Coastal Woodland Retreat Virginia Marine Science Museum

The Owls Creek Salt Marsh Preserve is a broad area stretching between the Virginia Aquarium and Marine Science Center’s two large exhibition halls. Mammals, birds and reptiles seek refuge here in one of the last great salt marshes on a coastline saturated with growing urban incursions. The Virginia Natural Heritage Program identified this section of Virginia as an area of “rare natural diversity” where marine and land ecological systems interact.

The Virginia Beach Garden Club began an association with the Science Center in the mid-1980’s by committing to a program of environmental restoration, conservation and education focusing on three natural habitats: marsh, native plants and coastal woodland. The first project was completed by the club in 1986, a nearly third of a mile long boardwalk through the marshland featuring signboards describing the animal and plant life that inhabit the area. Then in 1990, the club created and maintained an award winning Native Plant/Wildflower garden in an upland habitat.

The 1995 Founders Fund Award went to establish a Coastal Woodland Retreat on five acres of a partially wooded peninsula along Owls Creek. The Retreat contains nature trails with plantings of native trees, shrubs and wildflowers along with nesting boxes, feeding stations and educational signage.

In 2007, The Virginia Beach Garden Club purchased and planted 865 additional native plants to rejuvenate the grounds of the Virginia Aquarium in preparation for the GCA 2008 Annual Meeting.