East Texas Natives Project

The demand for ecotypic native seed sources for grassland restoration, pastureland and crop field conversion to native prairies, herbaceous understory restoration in the longleaf and shortleaf pine ecosystems, and the revegetation of disturbed sites on pipeline and highway rights-of-ways is rapidly increasing in the East Texas region. However, there are currently very few, if any, regionally adapted native seed sources available on the commercial market to meet these restoration demands. In response to this problem, the East Texas Natives Project (ETN) was established in early 2018 with founding and sustained support from Ellen Temple in memory of Buddy Temple. ETN is working to develop regionally adapted native seed sources for restoration efforts in the Piney Woods, Oak Woods and Prairies, and Blackland Prairie ecosystems of East Texas.

The objectives of the ETN project are:

To collect, evaluate, and release seed sources of East Texas native plants to commercial seed producers in order to facilitate availability of locally adapted native seeds to all consumers.
To develop and implement restoration and reclamation strategies that can be successfully used to reestablish native plants in disturbed or degraded habitats.
To promote the use of native plants in pastureland, timber operations, rangeland restoration, and highway, oil and gas, and energy transmission rights-of-ways reclamation.
Native plant evaluation sites in the region include the Daisy Farms Dairy in Paris, Texas, the East Texas Plant Materials Center in Nacogdoches, Texas, the Boggy Slough Conservation Area in Trinity County, and the Bois D’Arc Lake Mitigation Project at the Riverby Ranch in Fannin County.