Our 2012 Speakers:

Larry Costello

Larry has worked in the green industry in California for 29 years as an Environmental Horticulture Advisor with University of California Cooperative Extension. He has conducted a research and education program focused on tree management practices and is co-author of Oaks in the Urban Landscape: Selection, Care and Preservation (2011). He is a member of the International Society of Arboriculture (Western Chapter) and the San Francisco Urban Forestry Council. In addition, Larry is a member of the committee that developed guidelines for the production of quality nursery trees for California.

Former Position: Environmental Horticulture Advisor, University of California Cooperative Extension, San Mateo and San Francisco Counties. Conduct an education and applied-research program in landscape horticulture and urban forestry in San Mateo and San Francisco Counties. Education: PhD, Plant Physiology, University of California, Berkeley, 1981; MS, Horticulture, University of California, Davis, 1975; BS, Plant Science, University of California, Davis, 1972.

Affiliations: International Society of Arboriculture (Western Chapter), Arboricultural Research and Education Association (ISA), American Society for Horticultural Science, San Francisco Urban Forest Council.

Awards: Alex Shigo Award for Excellence in Education, 2009; L.C. Chadwick Award of Arboricultural Research, International Society of Arboriculture, 2002; ISA Western Chapter Research Award, 1997; International Society of Arboriculture Western Chapter Honorary Member Award, 1994; Northern California Turf and Landscape Council Research Award, 1991; International Society of Arboriculture Western Chapter Research Award, 1990.

Peter Estournes

Vice president of Gardenworks, has been involved in the landscape industry since he was a young boy working for his father’s landscape company.

A 1981 graduate of California Polytechnic State University in Pomona, he graduated with a degree in Ornamental Horticulture, and has worked throughout the industry as a nurseryman, grower, consultant, and contractor. Peter is licensed by the State as a Landscape Contractor (C-27) and Qualified Pesticide Applicator. He is also a Certified Landscape Professional and Certified Landscape Irrigation Auditor.

Affiliations: Active member of the California Landscape Contractors Association, The Green Industry Advisory Council, and has been active on numerous committees and boards relating to water conservation and xeriscaping.

Darren L. Haver Ph.D.

Education: Botany & Plant Physiology, UC Riverside. 1998 B.S. Ornamental Horticulture w/Botany minor, Cal Poly Pomona. 1993 Knowledge Areas NATURAL RESOURCES AND ENVIRONMENT Conservation and Efficient Use of Water Watershed Protection and Management Pollution Prevention and Mitigation .

Knowledge Areas: NATURAL RESOURCES AND ENVIRONMENT

Conservation and Efficient Use of Water Watershed Protection and Management

Pollution Prevention and Mitigation

John Lichter

John M. Lichter, ASCA Registered Consulting Arborist and ISA Board Certified Master Arborist, established TREE ASSOCIATES in 1993. He utilizes a unique blend of academic and practical experience to address the most challenging Arboricultural assignments. John received B.S. and M.S. degrees in Plant Science and Horticulture from the University of California at Davis and worked for several years providing research and extension services for the University of California Cooperative Extension and the U.C. Davis Horticulture Department as well as the U.S. Forest Service. John regularly teaches Arboriculture at U.C. Davis and has served on the Board of Directors for the American Society of Consulting Arborists and on Technical Advisory Committees for various non-profit groups.

Mark O’Farrell

O’Farrell is first and foremost a teacher, with a master’s degree in vocational agriculture from Virginia Tech University. He taught for North Carolina State University’s Cooperative Extension, and also helped develop a two-year degree program at NC State in sustainable agriculture. More recently, he was a water quality educator for the University of Nevada’s Cooperative Extension. He also is a U.S. Army veteran and has worked with FOCUS (For Our Country – United States) Foundation, an organization that helps returning veterans learn green-trade skills while working on an organic farm. Currently, O’Farrell serves as chair of the Nevada Organic Advisory Council.

O’Farrell and his family moved from North Carolina to Nevada in 2000 and started Hungry Mother Organics on his Minden property. He hit a ripe market. Demand for his produce quickly outgrew his growing capacity. He found the additional acreage he needed on the grounds of the Northern Nevada Correctional Center in Carson City, which held the added bonus of readily available manpower.

Ken Menzer

Tree seed collector & grower …young child to adult

Volunteer at Morton Arboretum (Lisle, IL) …pre-teen & teen years

Had a personal greenhouse & garden …teen years

Graduate Colo. State University in Horticulture while working at wholesale nursery

Landscape & irrigation designer, home and ancillary structural designer

General Contractor …design/build in Nevada, California, Illinois, Hawaii, & Japan

Forester for Sacramento Tree Foundation

Tree nursery propagator & grower

Certified & Consulting Arborist, Municipal Specialist, expert witness

Folsom City Arborist & Loomis Town Arborist for over 6-years

Ivy Munion

Ivy Munion has been in the professional irrigation industry since 1989. She started as a drafter and has grown with the I.S.C. Group to become a Certified Irrigation Designer, water management specialist, Watersense Partner, ARCSA Rainwater Catchment Systems Accredited Professional, and CEO of ISC Group, Inc.

Over the years Ivy has become a proficient irrigation consultant providing irrigation designs, water conservation and water management services for residential, corporate, municipal and private developments. Many of her designs include the specialized needs of renovation projects, reclaimed water, drip irrigation, mitigation and centralized control systems. She also participated in California’s AB2771 irrigation task force to help update the State’s water conservation guidelines.

Ivy is a Certified Irrigation Designer and Certified Landscape Irrigation Water Auditor. Her designs incorporate hydraulic and irrigation principles, state and local codes and regulations, ET NET, hydro zones, Micro Climates, rainwater and greywater as alternative water sources, and the latest in irrigation technology.

Ivy is past president of the Northern California Chapter of ASIC and currently sits on the ASIC National Board of Directors, participated on the NCTLC Board of Directors, and enjoys sharing knowledge with our members and prospective members.

Ivy also volunteers her spare time speaking to local green industry groups and schools. Ivy enjoys her career in the irrigation industry and demonstrates her enthusiasm with ear-rings made out of various irrigation components. As an environmental artist she helps keep the living canvas alive and thriving.

Lorence (Loren) R. Oki

Member of the faculty at UC Davis since 2002 and serve as the Cooperative Extension Specialist in Landscape Horticulture. This appointment is held jointly with the Department of Plant Sciences (80%) and the Landscape Architecture Program (20%).

Oki's research focuses on water issues in urban horticulture, and currently lead a large project funded by the California State Water Resources Control Board and the CALFED Bay-Delta Program that is characterizing runoff from residential areas and studies the effectiveness of management methods to reduce the runoff and the pollutants that may be included in it. There are eight study sites used in this project: four in Sacramento County and four in Orange County. This project also develops information to promote the implementation of low impact landscape management methods and measures the effectiveness of outreach methods. From data, loading models are being developed to demonstrate how changes in landscape features might effect reductions in pollutant loading.

Participates in projects to refine irrigation management in urban landscapes. Oki's research group is examining the water use of plants selected from the UC Davis Arboretum that are potential ornamental landscape plants. Selected plants are distributed to several demonstration sites around the State for further evaluations by UCCE Master Gardeners for garden performance. The group is examining how slow sand filtration and other natural water treatment systems remove plant pathogens, including Phytophthora ramorum the organism that causes the disease Sudden Oak Death, from nursery irrigation runoff. The treated water could then be safely reused for irrigation.

A project funded by the Santa Clara Valley Water District that was recently completed quantified the tolerance of Coast Redwood to sodium and chlorides that may come from reclaimed water, for example. Future work will look at the tolerance of landscape plants to irrigation with low quality water such as reclaimed municipal water.

Education: Ph.D., Ecology, University of California, Davis, March 2002. Dissertation: Effects of Substrate Salinity on Rose Stem Elongation; Advisor: Dr. J. Heinrich Lieth. Certificate Program in College Teaching, University of California, Davis, June 1998 Master of Science, Plant Science, University of California, Riverside. June 1976; Advisor: Dr. Toshio Murashige Bachelor of Science, Ornamental Horticulture, California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo, June 1974. Advisor: Dr. Howard Brown.

Ernesto Sandoval

Ernesto Sandoval, Director of the UC Davis Botanical Conservatory, grew up in the fast paced "Mow, Blow, and Go!" landscaping businesses of his father and relatives and can boast of mowing lawns non-stop for an hour on a weekly basis, a rare thing these days with the smaller yards of present day tract homes. Fast forward to his interest in Biology taking him to UC Davis for that major and particularly a tour his Freshman year at the Conservatory and the rest is just a little more history for context. From that tour, he found something he could be passionate about, and unbeknownst to him, he'd prepared for such a thing all his working life.

At the Conservatory, he discovered plants beyond turf grasses and foundation plants, especially succulents; because of his interest in diversity, he began to learn about drought tolerant plants including Mediterranean plants and CA natives.

When friends found out he had switched to Botany and had become a planthead of sorts, plant names to him are like people names (both easy to remember), they kept assuming his yard looked great. The challenge was to fill the void between reality and perception and his skills at growing plants outside of the pot intensive Conservatory plants. The solution is he started doing much more in ground growing in his garden and the lawns and weedy grass patches were the first to go! He even has fun getting paid to do that for others in his "spare" time and has at least five lawn removals on his resume!

Scott Volmer

Mr. Volmer has 18 years of landscape architecture, land planning, and habitat restoration experience. Scott currently works for Great Valley Design in Davis. He also worked for van Toolen Associates in Sacramento and was responsible for business planning and design guidance of diverse community, commercial and master planning design projects. Current focus areas in the greater Sacramento region include high density and mixed use projects, design development standards for master planned communities, and urban infill developments.

Education: Bachelor of Science Landscape Architecture, California Polytechnic University, San Luis Obispo, 1989 Associates of Arts Degree, Sociology, Saddleback College, 1984

Registration: Licensed Landscape Architect 1999, State of California #4740

Professional Affiliations: American Society of Landscape Architects, American Planning Association