RICHLAND — Researchers at the Washington State University Tri-Cities campus are preparing to open a new greenhouse to study how native plants are grown.
The 1,650-square-foot greenhouse, which replaces a small starter greenhouse on the campus, will have space to grow about 26,000 plants of roughly 100 species.
Plants that covered the Mid-Columbia region before the landscape gave way to crops and manicured lawns will be grown there. The first few have already been moved into the greenhouse to prepare for a public dedication set for Tuesday.
They include silky lupine that grows on the Hanford Reach National Monument’s Arid Land Ecology Reserve; spiny flame flower, a tiny succulent with bright red leaves found on the top of Rattlesnake Mountain, and common dogbane, used by Native Americans for fiber.
“I view this as a new branch of agriculture,” said Steven Link, WSU extension ecologist and associate scientist in the school of biological sciences.
Money for the project comes from an Environmental Protection Agency fine over past problems at the Hanford nuclear reservation’s landfill for low-level radioactive waste. The U.S. Department of Energy, which manages Hanford cleanup, and its contractor, Washington Closure Hanford, proposed paying off a portion of the fine in community projects. The contractor covered the cost.
The greenhouse cost $245,000 to build and the total cost of the project, including equipment, propagation of plants and monitoring 10 acres of plantings, will be about $494,000, according to WSU.
Demand is increasing for native plants to re-vegetate areas burned by wildfires, restore areas disturbed by road work and other activities, and landscape areas to nurture wildlife and cut water use. But it’s a demand that commercial growers are not prepared to meet, in part because so little is known about how to grow native plants.
Currently, restoration of natural lands ravaged by the Mid-Columbia’s summer brush fires typically is done with about five native species. But before the fire or other disturbance, at least 25 species would have grown in any location, Link said.
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