Meet Your Community:
Karen Gentry
Education Coordinator, Hidden Lake Gardens
Karen Gentry puts the public in public gardens
  aren
Gentry knew public gardens were where she wanted to be. So, after
arriving here nearly three years ago from Chicago’s Morton Gardens
she began searching for similar opportunities. When Hidden Lake Gardens
posted an opening, she jumped at the chance to put her knowledge of
soil science and horticulture back into practice.
Located two miles west of Tipton on M-50 and owned by Michigan State
University, the Gardens offer 755 acres full of unique indoor and
outdoor plants and trees to be explored via trails and guided tours.
Karen serves as Education Coordinator, teaching classes for the general
public, as well as some that are part of the Master Gardener Program.
She also organizes events at Hidden Lake Gardens that help draw the
public in to explore and learn more about the natural world. Karen
also recruits and coordinates the 170 volunteers who help maintain
the gardens and lead the tours. Volunteers assist with everything
from trail maintenance to the spring plant sale. “There is something
for everyone with the theme of nature and the preservation of it,”
says Karen. Her work at Hidden Lake is a change from the field work
she did for six years in Chicago, but she tries to get out in the
Gardens as much as possible. “I make the course schedule of 55
classes, and I am always out with the volunteers on workdays,”
she says.
Karen believes places like Hidden Lake Gardens are important because
it is preserved land open to everyone. “It never changes. It
only gets better,” she says. The goal of the garden is to educate
the public, and Karen strives to reach out to as many people in as
many ways as she can. The Master Gardener Program is only one of the
ways people can come and enjoy the garden. There are a number of tours,
short programs and classes on a variety of topics targeting different
ages and interests. The collections, ranging from the Harper collection
of dwarf conifers to the Hosta Hillside, are constantly renewed and
revamped. These changes keep people interested and coming back for
more.
“It benefits people to have a broader sense of their environment,”
says Karen. One example of how her work helps individuals and the
world around them is her course on Pesticide Use and Management. In
the course, Karen tries to instill in people simple ways of changing
their gardening in order to reduce pests. “If people monitor
their plants early enough, they can catch the problem early. For example,
you can use bio traps to capture gypsy moths. Or if you notice a section
affected by wilt, just prune two and a half inches below that. Hand-picking
things like garlic mustard are also easy ways to control weeds and
pests. Herbicides and insecticides should be a last resort,”
says Karen.
For more information about programs or volunteer opportunities at
Hidden Lake Gardens, contact Karen at 517-431-2060. Or visit their
web site at www.cpp.msu.edu/hlg/.
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