought in from all over the Western United States to see how well they grow here in Colorado. </p> With the help of many of the Research & Conservation Department’s wonderful seasonal staff, we planted over 5,000 seedlings from four different species native to the Front Range of Colorado and collected data on how the plants grew over the summer. We were pleased to see that they all did quite well in their first year! After just a few months in the ground, our seedlings were big and happy, which is good news for restoration efforts. Each seedling will continue to be monitored over the next several years to see how they perform long-term. </p> With climate change on the horizon, it’s important for land managers, like the Bureau of Land Management, to know what plants will survive here long term. Often it can be helpful to use species that are native to Colorado, but use of plants or seed that come from hotter and dryer regions in the county can help them to better adapt and survive long-term as temperatures get warmer and rain becomes less frequent. Other times, it is best to use plants or seeds that have been growing as close to the restoration site as possible, so that they are already well adapted to the environment they will be growing in. Knowing where to source plants from and where to plant them is an important research topic for bringing back native plant communities to Colorado! </p>
In winter, Denver Botanic Gardens connects us to the wild in a way that no other season can. Stripped of the froth and finery of summer, it feels more rugged and spontaneous, as if some things are just the way they happen naturally. Our imagination becomes freer to believe the dead tree trunk angled through a grove in Gates Montane Garden or the waterfall tumbling nearby into a pond are unplanned, and we are drawn to the very things we seek out in the wild – contemplative places and expansive views.</p> Come with me on a snowy day as we wander side paths and explore the nooks and crannies of the Gardens in search of a cultivated wild. I’ll share some of my favorite vignettes and features that on a quiet winter day may just transport you to an untamed faraway place.</p> The stonework in the Steppe Garden</strong> is home to treasures and one of my favorites is a trickling fountain sandwiched between two big slabs of buff rock. Crouch down at the opening and imagine you’re as tiny as a Lilliputian then take in the grandeur of this pint-sized chasm. </li> In Dryland Mesa</strong>, just before the main path curves north toward Monet Pool, you’ll find a side path that leads up rustic steps through an outcrop of boulders. Hunker down at the bottom and look up toward a weathered Utah juniper (Juniperus osteosperma</em>) and you could be deep in the Rockies on a hike.</li> Walk the southernmost path in the Rock Alpine Garden</strong> and look down a meandering brook across a rugged vista of boulders, shrubs and trees. On a cool winter’s day, you can almost taste mountain air. Of course, one reason we love vistas is that they exceed our expectations and even though this one is small, it’s exhilarating.</li> Trees are what give the Gardens its sense of grandeur and in winter the evergreens anchor us most in nature. Stand at the base of the giant yellow cypress (Chamaecyparis nootkatensis</em> ‘Pendula’) in the southwest corner of the Rock Alpine Garden</strong> and look up. Its upcurved branches draping down with green foliage feel as if they command the sky.</li> According to scientific theorists, humans are soothed by fractal patterns in nature, those that repeat at different scales, and now is the time when these patterns pop at the Gardens. Evergreen succulents and subshrubs stand out against a neutral palette of spent perennials – from large spiraling rosettes of Adam’s needle (Yucca</em>) in Roads Water-Smart Garden</strong> to the geometric wonder, prickly thrift (Acantholimon</em>), in the Steppe Garden</strong> – nature’s little geodesic dome.</li> In the wild, hikers often talk of feeling recharged by wind blowing around them and through the landscape, and in the Ornamental Grasses Garden</strong>, a similar feeling can be had. The grasses here are almost always in perpetual motion. The tiniest waft of air can send the delicate seed clouds of sand love grass (Eragrostis trichodes</em>) quivering or the wands of silver grass (Miscanthus</em>) swaying as gently as feathers.</li> </ul>
As the weather turns cold, we seek coziness, covering ourselves in layers of clothing, nestling into blankets and if we’re fortunate, taking sanctuary in heated habitations. When it comes to the extreme weather of the steppes, we live by the words of the Rolling Stones: “Gimme shelter or I’m gonna fade away.” These lyrics ring as true for us as they do for the multitude of vertebrate and invertebrate animals and microorganisms that exist in our gardens.</p> Through gardening, we align ourselves intimately with other creatures. These collateral beings are our kin, and we must consider our actions in relation to their health as we create, sustain or destroy garden spaces. The garden is their home, and we must remember that a bare garden is a space bereft of the raw materials of shelter.</p> In his article “Sustainable Fall Garden Clean-up”</a> my colleague Michael Guidi expertly outlined the aesthetic and biological advantages to leaving dead and decaying organic matter in the garden throughout the fall and winter seasons. The basic rules are easy:</p> Don’t cut back your gardens until spring (and if possible, leave some parts completely uncut until the following summer).</li> After cut back, leave organic matter of different sizes and materials in your garden (homes for animals and free mulch).</li> </ul> If you feel like you must cut back or clean up, consider not cutting back everything or leaving piles of the organic matter in your garden or somewhere out of sight in your yard.</p> Although we may feel compelled to clean our gardens, we must transmute our vision of a prepared space from one that is ready to fulfill our short-term needs (the promise of easy planting and harvesting in an organized space) to one that serves our long-term needs (a healthy biosphere that will support our gardens and crops for decades to come).</p> As you walk through Denver Botanic Gardens in the autumn, notice that while some spaces are thoroughly cleaned, much of the Gardens is left full of plant material through the winter months. These spaces, with their senesced skeletal forms and earthly hued layers of detritus are left intentionally to serve as spots of biological generation:</p> Josephine Streetscape:</strong> The Josephine Streetscape (both the east and west sides) is a dense mixture of shrubs, grasses, trees and perennials that aren’t cut back until very early spring. When it is cut back, the plants are cut roughly and dropped directly on the ground, creating the mulch for the garden and leaving lots of layers and hollows for life to find shelter in.</li> Ponderosa and Bristlecone Borders:</strong> The Ponderosa and Bristlecone borders are naturalistic gardens that reflect different plant communities of Colorado’s montane ecosystems. These gardens provide a depth and complexity that is helpful for wildlife to feel safe and nestled in.</li> Oak Steppe and Shrub Steppe: </strong>The interstitial spaces of the Gardens are important to support life since they often contain heterogeneous mixes of lots of different plant forms. The oak steppe and shrub steppe beds of the Steppe Garden are liminal areas, at the edges of the main garden. They are left full of fallen leaves and detritus giving animals an out-of-the-way home.</li> The Lilac Garden: </strong>The Lilac Garden has a thick and wild understory that is left full of stems of different sizes, heights and states of decay and grasses and seed heads that are crucial for use as nesting materials.</li> The Laura Smith Porter Plains Garden: </strong>The shrubs and grasses of the Plains Garden are left to grow, collapse on themselves and grow through their own detritus for several seasons at a time creating a complex matrix of life and decay and allowing for different cycles of vertebrates and invertebrates to breed and live within.</li> </ul> This short list highlights the winter habitat potential of just a handful of places that you can visit and investigate, but areas of refuge continuously thread throughout the Gardens. I hope you enjoy seeing the winter garden with new eyes.</p>
