My apartment’s not exactly the first place anyone would think to have a Christmas tree. It’s the size of a toddler’s shoe box and my daft cats have a sweet tooth for pine needles. However, for thousands of New Yorkers who did decorate trees for the holiday season, this past weekend was an opportunity to not only retire 2011′s evergreens, but grant them a second life.

24,231. That’s the number of trees recycled during this year’s MulchFest. It soundly tops last year’s final count of 17,000, and with good motivations–it’s the best way for New Yorkers to keep their conifers out of the landfill (the compost is probably better used elsewhere). On Saturday and Sunday, thousands of city residents hauled their trees to one of 35 MulchFest collection spots throughout the metropolitan area, handing over their firs and pines for a cup of coffee and a bag of mulch.
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Meet Larry Weaner, a nationally recognized leader in the natural landscape field whose work combines ecological restoration with traditions of fine garden design. Thursday, January 19, 10 a.m. to 12 p.m.

Larry Weaner takes you beyond popular buzzwords like “sustainable” and “low-maintenance” to examine some surprising and at times counter-intuitive strategies for eco-friendly garden design.

Weaner’s presentation takes a look at practical, concrete processes for creating easily-managed landscapes that seamlessly combine ecological diversity, cultural expression, and the traditions of garden design. See how his alternative approaches—on everything from selecting plants to arranging, spacing, and weeding gardens—can yield rich landscapes that are more easily maintained, achieving their greatest ecological and aesthetic potential.

Weaner, 58, has created hundreds of native landscapes throughout the eastern United States since 1977. Larry Weaner Landscape Associates has received the top three design awards in 2008 from the Association of Professional Landscape Designers. Their projects include private gardens, public and commercial spaces, meadows, and natural areas.
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A fuzzy bud in waiting. The magnolias that came out of October’s storm battered now give us cause for pleasant anticipation.

Magnolia x soulangeana ‘Alexandrina’ — Photo by Ivo M. Vermeulen