“She handed me a Master Naturalist application and told me I would not regret this decision. I haven’t!”
Mittie
Mittie McDonald, 2013
Sara and Glen Shaffer introduced and brought me to my first Master Naturalist meeting in 2012. I sat next to Sally Evans, who was waiting for me at next month’s Master Naturalist chapter meeting. She handed me a Master Naturalist application and told me I would not regret this decision. I haven’t!
I Started out volunteering at Holifield Science Learning Center, helping maintain the outside wildflower and perennial gardens. Continue to volunteer at Children’s Hospital in Plano, helping to maintain a perennial garden and reestablish the native prairie in the once eroded and baren field on the east side of the hospital complex. Many Master Naturalists have helped with this specific restoration and to watch the earth heal is breathtaking. I also volunteer at the Heard fossil lab and have been provided all new opportunities to learn about prehistoric fish, mammoths, and Mosasaurus. My new tools of choice are bamboo sticks and acetone for cleaning away matrix from delicate prehistoric bone fragments!
Being a Master Naturalist is an opportunity to learn everything about nature from the best of the best and then to give back what you learn. You are only limited by yourself. The opportunities presented are abundant and the friendships you make along the way are 100% genuine. The best of the best, always willing to give!