Norfolk Master Gardeners
830 Southampton Ave., Ste 2069
Norfolk, Virginia 23510-1045
Becoming a Water Steward
What exactly is a Water Steward?
We could not give you a formal definition of one even after attaining Water Steward status this past June. We just think of it as a Master Gardener who, with the help of extra training, focuses on plants or projects that have to do with the water, especially the salt/brackish water that surrounds our fine city. Likewise, our reasons for becoming a Water Steward largely had to do both with how water defines our city as well as the inevitable sea level rise to which we have to adapt.
The most recent WS planting had volunteers install over 2000 plugs of spartina
and other salt-tolerant species along the seawall in front of The Hague School.
With so many plants, volunteers are needed for several days
and the compacted, rubble-strewn soil makes for hard work.
As a result, a day before Master Gardener College began for most of the participants in September 2019, the two of us, along with Robin Franklin and Tara Honey, found ourselves at The Main in downtown Norfolk, seated with other Water Steward wannabes from around the state, yet another thick binder of training materials in front of each of us. We hardly knew each other that first day, (except Robin and Tara were friends from their Class of 2016 days). Of course, that changed quickly, as we powered through about 30 hours of advanced Water Steward training offered alongside the keynote and breakout sessions at that year’s Master Gardener College, the first requirement of becoming a Water Steward. It was a very interesting four days, with technical and programmatic training organized by Frank and Pat Reilly of the Central Rappahannock unit. Where better to have Water Steward training than in our own city that is surrounded by water? We all learned a lot, and of course the training, which included a few site visits, confirmed lots of things we already knew or had picked up along the way.
The second and final step to becoming a Water Steward is to complete a 30-hour project. We were instructed to work with the City of Norfolk to come up with a project, something involving Water Steward issues that would benefit the city or support particular local needs. Naturally, we chose Justin Shafer as our point man at the city. His official title in the norfolk.gov staff directory is Water Quality Project Manager for the Division of Environmental Storm Water Management. If you don’t know Justin, he seems to be in the forefront of every major resilience or other water-related project in town. Justin suggested several sites we could consider, involving either plantings to help with erosion control or experimental plantings that may guide future plantings. We chose several related activities: an experimental planting along the Hague at South Mowbray Arch in front of the Hague School (near the Chrysler Museum), another planting at the same site to help with erosion and to compare to the first, and a planting of wildflowers and seeds (one group using compost, one not using compost) along the banks of Greenway Park on Llewellyn Avenue that would act as a buffer planting and also beautify the area. We were all ready to begin in late March 2020 when the COVID shutdown occurred.
As with everyone, COVID threw a huge monkey wrench into our project because we were supposed to finish it by the end of September 2020, within one year after our training. COVID of course caused multiple problems: – not only was it potentially risky being near other people, but also COVID caused backups in the supply of plants and other materials. Luckily, Chris Epes granted us another year reprieve.
We managed to get the first planting done in late October 2020, staying six feet away from each other and wearing masks. The ground at the Hague site was so compacted that we were forced to use a battery powered drill with an auger bit that Drew happened to have in his tool arsenal; we could not have even started the planting without that drill. The second and the third plantings were almost back-to-back in early May 2021, luckily after each of us were vaccinated. For the second planting we were graciously assisted by kids from the nearby Hague School and Ghent Montessori School as well as some other volunteers (and of course Drew’s famous battery drill with auger tip!). We completed the first and the third plantings with just the four of us NMG Water Steward Interns; it would have taken us an extra day or two to finish the second planting if we did not have the volunteer help.
Drew head down over the electric drill
Scott Mackey, a regular volunteer at
the Hermitage wetlands, consults with Will during a break from pickax work
to break up the soil
There were some other smaller glitches as well. Perhaps the most annoying was discovering that a city work crew had mowed our first planting in October 2020, a week after we put it in. Since when does the city mow that horrible, desolate stretch of rubble-infested ground along the Hague that has gradually eroded away? The answer, of course, is whenever something grows there! Coordinating the schedules of four people – sometimes five including Justin – also proved more difficult than we anticipated. We were all busy even during the Spring of this year. The plants also came in late this Spring, and we could not get them in the ground until early May. The weather was unkind as well; it did not rain until the very end of May, forcing our plantings to go almost three weeks with little water.
Despite COVID and its complications, we completed our project, and this past June officially became Water Stewards, nearly 21 months after the training in September 2019. It has been one crazy ride. Now all we have to do to maintain our Water Steward qualification is an annual 15 hours of WS work and five hours of WS-related continuing education, above the usual hours of a Master Gardener. We intend to milk Justin for lots of these work hours! We understand that all of the Steward certifications (land, tree, and water) have the same hours requirements: 30 of training, a 30-hour project/internship, and then, after certification, an additional 15 hours of work and five hours of continuing education annually.
We highly recommend doing the Water Steward training and urge more NMGs to try it. In a city that is largely defined by water and threatened by sea level rise, we feel that Water Steward training, volunteering, and educating the public is critical. Plus, it is fun and very different from the usual Master Gardener work. And we can’t imagine that the next team of Water Steward interns will have as many obstacles as we did in completing the certification.
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