Our Writers

Pam Beck is a well-known Southeastern garden writer, popular lecturer, and freelance photographer. Since 1993 Pam has contributed numerous gardening articles and photographs to Carolina Gardener Magazine, one for which she was awarded a national Silver Trowel Award for magazine-writing for 2006 by the Garden Writer's Association. She is co-author of Best Garden Plants for North Carolina (Lone Pine Publishing, 2006). In addition to her busy lecture schedule, Pam is also a local garden scout and stylist for Better Homes & Gardens Magazine, and currently serves on the Board of Advisors of the J C Raulston Arboretum in Raleigh, North Carolina.

Dick Bir is a horticulturist and conservationist as well as faculty emeritus from the Department of Horticultural Science at NC State University. He has published hundreds of articles, HGTV to Horticulture, American Nurseryman to American Gardener, as well as presented hundreds of invited lectures. Dick has received many awards from conservation, education, gardening and green industry groups including the 2006 Scott Medal from Swarthmore College and 2007 Balantine Award from the Southeastern Flower Show.

Dick was one of the pioneers of the current native plants education and research revival including the native plants conference at Cullowhee and writing Growing and Propagating Showy Native Woody Plants. He believes beautiful gardens are possible for anyone if we want them and have the right teachers.

Peter Loewer is one of the most prolific garden writers and illustrators in the Southeast. To date, he has written 34 books and provided illustrations to literally hundreds more. His book, The Wild Gardener, was named one of the best 75 gardening books of the twentieth century by the American Horticultural Society, while some of his drawings are in the permanent collections of The Hunt Institute of Botanical Documentation at Carnegie Mellon University. Alumni of Carolina Gardener events are also familiar with Peter's plant knowledge and quick wit, and we'll be welcoming him back to the stage during our 2006 Symposium in Asheville. Having moved to the region from New York many years ago, Peter has become a consummate plantsman on all things green and growing in the Southeast. He now lives in Asheville, N.C., with his wife, Jean, and kitty-cats, Kubin and Willow. You can visit his website at www.thewildgardener.com.

Barbara Pleasant is the author of twenty books on gardening (including The Whole Herb, The Southern Garden Advisor) and countless magazine articles. One of her recent releases, Garden Stone, won a Garden Globe Award of Achievement for writing from the Garden Writers Association. The Washington Post called it "one of the best books on using stones in the landscape that we've ever seen." In addition to being a frequent contributor to Carolina Gardener magazine, Barbara is a regional columnist for Nationalgardening.com and Gardening How-To magazine, and was a featured guest speaker at the North Carolina Mountain Magic event in September. Originally from Lexington, AL, Barbara now makes her home in southwestern Virginia. She has a teenage daughter, a large black dog, and she dreams of a perfect world in which every person joins in the fun of growing plants. You can learn more about Barbara by visiting www.barbarapleasant.com.

Rekha Morris is an art historian, plant explorer and horticultural writer who has written for a number of horticultural journals such as the Rock Garden Quarterly, and American Gardener, and is a long time contributor to Carolina Gardener and to The Begonian. She has a woodland garden in Pendleton, S.C., where she experiments with shade-tolerant species from around the world. These grow side-by-side with her growing collection of native plants, many of which she has rescued [with permission] from sites slated for development. This woodland garden combining native and exotic plants was featured in the American Gardener [2001]. She currently travels frequently to document species begonias in the eastern branch of the Sierra Madre Mountains of Mexico, as well as the eastern Himalayan region of India on the borders of China. Her lectures appearances in the USA on species begonias include the JC Raulston Arboretum in Raleigh, Miami, Los Angeles, San Antonio, San Diego, Dallas, and Ballarat and Melbourne, Australia. She spoke on Species Begonias at the American Begonia Society in Houston in May 2008.

Margot Rochester of Lugoff, S.C., author of Earthly Delights: Gardening by the Seasons the Easy Way, has a relaxed and entertaining speaking style and "imparts wisdom like blossoms strewn along the garden path". She has created a large and lush, layered mixed border that wanders around her suburban lot, using strategies that eliminate tilling, weeding, fertilizing and insecticides. Her mission is to enable others to do the same and her mantra is "Keep it easy, keep it fun, keep it personal and keep on keeping on".

Margot writes garden columns for The (Columbia, S.C.) State, the Kershaw County (S.C.) Chronicle-Independent and The Island Breeze on the Outer Banks of North Carolina. She is currently working on a second book: Down to Earth: Practical Thoughts for Passionate Gardeners. She has been a Master Gardener for eleven years and has presented programs at the Charleston Horticulture Society Winter Symposium, the Greenville (SC) Master Gardener Symposium, The North Carolina Arboretum in Asheville and Daniel Stowe Botanical Garden.

Rita Pelczar received her B. S. and M. S. degrees in horticulture from the University of Maryland. Throughout her career as extension agent, Peace Corps volunteer, teacher, public garden director, and associate editor of The American Gardener magazine, she has shared her enthusiasm for and commitment to environmentally responsible gardening. Her articles have appeared in The American Gardener, Horticulture, National Gardening, Fine Gardening, Flower and Garden, The Herb Companion, Mother Earth News, Organic Gardening, and The Carolina Gardener; she has also contributed to several books. She and her husband recently moved to a small mountain farm in Madison County, NC, where they grow a variety of ornamental and edible plants, including organic hops.

Barbara Sullivan is a garden writer, photographer, designer and lecturer. She is the author of Garden Perennials for the Coastal South (UNC Press, 2003) a guide to gardening along the Southeast and Gulf Coasts. She travels throughout the area giving presentations on the perils and pleasures of coastal gardening. She is a member of the Garden Writers Association of America and winner of one of their Golden Globe awards. She has broadcast garden commentaries on public radio station WHQR-FM for the past seven years. In addition to designing the garden for the Minnie Evans tribute at Airlie Gardens in Wilmington, N.C., she has also served on the board of the New Hanover County Arboretum in Wilmington. Barbara is the mother of two grown children and lives in Wilmington with her husband, Michael and their dog, Oscar.