Earth-Kind Rose Team earns Vice Chancellor’s Award

Contact: Kathleen Phillips, 979-845-2872, ka-phillips@tamu.edu

COLLEGE STATION – The National Earth-Kind Rose Team has been honored with the Texas A&M AgriLife Vice Chancellor’s Award in Excellence for Collaboration.

The honor was presented Jan. 6 during the 2015 Vice Chancellor’s Awards in Excellence ceremony in College Station.

The Vice Chancellor’s Awards in Excellence were established in 1980 to recognize the commitment and outstanding contributions of Texas A&M AgriLife faculty and staff throughout Texas and provide an opportunity to celebrate the achievements of those honored.

Team members recognized were: Todd Williams, Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service agriculture and natural resources agent in Rockwall County; Allison Watkins, AgriLife Extension horticulture agent in Tom Green County; Kimberly Benton, AgriLife Extension horticulture agent in Cherokee County; Dr. Derald Harp, associate professor of horticulture at Texas A&M University-Commerce; Dr. John Sloan, watershed scientist at the University of Illinois-East Alton; and Dr. David Zlesak, associate professor of horticulture at the University of Wisconsin-River Falls.

According to the nomination, the interdisciplinary team was assembled to address some of the greatest concerns facing American landscapes: wasted water, misuse of fertilizers and pesticides,  and overburdening landfills with leaves, grass clippings and wood chips.

“The team created the overall Earth-Kind Environmental Landscape Management System and then launched three national programs — Earth-Kind Roses, Earth-Kind Environmental Soil Management and American Rose Trials for Sustainability,” the nomination noted.

The team has designated 23 rose cultivars as Earth-Kind, replicated field trials at 75 sites in 11 states and shown that “without a doubt, across many climates and soil types, Earth-Kind roses will give outstanding landscape performance with little maintenance, 70 percent reduction in irrigation, and total elimination of fertilizers and pesticides with the use of native tree mulch, composted tree leaves and wood chips, which reduces pressure on landfills,” said Dr. Larry Stein of Uvalde, AgriLife Extension’s associate head for horticulture. “Earth-Kind Roses has become the fastest growing and most popular university program of its kind in the nation … with individual cooperators testing Earth-Kind roses in 27 states and six foreign countries.”

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