5846 Blendon Place Drive

My address is not the location of the pollinator habitats we are developing. We have a group of volunteers who live in a condominium complex adjacent to the Blendon Woods Metro Park. We volunteers are called The Trailblazers that are maintaining and developing pollinator plants along a one half mile long nature trail in our complex immediately adjacent to the Metro Park. Over the past three years we have convinced the HOA to stop mowing on ~2,000 feet along the trail in a swath 5-10 feet wide. About 1200 feet of the unmowed area is being allowed to naturally regrow. A mixture of native, domestic, and non-native plants are repopulating the strip. The other 800 feet is being planted with native pollinators such as bee balm, astilbe, milkweeds, dog bane, cone flower, black eyed susan, coreopsis, blazing star, cup plants, prairie dock, rattlesnake master, golden Alexander, dill, fennel, ferns, daisies, false indigo, Virginia bluebells, beards tongue, turtle head, foxglove, and others. We have been encouraging native plant growth by removing bush honeysuckle, multiflora rose, and garlic mustaRd