Greenspeak: Dialogue Between Landscape Architects and Native Plant Producers to Promote BNG - 1.25 PDH (LA CES/HSW)

Recorded On: 10/07/2024

In 2024, we're stepping up our game in setting ambitious biodiversity goals. During this session, we'll engage in meaningful discussions to identify key challenges, discover opportunities, and discuss how to overcome obstacles together across the design/supply chain. To expand nature-based solutions, we need a solid network of suppliers and partners.

Learning objectives:

Gain knowledge on how to improve landscape specifications to get a better product from native plant producers.
Understand how agencies support and work with producers and designers to scale up biodiversity.
Learn about production, order and contract growth timeline for native plant material to facilitate production, material availability and end quality.
Become familiar with a few horticultural best practices that will support biodiversity.

María Landoni, ASLA, PLA

Founder and Design Director

Sur Landscape Architecture

María is a licensed landscape architect and horticulturist who designs public landscapes where ecological function and community access are inseparable. Raised in Patagonia and Buenos Aires, Argentina, she learned early, and in her body, how nature sustains well-being, health, and social cohesion. After leading award-winning work at esteemed design firms, she founded Sur Landscape Architecture in Kansas City, where her practice centers on native plant design, urban watershed restoration, and accessible public space. She teaches visual communication to planning and urban design students at UMKC, serves on ASLA’s Biodiversity & Climate Action Committee and as VP of Advocacy for its Prairie Gateway Chapter, and leads Missouri Stream Team #7112. Across design, horticulture, and advocacy, she challenges assumptions about what urban landscapes can be, crafting places with health, prosperity, and joy at their core.

Ronda Burnett, ASLA

Community Conservation Planner

Missouri Department of Conservation

Ronda Burnett has helped communities connect to nature since 2005 when she joined the Missouri Department of Conservation as a Community Conservation Planner. She holds a Bachelor of Landscape Architecture from Louisiana State University and a Master of Urban, Environmental, and Land Use Planning from the University of Kansas. Ronda is the author of the award-winning reference manual, “Conservation Planning Tools for Missouri Communities,” published as a guide for urban planners in 2018. Currently, Ronda serves on the Missouri Chapter board of the American Planning Association and is Chair of the Missouri Prairie Foundation’s Grow Native! Committee.

Elliott Duemler

Sales Representative- Native Plant Production Expert

National Nursery Products

Elliott is a sales representative for National Nursery Products (NNP) representing national and regional plant producers in the US. Prior to NNP, Elliott was the perennial production manager at Taylor Creek Restoration Nurseries for 17 years overseeing all aspects of the Taylor Creek perennial product line. He was instrumental in the growth of the organization’s perennial production. In his sales role Elliott works closely with multiple native plant producers to help maintain supply of in demand native species, but specifially the Carex genera.