The Upstate Native Plant Society presents botanist and naturalist David Campbell on Tuesday, Jan. 18 at 7 p.m. at the Landrum Depot, 211 North Trade St., Landrum.  Campbell will speak on the rare and unusual plants of Polk County.

Since 2012, Campbell has been cataloging the plant life of Polk County on behalf of the herbarium at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. Campbell says, “There’s a lot of geological diversity, the soils are very unusual, very nutrient-rich, so there’s some neat things to be found there.”

Polk’s interesting plant life includes oddball “disjuncts” that are more than 500 miles away from where they are normally found, and it is said to hold the only North Carolina occurrences of plants such as the Allegheny spurge, Whorled horse balm, Ozark bunchflower, and Thicket creeper.

Campbell will be discussing his recent botanical finds, as well as sharing stories of the quest. The presentation will include photographs of rare and unusual plant species found in Polk County and discussion of his finds.

The program is free and open to the public. While the meeting starts at 7 p.m., there will be refreshments and social time starting at 6:30 p.m. Visit scnps.org for more information.

– submitted by Janice Weakland