Wildflower of the Year program begins, co-sponsored by the Garden Club of North Carolina, to actively promote a showy southeastern native plant. The inaugural plant is the Cardinal Flower. Flower seeds are available on request, but the seed supply runs out, leading to continuation of the Cardinal Flower as Wildflower of the Year in 1983, and in 2001 is again Wildflower of the Year.
A delegation of distinguished botanists from Harvard University and the People's Republic of China, followed by visits from botanists from South Africa and England visit the Garden to collect plant material and observe the Garden's operations.
The Garden, the Coker Arboretum and Mason Farm Biological Reserve become a single administrative unit under Dean Samuel Williamson Jr., Dean of Arts and Sciences. Dr. C.Ritchie Bell is named director of the unit. When Dean Williamson became Provost and Vice-Chancellor for Academic Affairs in 1984, the unit moves with him.
As of 1982, through the Botanical Garden Foundation, the NCBG manages five natural areas: Gordon Butler Natural Preserve (5.5 acres); Pinky Falls Preserve (6.5 acres); Olive Tract Preserve (4 acres); Penny's Bend Nature Preserve (86 acres); and, Stillhouse Bottom Nature Preserve (7 acres). These tracts exist to protect rare species and are outstanding examples of natural areas. Three areas (Gordon Butler, Pinky Falls and the Olive Tract) are state-registered Natural Areas.
In the Herb Garden, the Poison Plants garden's first planted resident is the poison sumac.
The Learning Garden, a 1982 joint project of the Garden's Horticultural Therapy Program and the Special Populations Program of Chapel Hill Parks and Recreation, is given the Award of Excellence by the North Carolina Recreation and Parks Society.
Daily sales of propagated wildflowers and herbs, early April into October, replace the annual wildflower sale.
NCBG's Dot Wilbur-Brooks broadcasts a show on horticultural and botanical subjects aired twice every Monday on WUNC-FM with the NCBG mentioned as sponsor. Scripts are written by Dot and volunteer Virginia White.
NCBG and Rob Gardner host a meeting of concerned carnivorous plant specialists, co-sponsored by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the NC Plant Conservation Program and the NCBG, to discuss protection and conservation of the endangered Green Pitcher Plant.
The NCBG has a weekly column in 48 newspapers in North Carolina and southern Virginia.
The NCBG completes the contract with the Plant Protection Program of the N.C. Dept. of Agriculture to develop a nursery for legally protected plants, to conduct rescues of listed species when needed, and to coordinate propagation research among research investigators and nursery growers.
The newly-formed local branch of the Sierra Club begins to hold monthly meetings in Totten Center.
The 74th anniversary of the Herbarium is celebrated together with the recent founding of Friends of the UNC Herbarium, organized to support and promote Herbarium operations and services as a scientific and educational resource.
ID: 39Modified by: KnauffLast Update: 2017-01-11Publish: 1