I Dig Your Story

Kate Santos has built a career that crosses some of horticulture’s most distinct boundaries: from applied research and greenhouse production to breeding and global operations—and now public horticulture at Longwood Gardens.

As Associate Vice President of Science at Longwood, Kate brings that commercial and scientific experience to a place where horticulture is about growing beautiful plants—and so much more. Her work connects production, conservation horticulture, biodiversity, climate resiliency, sustainability, research—and most importantly she’s helping to connect these to the 1.7 million people who visit Longwood Gardens because they simply love plants and nature.

In this conversation, Kate talks about feeling disconnected from plants despite moving upward in her career, and eventually taking a year away to ask the hard questions and figure out what truly mattered to her. She also explains how Longwood is using horticulture as a tool for conservation and stewardship, and what it means to help carry the responsibility of a garden of such distinction.

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Seed Your Future: www.seedyourfuture.org

National Garden Bureau: www.ngb.org

In this quarterly bonus I Dig Your Story sub-pod we call Fifth Tuesdays, host Ellen Wells does a follow-up with a former guest, Roshan Patel.  

When we first talked, Roshan was getting his hands dirty at Mack Park Farm in Salem, Massachusetts, and discovering just how much community can grow around a garden. Now, several months later, he has plenty to report.

Roshan talks about a busy growing season, creating garden videos, and the expanding impact of Mack Park Farm—including nearly 5,000 pounds of donated food and a growing volunteer base. He also fills us in on a new community garden at the Plummer House and the new Friends of Mack Park Farm, a nonprofit created to help secure the farm’s future.

And, of course, Ellen has to ask: Has Roshan finally made peace with kale? Plus, a peek at fatherhood and Roshan’s hopes for introducing baby Blake to the garden.

Resources:

Roshan Patel: Growing Community Through Urban Agriculture - podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/roshan-patel-growing-community-through-urban-agriculture/id1856208214?i=1000779882808

Roshan’s Instagram: - https://www.instagram.com/drizzleranch/

Jonathan Bardzik has built a life around curiosity, creativity, and bringing people together. From growing up in his family’s Massachusetts garden center to working in horticulture, cooking for others, writing books, and creating retreats, his path has rarely been linear—and that’s exactly the point.

In this conversation, Jonathan shares how his relationship with plants began, why following curiosity has shaped so many of his choices, and how cooking became a way to create connection and joy. We also talk about his experience spending more than nine months on solo retreats, what he learned from stepping away from everyday demands, and why he now creates that space for others.

Jonathan keeps close to his heart this advice: “Make connection a priority in your life. It is the greatest source of joy that you will have.”

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What happens when two friends get excited about school gardens and then decide to start taking their viewers inside some of the most interesting gardens around Central California?

Christy Calderon and Shelley Joyner are the creators of Between Two Shrubs, a YouTube show that’s a little like MTV’s Cribs, but for gardens. They tour home landscapes, talk with the people who created them, and show viewers what’s growing, what’s working, and generally what’s happening just out of sight.

But their interest in gardening and their friendship started before their viral backyard videos. Christy and Shelley became involved with the garden program at their children’s school because they saw the garden as a place where kids could learn by doing and have access to fresh food. Their work has grown into a hands-on educational garden with a full curriculum, gardening activities, events, and plenty of opportunities for students and parents to get their hands in the soil.

In this episode, we talk about:

Connect with Christy & Shelley:

Between Two Shrubs on YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/@BetweenTwoShrubs

Between Two Shrubs on Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/betweentwoshrubs/

Between Two Shrubs School Garden Planning Materials - https://www.etsy.com/shop/BetweenTwoShrubsShop

Sunset Magazine article: https://sunset.com/home-garden/garden-basics/how-to-start-a-school-garden

Rayne Gibson grew up in family-owned wholesale nursery in Louisiana, learning the business from the ground up. By the time he graduated from LSU with a horticulture degree, he had a very specific vision: build up the operation into a multi-state container nursery business and become one of the best nurserymen in the industry.

Then everything changed.

In this episode of I Dig Your Story, Rayne talks about leaving the family business after realizing the future he had been promised wasn’t going to happen—and how that difficult decision ultimately led him to opportunities he never expected. He shares the story of turning around a struggling wholesale nursery in Fort Worth, rebuilding its team and operations, and discovering what good leadership really looks like.

Today, through Taproots Horticulture Consulting, Rayne helps horticulture businesses that struggle with production planning, operational efficiency, sales coaching, team building and leadership, helping them become the best nurseries and people they can be.

The conversation also touches on:

Resources:

Laura Kunkle’s career has taken some unexpected turns—from wanting to be a professional piano player at the Olympics, to sports broadcasting, accounting at Highlights for Children, and eventually a decades-long career in the green industry. Today, she’s the executive director of America in Bloom, an organization helping communities across the country become better places to live, work, visit, and invest in.

In this episode, Laura and I talk about how America in Bloom uses trees, flowers, environmental stewardship, heritage preservation, and—most importantly—volunteerism to help communities see themselves differently. Laura shares the remarkable transformation of Castle Rock, Washington, and explains why communities need to “be in it for the long haul” to create lasting change.

We also get into why plants are more than pretty, how beautiful communities can make us feel good (and encourage us to spend time and money there), and why community involvement is at the heart of lasting change.

And because this is I Dig Your Story, we go beyond the professional story. Laura reveals her hidden talents—juggling! spinning a ball on her finger!—and explains why pickleball became an unexpected way for this self-described shy person to build community.

In this episode:

Connect with Laura:

America in Bloom – www.americainbloom.org

Gardens Across America – www.americainbloom.org/programs/gardens-across-america

Ashley Vernon’s relationship with plants began with childhood curiosity—tasting honeysuckle, exploring her grandmother’s grapevines, and growing her first strawberry patch—but the path to her career in community orchards was anything but predictable.

Adopted as a baby, Ashley grew up curious about her background and where she came from. That curiosity became a kind of wanderlust, leading her from nursing to political science, international studies, and journalism, then to Belize, the Peace Corps in Mauritania and Rwanda, and eventually to social work. Along the way, she developed a fascination with understanding people, places, and how interconnected our stories are.

That curiosity led to Ashley becoming Co-Executive Director of The Giving Grove, a national organization helping communities establish and sustain community orchards.

In this episode:

Plus, Ashley shares the story of the first apple tree she grafted—and why she calls one particularly wicked-looking tree in her yard “Maleficent.”

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What happens when a lifelong love of plants meets an insatiable curiosity about, well, just about everything? For horticulturist, author, educator and entrepreneur Leslie Halleck, it has made for one fascinating career.

Leslie and I go way back, so this conversation was a chance to talk not just about what she does, but how she got there. From growing up as an Army brat and gardening with an adopted German “Oma” to studying botany, working at a garden center, conducting research trials and eventually building her own horticultural consulting business, Leslie has never been a one-lane kind of person.

We talk about her career in public gardens and retail, how writing became such an important part of her work, and the three-legged stool that is Halleck Horticultural: supporting the horticulture industry, teaching the next generation of horticulturists, and providing scientifically accurate gardening information to consumers.

Leslie also shares why she thinks gardeners need to be especially careful about the information they find online, what she teaches her horticulture students about evaluating sources, and why she believes learning new things—and even picking up new hobbies—is an important part of who she is.

In this episode, we talk about:

Listen to Leslie's story on I Dig Your Story—and find out what happens when a horticulturist refuses to stay in just one lane.

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Angelique Robb didn’t grow up dreaming of a career in horticulture. She studied engineering, worked in the oil industry, and moved to Scotland before gradually finding her way into landscape design and build. Along the way, she discovered that the problem-solving, project management, and visualization skills she developed as an engineer were remarkably useful in the landscape industry.

Today, Angelique is the owner of SYNKD, a media and events platform created to connect the many disciplines that make up the landscape industry. In this episode, we talk about her unconventional career path, the lessons she learned running a landscape design/build business, and why she believes collaboration—not working in silos—is one of the keys to moving the industry forward.

Visit SYNKD at synkd.io for the publication, events, podcasts, videos, and more.

Angelique welcomes feedback and ideas from landscape professionals about what the industry needs. Contact her at [email protected]

After a corporate layoff unexpectedly changed his career path, Roshan Patel traded digital marketing for community gardening—and found a new sense of purpose in the process.

In this episode, Roshan shares how volunteering at Mack Park Farm in Salem, Massachusetts, grew into a passion for urban agriculture, food security, and community engagement. He also talks about using social media to make gardening more approachable and why getting your hands dirty can change much more than what's growing in the garden.

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