2026 Conference Speakers
Dr. Rosalyn LaPier
Dr. Rosalyn LaPier will be presenting the keynote session entitled, “The Land is Not Wild.”
Rosalyn is an award-winning Indigenous writer, environmental historian, and ethnobotanist. They work within Indigenous communities to revitalize traditional ecological knowledge (TEK) and to strengthen public policy for Indigenous languages. They are the author of two books including Invisible Reality: Storytellers, Storytakers and the Supernatural World of the Blackfeet, produced two Blackfeet language lexicons, and written dozens of articles and commentaries. Rosalyn is an enrolled member of the Blackfeet Tribe of Montana and Red River Métis.
Catherine Moravec and Lisa Pace
Catherine and Lisa will be presenting the first New to Native Plants session entitled “From Lawn Replacements to Naturalistic Prairies: Ideas for Incorporating Native Grasses in Colorado Landscapes.”
Catherine Moravec and Lisa Pace work in the Water Conservation Group at Colorado Springs Utilities. Their backgrounds in horticulture science and landscape design have helped broaden the approaches to water wise landscaping beyond the seven principles of xeriscape to a more natural approach that includes many more native plants. Catherine earned a M.S. in horticulture from the University of California, Davis and Lisa earned a B.A. in horticulture from Colorado State with an emphasis in landscape design and contracting.
Laura Lukens
Laura Lukens will be presenting the first Knows Native Plants session entitled, “Conserving Bumble Bees in Colorado’s Front Range.”
Laura (she/her) is a PhD student in the Graduate Degree Program in Ecology at Colorado State University. Her research focuses on how anthropogenic change affects population dynamics and species interactions, with a particular interest in endangered species conservation. Laura earned her BS from the University of Minnesota in 2015. Prior to graduate school, she studied monarch butterflies, parasitoids, and grassland ecology at the University of Minnesota and with the Monarch Joint Venture. Her current research explores variation in floral resource availability and bumble bee community composition across land use types in Colorado, incorporating conservation genetic methods to evaluate population health.
Derek Lowstuter
Derek Lowstuter will be presenting the second New to Native Plants session entitled, “Native Trees for Bees (and other Wildlife).”
Derek Lowstuter graduated from CSU with a bachelor's degree in Natural Resource Management, with minors in Horticulture, Forestry, and History. He obtained his M.S. degree in Forest Sciences while serving as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Ethiopia. He is currently a Ph.D. student in the CSU College of Education. He previously founded and operated a 40ac regenerative farm in North Dakota, as well as an organic soil amendment manufacturing and consulting company. Derek currently works as an Agricultural and Natural Resources Regional Specialist for CSU Extension. He is a Certified Arborist, permaculture designer, and agroforester, and has directed agricultural and natural resource management projects on four continents. Derek now calls Colorado Springs home with his wife, their daughter, and a menagerie of animals and houseplants.
Dr. Jennifer Bousselot
Dr. Jennifer Bousselot is a founding member of the Landscaping with Colorado Native Plants Conference committee and will be our conference emcee. She will be presenting the second Knows Native Plants session entitled, “Native Trees and Shrubs of Colorado.”
Jennifer is an Associate Professor in the Department of Horticulture and Landscape Architecture at Colorado State University. She completed her doctorate research studying green roof species selection, including Colorado native plants, at Colorado State University in 2010. Jen was the CoNPS Marketing and Events Coordinator 2015-2019. She is a co-author of the CoNPS published 3rd edition of Common Southwestern Native Plants and the upcoming 3rd edition of Trees and Shrubs of Colorado.
Maggie Gaddis
Maggie Gaddis will be presenting the third New to Native Plants session entitled, “Growing Native Plants for Restoration Outcomes.”
Maggie Gaddis is the Executive Director of the Colorado Native Plant Society. Maggie is a restoration ecologist and botany educator. She originally started volunteering for CoNPS as the Southeast chapter chair because she needed more botanists to participate in her citizen science-based research in the Garden of the Gods in Colorado Springs. Graduate students from all over the Front Range came down to help her collect data and that is when she knew that her people were in CoNPS. Maggie was hired as the first-ever Executive Director of CoNPS in 2021.
Lyss Goldpenny
Lyss Goldpenny will be presenting the third Knows the Native Plants session entitled, “Cultivating Native Seed Availability.”
Lyss Goldpenny works in the Research and Conservation department at Denver Botanic Gardens as Native Plant Production Specialist, growing out native species for seed production. They have worked in ecological restoration and conservation biology for several years in both the public and private sectors, conducting natural resource assessment and management actions of many kinds. They also have a special interest and skillset in avian biology and fire mitigation.
Ilene Flax
Ilene Flax will present the endnote session entitled, “Vibrant Colorado Native Plant Landscapes.”
Ilene Flax has focused her landscape architecture practice on making places for people to connect with nature and with each other. She has a background in ecology and has centered her work on the technical aspects of design and construction of ecologically functional landscapes. She is delighted to be a steward of the City of Boulder’s beloved Open Space and Mountain Parks system.
