Volunteer
Removing invasive plants is the first step in habitat restoration! Join us with an ongoing Remove Invasive Plants (RIP) event or contact jsoles@arlingtonva.us to schedule one for your school, church or business group, or otherwise want to participate in this program.
Learn more.
Join volunteers in restoration plantings in Arlington’s parks every fall and spring. All year round, volunteers also plant locally collected seeds and tend seedlings at our nursery, as part of the first step in returning native plants to Arlington’s parks. Nursery workdays are held every Tuesday afternoon from 2-4 p.m. at our nursery in Barcroft Park. To see all our upcoming events and to register, click here. Contact jsoles@arlingtonva.us to learn more or for location directions.
Citizen Science
Participate in a BioBlitz or the City Nature Challenge – or participate in one of the many iNaturalist projects in the county. Contact aabugattas@arlingtonva.us to learn more.
Submit Natural Resources Volunteer Hours
Park Steward Application
Native Plant of the Month
Virginia Spring Beauties
Claytonia virginica
The appropriately named Virginia Spring Beauties (Claytonia virginica) are indeed beautiful, if small, spring ephemerals: growing leaves, blooming, and producing seeds before the trees fully leaf out and then disappearing until the next spring. Their scientific name was assigned by Linnaeus himself in honor of John Clayton, one of Virginia's earliest naturalists. They can be quite abundant, blanketing open woodlands so thickly they sometimes look like snow. Carolina Spring Beauty (Claytonia caroliniana) is another species that grows in the mountains West of our region. Read more.