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Our list of Professional Plant Reviewers
Reviewer
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About the reviewer
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| Angie Eckert |
Angie Eckert is the Manager of Eckert's new Garden Center located in Belleville, IL. Eckert's is a seventh generation family run business and is well recognized in the Metro area. Angie was a horticulture instructor at Southwestern Illinois College and is currently an instructor for the Garden. Angie has bachelors of science from the University of Illinois with a major in Ornamental Horticulture with emphasis in Landscape Design and a masters in Horticulture Education from Ohio State. Her present interest is growing low maintenance perennials.
Angie is certified as Nursery Professional by the IL. Nurserymen's Association and a member of the American Nursery and Landscape Association. She is on the University of Illinois Alumni Advisory Board for the College of ACES; and the membership and Eastside Advisory Boards for the MO Botanical Garden. |
| Ben Chu |
Pruning shears are to Ben Chu what a paint brush is to an artist. As horticultural supervisor of the South Gardens at the Missouri Botanical Garden, which encompasses the Japanese Garden, Ben’s pruning duties and expertise involve not only the maintenance and health of shrubs and trees but, in the Japanese manner, harmonizing their form to the shape and structure of the garden as a whole. A Certified Arborist and a member of the International Society of Arborculture, Ben also holds an associate’s degree in horticulture from Meramec Community College. He was selected to participate in an intensive international seminar on Japanese gardening in Kyoto, Japan. In addition he has served as the moderator of a panel on the maintenance of Japanese gardens at a meeting of the International Association of Japanese Gardens in Portland, OR. Locally, Ben has conducted classes on Pruning, Fertilization, Japanese Garden Design and Pruning in the Japanese Manner for the Botanical Garden, both Missouri and Illinois Master Gardeners and a wide variety of garden societies and clubs. At home he relaxes by tending a perennial garden. "I don’t have a Japanese garden," he says with a laugh. "It’s too much work." |
| Charlotte Schneider |
Charlotte is a former arborist with the Missouri Deparment of Conservation. Now retired, she volunteers regularly as a Plant Doctor at the Missouri Botanical Garden. |
| Chip Tynan |
Chip Tynan is manager of the Missouri Botanical Garden’s Horticultural Answer Service, overseeing a staff of more than 40 volunteers who annually field some 28,000 questions from area gardeners. An old-time generalist in a field increasingly dominated by specialists, Chip manages to stay current in the many aspects of modern horticulture and is respected and admired for his unparalleled experience as a self-taught lifetime gardener. Well-known locally for the weekly gardening column he writes for The St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Chip regularly teaches adult education courses at the Garden, gives many talks to gardening clubs, and is frequently called upon by local TV and radio stations to speak on a wide variety of gardening subjects. |
| Dianne O'Connell |
It’s hard to find a type of gardening Dianne O’Connell doesn’t like. "From native plant gardens to fine, high cultured formal gardens, I’ve designed all of them and I’ve worked in all of them," says the owner of Landscapes Alive, a residential and commercial landscape consulting and design business. In addition Dianne teaches horticulture on a part-time basis at both Meramec Community College and East Central College in Union, MO. She is a sought-after speaker for such groups as the Missouri and Illinois Master Gardeners and the Southern Illinois Grounds Management School. Her professional memberships include the American Horticultural Society, the Perennial Plant Association, the Gateway Professional Horticultural Association and the Horticultural Advisory Board at Meramec Community College. Dianne studied horticulture at Meramec and holds a master’s degree in education from Washington University. She enjoys enhancing her talks with her own photography. |
| Jason Delaney |
Horticulturist Jason Delaney came to the Missouri Botanical Garden shortly after receiving his certification as a landscape horticulturist from Michigan State University. In the six years he has been in St. Louis, he has already become a leader in the gardening field. At the Botanical Garden his responsibilities have grown to encompass the Samuel and Heckman Bulb Gardens, the Dwarf Conifer Garden, the Rock Garden, the Jenkins Daylily Garden and the Goodman Iris Garden. Outside the Garden, the southern Illinois native is currently Regional Director of the Central Region of the American Daffodil Society, President of the Greater St. Louis Daffodil Society, Board Member of the Mid-American Regional Lily Society, and vice-president of the West County Daylily Society. In April he will be one of the speakers at the American Daffodil Society Convention in Cincinnati. Locally, Jason is often on the speakers list at the Botanical Garden, at meetings of Master Gardeners and at garden clubs. In what spare time he has, he hybridizes daylilies and tends to his collection of nearly 1,000 different types of daffodils. His greatest satisfaction, he notes, is hearing the comments of Garden visitors as they walk by the flower beds he tends and say how beautiful they are and how good they make them feel. "Not many people can have nearly a million people a year walk by and admire the work they do." Jason says with pride. |
| John Smelser |
John has lived the majority of his life in Oklahoma City, where he continues to live in the home his family purchased in 1955. He hated gardening when he was a boy; because all it seemed to consist of was mowing and edging and turning shrubs into little balls and boxes. He served in the United States Air Force during the Vietnam War era. It was during this time, to his own surprise, that he began to love plants & gardens and think in terms of a career that revolved around them. After discharging he worked in an Indian trading post in Tucson while studying oriental philosophy at the University of Arizona. After 3 years he re-entered college full-time at Oklahoma State University, supporting himself with the G.I. Bill and jobs in a nursery & restaurant. He graduated in 1979 with a major in Landscape Architecture and a minor in Horticulture. After graduation he was one of the first designers to be licensed by the state of Oklahoma to practice Landscape Architecture. For 3 years after graduation he worked for a large commercial landscape contractor as an estimator who secured jobs for the firm through the competitive bid process. In 1982 he realized his first love was the design and creation of fine residential gardens. He opened his own firm and spent the next 8 years creating gardens in and around Oklahoma City. In 1984 he was elected a member of the American Society of Landscape Architects. He was retained by the University of Arkansas in Fayetteville in 1987 to design and supervise the installation of a 2.5 acre garden between the Mullins Library and student union on the Fayetteville campus. In order to help care for an aging parent, he closed his firm in the late 1980’s and spent the next 8 years designing gardens for a cutting-edge Oklahoma City landscape nursery. He helped this nursery expand its plant offerings to more than 500 varieties of perennials and over 300 varieties of trees and shrubs. He was also instrumental in helping this nursery convert its pricing, purchasing, inventory, and estimating procedures to computers. In 1998 he returned to private practice. During this period he designed, in addition to private gardens, an intensely planted garden for the 50 year anniversary of a prominent OkC church. The cloistered courtyard portion of this garden remains to this day one of his favorite projects. He also designed, provided text and photographs for, and maintained a web site for the nursery he was involved with in the 1990’s. He has been semi-retired since 2003… but is still actively involved in photographing and writing about plants and gardens., and occasionally designing and creating gardens for select clients. Throughout his career he has encouraged everyone he knows to create gardens with plants instead of concrete…. and has successfully convinced most clients to garden without resorting to the use of chemicals. He has never sold a Cottonwood, a Euonymus, a Hackberry or a Silver Maple to anyone. His approach to gardening, plants, the natural world…. and human attitudes toward them is summed up in a favorite quote from Annie Dillard’s profound Pulitzer Prize winning book Pilgrim at Tinker Creek: “…beauty and grace are performed whether or not we will or sense them. The least we can do is try to be there.” His best advice to clients & budding gardeners comes from Dream Windows, a beautiful documentary on Japanese gardening: “You must simply sit and look at a garden. What you see is what you bring to it.” His favorite plants are Hostas, Hellebores, Japanese Maples, Orchids, Peonies & The Tibetan Blue Poppy. |
| June Hutson |
During her 30 year career at the Missouri Botanical Garden, June Hutson has become recognized both regionally and nationally as one of the top names in hands-on gardening. For her work June was named the Aurelia Schlapp Curator of Perennials, the only horticulture curatorship awarded in the history of the Missouri Botanical Garden. As supervisor of the eight-acre Kemper Home Demonstration Garden complex, she oversees 23 different types of gardens scaled to a size that makes them practical for individual home owners. June selected much of the plant material used in the Kemper Gardens during their installation and, as curator of the Temperate House/Mediterranean House and Rock Garden during her first years at the Garden, was responsible for the selection of new plant material for the Temperate House when it was renovated in 1988. She is the author of Annual Gardening for the American Garden Guide series and numerous articles in such magazines as Fine Gardening, Midwest Living and Better Homes and Gardens. In addition she is featured in a new book Container Gardening published by Fine Gardening magazine. Away from the Garden, June is an independent garden consultant and designer and has lectured with Ken Miller Horticultural Consultants in various cities throughout the Midwest. She holds a degree in horticulture from Meramec Community College and is on the advisory board at Meramec. |
| Mary Ann Fink |
To professional landscape designer and consultant Mary Ann Fink, "every garden is a picture." Her gardening career began in her own backyard with a "pot of petunias," and quickly blossomed as she began to lend her expertise and design sense to friends and neighbors. Her "desire to personalize her own home" through gardening had become a successful career.
Sharing her knowledge through teaching and consulting, her background includes 20 years professional experience in the home gardening industry, many years of volunteer work as a Master Gardener and as a Plant Doctor at the Missouri Botanical Garden's Kemper Center for Home Gardening.
While holding her staff position at Missouri Botanical Garden her responsibilities included the Kemper Center's Trial Garden and a new perennial area, which addressed the influx of new plant introductions.
She is a free lance writer and energetic speaker on horticultural topics, teaching a variety of professional and home gardening classes at Missouri Botanical Garden. Coordinating the Missouri Botanical Garden's Plants of Merit Program, she travels throughout Missouri, southern Il and Kansas, promoting great but under utilized plant that thrive in this area. |
| Mike Miller |
Mike Miller is a St. Louis native who spent his early years living in the shadows of the Missouri Botanical Garden. His family moved out into the rural suburbs, where exploring and observing woods, meadows, hills, streams, and wildlife became a favorite pastime. After serving 4 years in the Air Force during the Vietnam War era, he studied botany, horticulture, and landscape design at the University of California. In 1977 was selected to join Missouri Botanical Garden Horticulture staff. During his 5 year tenure Mike obtained the Missouri State Pesticide license for Ornamentals, Turf, and Aquatic Environments and also began teaching in the Garden’s ever popular evening series and continues to do so today. New in spring 2005 has two gardening books available – Missouri Gardener’s Guide (proven plants for the region), and Month by Month Gardening in Missouri (how to take care of your landscape)
The author's professional career: includes four years as general manager of a retail garden center, when he became a Missouri State Certified Nurseryman, co-founder of a predatory insect store, 7 years as a faculty member of the Horticultural Department at St. Louis Community College at Meramec. Mike has participated in programs sponsored by Powell Gardens of Kansas City, Missouri State Department of Natural Resources, Landscape and Nurseymen’s Association of Greater St. Louis and the University of Illinois Extension Service. His garden articles have been featured in local and regional newspapers and magazines. Mike’s voice has been heard for 10 years hosting the KMOX ‘Garden Hotline’.1998 Mike Miller Designs a landscape design and consulting firm was established, and later that year Mike and Tracy Ann began hosting Holiday Vacations tour groups giving an opportunity to see and learn how gardeners design, care and maintain plants, many similar to those of Missouri’s gardens.
Memberships on several citizen and advisory board panels, including St. Louis’ Operation Brightside, a privately funded beautification organization and as an epileptic Mike also sits on the board of directors for Epilepsy Foundation of Greater St. Louis. |
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