Gill Hyland (B.Sc. Physical Geography and Master of Landscape Architecture) is the owner of Common Ground, a sustainable landscape design firm located in Perth. For Gill, sustainable design incorporates aspects of landscape ecology, landscape architecture, and permaculture in developing designs that reflect ‘a sense of place’ while maintaining their connection to the larger world. Designs are developed to meet the functional needs of the owner while addressing the property’s environmental requirements and capacity.

Judy Wall (trained and certified in Horticulture through Guelph University) is the owner and operatorof the Rock Wall Gardens nursery/garden center just east of Perth on Hwy. 7.
As a member the Lanark Master Gardeners, an Executive member of the Ottawa Valley Rock Garden Society, a member of the North American Rock Garden Society, Judy is well acquainted with many unique alpine, rockery plantings not known to many.
www.rockwallgardens.com

Lorraine Johnson is passionately interested in native plants and the ecological context of the garden. She is the author of numerous books including The New Ontario Naturalized Garden, 100 Easy to Grow Native Plants and Grow Wild! Native Plant Gardening in Canada. Lorraine is also editor of The Blazing Star, a journal published by the North American Native Plant Society and a regular contributor to Canadian Gardening magazine, Toronto Life Gardens and garden correspondent for both television and radio. President of the Canadian Wildflower Society and Board member of the North American Native Plant society, she is also active on the boards of many community organizations. She lives in Toronto.

Kristl Walek is the owner of Gardens North, a nursery in North Gower that specializes in perennial and woody seed, hardy for cold-climate gardens. Kristl is an enthusiastic and obsessive collector of native plants both common and rare that are not often sold as seed. Her goal is to introduce interesting, new hardy plants into the marketplace and promote species that are native here, some common in the wild but not often sold as seed.
www.gardensnorth.com

Retired head gardener to six Canadian Governors General and Prime Ministers, with more than two decades as phone-in “gardening guru” for CBC Radio’s “Ontario Today”, the patient and affable Ed Lawrence has provided practical, down-to-earth advice that has become the final word in gardening for more than half a million loyal listeners and fans. Ed has recently written a book, Gardening Grief and Glory, providing in print answers to the most common gardening questions.

Ted Mosquin (B.Sc. (Hons.) in Botany (U. of Manitoba 1956), and a Ph.D. in Systematics & Evolution (UCLA 1961) has an impressive background as an academic, research scientist, writer, editor and consultant in the fields of systematics, ecology and natural history, Biodiversity, threatened species and habitats. Between the late 1960s to the present he has served as President of a number of local, regional and national Canadian environmental organizations. Ted has been honoured by a number of awards, including the Queen's Silver Jubilee Medal for conservation work by the government of Canada.
In 1985 Dr Mosquin was contracted by Mississippi Valley Conservation to prepare the Master Plan for the recently acquired Purdon Conservation Area, a document that guided MVC over the coming decades in the stewardship of this treasured property. Ted meanwhile took on the role of a benevolent godfather to the Showy Lady-slipper Orchids and over the next decades was a tireless volunteer interpreter, advisor and nurturer of the site and its orchid colony. As an active member of the Mississippi Valley Conservation Foundation, Ted led the efforts to fundraise for various improvements to the site and the orchid habitat. These initiatives included new extensive interpretative signage for the visitors’ benefit, scientific studies of the orchid colony, hands-on attention to pollination and seed dispersal, the development of a new uplands trail to complement the boardwalk through the fen and in 2006, a new Master Plan for the site. In recognition of his tireless efforts and devotion to the Purdon Conservation Area and his key role in its ongoing development, the new trail developed under his inspiration and direction has been named the Ted Mosquin Highland Trail.
www.ecospherics.net