🌿 Meadow & Rain Garden Workshop 🌿
📅 Saturday, March 21 | 🕙 10:00 AM – 2:00PM
📍 11 Forest Drive, Catonsville, MD 21228
Sponsored by: Sierra Club – Greater Baltimore Group, Wild Ones Greater Baltimore and the Baltimore County Master Gardeners' Program
Join us for a hands-on workshop exploring the beauty and practicality of meadows and rain gardens. This event will combine education, inspiration, and community connections for anyone interested in native plants, sustainable landscaping, or climate resilience.
RSVP HERE
This hands-on workshop is designed to help participants understand the annual work required to maintain a larger residential meadow without the use of mowers. While meadows are often described as “low maintenance,” they are not “no maintenance.” This program focuses on the real, seasonal tasks that keep a meadow healthy, resilient, and thriving year after year.
Participants will learn by doing, cutting back meadow growth, managing plant material, and discussing best practices for preparing the site for new spring growth. The ultimate goal is to build confidence and practical skills, so attendees feel prepared to maintain a similar meadow at their own home. It also focuses on Best Practices for yard waste in terms of CO2 emissions, insect life and food for wildlife.
Beyond individual yards, this workshop is also about community stewardship. This meadow has become a neighborhood amenity, and its long-term survival depends on shared knowledge and participation. If a pattern of community support is not established, it cannot be assumed that future owners of the property would continue the work that currently goes into maintaining this space. By coming together, participants help ensure the meadow’s existence well into the future while modeling a communal approach to land care, climate resilience, and neighborhood pride.
What to Bring
Gardening or work clothes
Gloves
Hand pruners/snips
Small hand saws (very helpful, if you have one)
🌱 About the Garden
The Dongarra meadow and rain garden grew out of both vision and necessity. After a second devastating flood in their neighborhood, Paul and his family were determined to create something that could help the community while fulfilling a long-held dream. They envisioned a natural meadow that would reduce mowing, provide vital pollinator habitat, and bring a sense of awe to the neighborhood.
With renewed purpose, the design began in the winter of 2019 and was put into action at the start of the COVID lockdown. Today, the system thrives with little bluestem as its foundation, accented by native wildflowers such as liatris, coneflower, black-eyed susans, goldenrod, and asters. Specimen plants like Buttonbush, Viburnum Nudum, Winterberry, and Sweet Bay Magnolia further enrich the landscape, offering food and habitat for wildlife year-round.