Family Days: Celebrate Native Plant Month

During April people across Montana and the nation celebrate native plants by planting native trees, shrubs, perennials, vines and grasses. They also remove non-native plants and restore native habitats to allow birds, bees, butterflies and all wildlife to flourish. At the museum there will be various activities that raise awareness about these beautiful, native plants.
Members and volunteers of the Livingston Tree Board will be planting native plants on the museum grounds. Participants can plant seeds to take home and use their senses to learn to identify herbs. Coloring sheets of Montana native plants are provided with a color key.
During Family Days, the museum’s Montana Native Plants Teaching Trunk will be on display. Park High School students collected fifteen specimens from the area around historic Fort Parker, east of Livingston, preserved them and researched how native peoples used the plants for food or medicine, which is included in the trunk. (Educators can check out this and other Indian Education for All trunks at the museum for classroom use.) In addition, copies of pages from the scrapbooks created by Olga Fraser from specimens she collected in Yellowstone National Park (with permission) in the 1970s will be on display.