Dr. Ross Bayton

London-born botanist and gardener Dr. Ross Bayton gained his PhD at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, studying the classification of tropical palms. He’s the author of several books on horticulture including New Trees: Introductions to Cultivation (with John Grimshaw), Plant Families: A Guide for Gardeners and Botanists (with Simon Maugham), and most recently The Gardener’s Botanical: An Encyclopedia of Latin Plant Names, as featured in the New York Times. Formerly the Gardening Editor of the UK’s best-selling gardening periodical, BBC Gardeners’ World Magazine, he is now the Director of the world-renowned Heronswood Garden in Kingston, Wa., and is developing a 5-acre garden at home in nearby Bremerton.


Shay Perryman

Shay Perryman is the Natural Resource Manager at the Lake Washington Ship Canal, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Seattle District. She and the Natural Resource Management team, along with a number of official Army Corps partners, host summer events to promote environmental stewardship, many of which take place in the Carl S. English Jr. Botanical Garden. The team also promotes water safety and interprets the Corps mission at Lake Washington Ship Canal, including Navigation, Fish Passage, and Water Control.


Nicole Celestine

Nicole Celestine is a Public Affairs Specialist with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineer, Seattle District, telling the Army Corps’ story. Along with her Public Affairs team, she provides public affairs counsel and assistance to various construction and operating projects across Idaho, Montana and Washington State, including Lake Washington Ship Canal and Hiram M. Chittenden Locks. She has written several articles highlighting projects the district is managing, including the Stormwater Bay Dune Berm Restoration project (Tokeland, Washington). Her article on the Mountlake Terrace Aquatic Ecosystem Restoration project was featured in America’s Engineers and The Corps Environment magazines.


José Gabriel Martínez-Fonseca

José Gabriel Martínez-Fonseca divides his time between Nicaragua and Arizona, where he recently completed a PhD in bat ecology. He owns almost as many headlamps and cameras as Charles does and has contributed images to wildlife publications worldwide. He is also very adroit at catching specimens, including the tarantula he is holding here (featured also on page 71). José is the coauthor, along with Charles Hood and Erin Westeen, of Sea Turtles to Sidewinders: A Guide to the Most Fascinating Reptiles and Amphibians of the West.


Charles Hood

Poet and naturalist Charles Hood lives in the Mojave Desert. He recently released two books with Heyday: Wild Sonoma and A Salad Only the Devil Would Eat: The Joys of Ugly Nature. While working on this book, Charles passed the thousand-species mark on his world mammal list—an achievement that he says “ranks somewhere between being a local pickleball champion and accumulating the world’s largest ball of string.” Always ready for the next excursion, he owns three bat detectors, nine headlamps and flashlights, and a hard-copy world atlas, “since you never know when Siri will go wonky on you.”


Linda Andrews

Owner, Linda Andrews Landscape and Design, Olympia, WA

Linda Andrews creates beautiful, sustainable gardens designed to enhance her clients’ well-being and that of the natural world. Throughout her 22-year practice she’s worked to create gardens that increase habitat, manage stormwater, reduce supplemental water needs, and increase climate resilience while creating year-round beauty. Richly layered, plant-driven spaces with handsome hardscapes replace the dominance of traditional lawns. Linda is also an artist whose work explores the interconnectedness of plants and animals, with a special eye to rare plants and invertebrates of the PNW prairie-oak ecosystems.


Jason Dewees

Author of Designing with Palms (Timber Press, 2018), Jason Dewees is the horticulturist and palm expert at Flora Grubb Gardens, in San Francisco.

A volunteer at the San Francisco Botanical Garden since 1994, he works as a horticultural consultant for landscape designers, landscape architects, and gardeners. He has offered guidance to the Conservatory of Flowers, Golden Gate Park, the University of California Botanical Garden, the City of San Francisco, the Presidio Trust, the San Francisco Department of Public Works, and the San Francisco Botanical Garden, trained volunteers and docents, and has propagated thousands of trees.

He has lectured at the California Horticultural Society, The Huntington Library, Art Collections, and Botanical Garden, the Marin Art and Garden Center, the Mill Valley Outdoor Art Club, the Sherman Library and Gardens, and the Garden Conservancy.

Jason joined the Northern California Chapter of the International Palm Society as their youngest member in 1986, and has served on the council of the California Horticultural Society, as well as on the Horticultural Advisory Committee of the San Francisco Botanical Garden, and the Advisory Council of the Conservatory of Flowers. Born and raised in San Francisco, he graduated from Wesleyan University in Middletown, Connecticut.


Rick Flores

Rick Flores is Associate Director and Steward of the Amah Mutsun Relearning Program (AMRP) at the University of California Santa Cruz Arboretum and Botanic Garden. His professional experience at the Arboretum is with California native plants, but currently oversees the work of maintaining all of the Arboretum’s core plant collection displays.  As Steward of the AMRP, Rick fosters the relationship between the Amah Mutsun Tribal Band and the Arboretum, oversees educational programming, and helps develop displays of culturally important native plants.

When not at the Arboretum, Rick enjoys hiking, backpacking, fishing, mountain biking, bird watching, and just generally being outdoors, in addition to spending time with family and friends. Rick has worked at the Arboretum for over 25 years and holds both a B.A. and M.A. in Environmental Studies from UCSC.


Anne Biklé

Anne Biklé is a science writer and public speaker.  Her work explores the connections between people, plants, food, health, and the environment.  She is the co-author of The Hidden Half of Nature, which tells the story of soil and human microbiomes through memoir, history, and science.  Her most recent book, is What Your Food Ate: How to Heal Our Land and Reclaim Our Health.  She can be reached via www.Dig2Grow.com