NACOGDOCHES, Texas – The SFA Gardens will host its monthly Les Reeves Garden Lecture Series at 7 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 18, in the Agriculture Building, Room 110, on Wilson Drive at Stephen F. Austin State University. Dawn Stover, longtime SFA Gardens research associate, will present an entertaining program titled “Why Dr. Creech Rocks as a Boss.”
Dr. David Creech joined the SFA faculty in 1978 and is director of the Arthur Temple College of Forestry and Agriculture’s SFA Mast Arboretum, a 10-acre, on-campus resource that has enjoyed steady growth and utilization since its inception in 1985. Creech also directs the eight-acre Ruby M. Mize Azalea Garden, featuring more than 6,000 azaleas, 200 varieties of Japanese maples, camellias and hydrangeas, and numerous other special collections. He is co-director of the 40-acre SFA Pineywoods Native Plant Center, a garden affiliated with the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center in Austin.
As a research associate in the arboretum directed by Creech, Stover maintains the living plant collection and is responsible for maintenance of the arboretum and the horticulture facilities. She also manages two successful annual sales, coordinating student workers and volunteers for the events, which provide additional funding and community outreach.
Stover serves as editor of Garden News, a quarterly newsletter published for Arboretum members, and writes for other garden-related publications. As part of her research responsibilities, Stover trials a wide range of herbaceous plant material and disseminates information within the horticulture industry, as well as the gardening public. She is an instructor in SFA’s Department of Agriculture, teaching a course on annuals and perennials.
The Theresa and Les Reeves Garden Lecture Series is normally held the third Thursday of each month. A rare plant raffle will be held after the program. The lecture is free and open to the public, but donations to the Theresa and Les Reeves lecture series endowed fund are always appreciated. For more information, call (936) 468-1832 or e-mail grantdamon@sfasu.edu.
