South Florida Sun Sentinel from Fort Lauderdale, Florida • A7

DEBORAHWORK dworktribpub.com Master Gardeners' leader publishes rain forest research -) GREENERY Students finish a final exam before graduating from Broward County's Master Gardener program, which is taught by John Pipoly, left, at Tree Tops Park in Davie, staff photosjaneris marte CO John Pipoly is on a mission. His goal: to groom budding horticulturists through his year-long Master Gardener Program, then send them out to help create community gardens, lend a knowledgeable hand at local ar-mer's markets, and work on small-scale organic farms. His current students are inthe lastthroes of training. Holed up recently in Oak Ridge Hall at Tree Tops Park in Davie, the 22 potential Florida Master Gardeners took a 75-question final exam and then pored over and identified 31 plant specimens. "We really need the help That why we train to this extent.

It's like a graduate course," said Pipoly, an urban horticulture agent for Broward County's Parks and Recreation Department and the University of Florida's Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences. "So far, we've put local Master Gardener coordinators in 26 of Broward's 31 cities, and that's pretty amazing." Master Gardeners must complete Broward's program, as well as 75 vol-unteer hours. The gardeners, in turn, are prepared to educate the public on topics such as landscape, plant nutrition and pest management. Student Linda Macedo pondered the final exam, saying her aim is to encourage local gardeners to grow at least one edible plant, even in flower gardens. "You can have a beautiful landscape and still add two or three edible plants, such as herbs or carrots," said Macedo, a chef and associate organic farmer at Criswell Farms in Fort Lauderdale.

"Carrot tops are beautiful!" Pipoly manages more than 240 Master Gardeners countywide and recently organized the opening of Master Gardener Public Service Centers in six parks. He said they have gone from fielding 10,000 resident que- by botanist John Beam an. After earning his doctoral degree in biology from the City University of New York, he spent years trekking the jungles and liana forests of Central and South America and Southeast Asia. He's been dropped off by helicopter to collect samples in the most remote and least bo-tanically known areas of Guyana, trained foresters and ecologists in Columbia, and helped found an herbarium in Peru. Pipoly has also played a part in the discovery of about 100 new plant species and was recently a member of an international team of scientists that authored a research paper published inNa-ture Communications His research found that only one percent of Amazon tree species are responsible for half of the carbon storage and productivity of the Amazon rain forest.

"I was taught that a scientist's job is to make people care about the natural world," he said. "Scientists who don't contribute to the welfare of society don't deserve public support. Scientists owe it to the country to do something, to make things better. You have to give something back." For information about the Master Gardener program in Broward County, visit bitlyBroward MasterGardener. teaching to mean that God always requires absolute forgiveness, without conditions.

I took the position that I'm commanded to always forgive, but not until the sinner has asked to be forgiven. Today, for the first time in my life, I think I may have been wrong. I'm often wrong, but until now I've never been in doubt. Today, I'm ries each year, to 120,000. "It's just exploded," he said, crediting the fact that he and his proteges now offer advice via email, in addition to taking walk-ins and phone calls.

Master Gardener Susan Mather, who graduated from Pipoly's program in 2009, said she also sees an increase in serious gardening, whether it is raising vegetables, tending to tropical blooms or creating havens for butterflies. "People are coming back to nature," said the Plantation resident. "We're getting in touch with real food and real killings are purchased legally For others, the big lesson is that we must provide more options for the treatment of mental illness. I also understand this lesson, but there's no way to purge the public square of every unbalanced and potentially violent, mentally ill person without creating a police state. The problem is complicated by the fact that not all people who com CO TO TO CO CO CO 73 0 I 73 beauty." Pipoly describes himself as an inner-city kid from Detroit who spent summers baling hay on his uncle's Michigan farm.

"My cousin knew the names of all the trees. I figured, if he knows all that, I can learn, too. I was determined to find trees he didn't know the names of." While studying botany as an undergraduate at Michigan State University, Pipoly was mentored mit evil acts are mentally ill. I would pose the big lesson for me as a theological and moral question: Is it right to forgive an unrepentant killer? My dear friend Monsi-gnor Thomas Hartman and I have always agreed about most things. We don't agree about Jesus and nearly came to blows when Tommy once ordered a corned beef sandwich on white bread with After church murders, forgiveness a mighty sword against hate e've been here before, and we'll be here again.

But how should we respond? After the tragic killings of nine people during evening Bi-ble study at Emanuel AME church in Charleston, S.C in the aftermath of mass murder, what is the big lesson we must learn that ben- efits our spiritual growth? For some, the lesson is that we must find better ways to control and limit gun ownership in America. I understand this lesson, but I cannot learn it. Gun ownership is a constitutionally protected right, and many of the weapons used in mass cheese. However, we've often argued over whether forgiveness needed to be earned. It is Peter's question in Matthew (KJV): "Then came Peter to him, and said, 'Lord, how oft shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? 'Til seven Jesus saith unto him, say not unto thee, until seven times; but, until 70 times Tommy fairly took this.