MARLBOROUGH – The city has a new rain garden.
On Oct. 17, volunteers from DuPont helped install dozens of native plants in a plot at Ward Park, near the Marlborough Senior Center’s greenhouse.
According to Heather Conkerton, the ecological restoration coordinator for OARS, the rain garden will clean and infiltrate stormwater, add biodiversity and help mitigate flooding.
“These plants can live in a moist environment,” and they will also attract butterflies and other pollinators, said Clay Larsen of Yard and a Half Landscaping, who delivered the plants and mulch.
When the DuPont volunteers arrived, Larsen taught them how to remove the plants from their pots, and the proper way to dig and mulch.
The group installed the garden in about one hour.
“It was just an awesome day,” said Derek Thoresen, a chemist with DuPont. “It was fun to be a part of it.”
Conkerton said that installing a rain garden in a public location will help encourage others to build their own rain gardens.
The rain garden is part of a program with OARS as part of its Sudbury-Assabet-Concord Climate Resiliency Coalition. An interpretive panel, which will be installed later, will provide education to the public about the importance of stormwater management and biodiversity.
Funding for the project at Ward Park came from DuPont’s Clear into the Future program.
The garden will be maintained by the senior center’s garden club.
A formal ribbon-cutting will take place sometime next spring.
