DonateKeith Nevison
Keith is responsible for overseeing all of the horticultural initiatives for Santa Barbara Botanic Garden.
In 2022, Keith Nevison relocated back to his home state of California to step into the role of director of horticulture and operations at the Garden. With the opening of the Backcountry in June 2022, Keith has been excited to work with the Garden teams to establish a welcome space for the young and young at heart to have fun and create lasting memories, while learning about the ecological importance of native plants.
He moved to Santa Barbara from Virginia, where he served as the farm and natural resource manager at Bundoran Farm, stewarding 2,300 acres (930 hectares) of pastures, forests, and natural areas for a community association. In addition, Nevison spent three years cohosting “Virginia Home Grown,” a flagship Virginia Public Media program exploring the delights and challenges of gardening in the commonwealth. Prior to that, he served as manager of Monticello’s Thomas Jefferson Center for Historic Plants and launched the Monticello Center for Food and Farming.
Keith obtained his master’s degree in public horticulture through the Longwood Graduate Program at the University of Delaware, where he studied pollinator interactions on native Phlox and its cultivars. He presently holds certifications as a master naturalist, FFT2 certified wildland firefighter, and an International Society of Arboriculture arborist. He loves exploring nature and native plants in the Golden State with his wife, Jennifer, and son, Felix.
Insights
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Introducing the 805 Initiative: Santa Barbara Botanic Garden’s Local Genetics Nursery Program
Last year, Santa Barbara Botanic Garden introduced a new nursery initiative designed to produce locally adapted plant material for restoring wildlands and for anyone wanting to support wildlife with regionally endemic native plants. We call this program our 805 Initiative, named for our area code, which stretches along the South and Central Coast of California,…
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Introducing the Tipton Trail
On Sunday, November 17, celebrating National Hiking Day, Santa Barbara Botanic Garden is opening the new Tipton Trail, a pathway connecting Garden members and guests to the eastern portion of the Garden’s 78-acre property. This 1.3-mile long, out-and-back trail begins in the Garden’s Pollinator Garden Section, north of the Pritzlaff Conservation Center and east of Mission…
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Emerald Ash Borer | Detecting Early, Responding Rapidly
This summer, Santa Barbara Botanic Garden started work with CAL FIRE’s Forest Entomology and Pathology Program on an early detection initiative scouting for the presence of emerald ash borer (EAB) in our region. EAB is a non-native jewel beetle, originally from Northeast Asia, that was first detected in North America in 2002 in the vicinity…
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Milkweed for Monarchs
On July 21st of this year, migratory monarch butterflies were officially entered as Endangered on the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List of Threatened Species. The migratory monarch butterfly is a subspecies of the monarch butterfly that is widely known for its epic, thousands of miles long journey from summer breeding areas…
