With help from a Conservation Champions grant, Como horticulturists are calling attention to one of Minnesota’s most valuable and vulnerable ecosystems.

With its glossy leaves and deep red and purple coloring, the pitcher plant is one of Minnesota’s most captivating natives. So captivating, in fact, that when insects are drawn into its invitingly vase-like body, they soon discover there’s no way out. Tiny, down-drafting hairs inside the plant make it impossible for prey to find purchase before being drowned and digested by this carnivorous plant. 

Native to Minnesota’s peatlands, pitcher plants are just one of the fascinating featured players in a trio of “mini bogs” floating this season in the Marjorie McNeely Conservatory’s Water Gardens. Created by Como horticulturists Bo Akinkuotu and Victoria Housewright, these miniature peatlands—and new interpretive signage nearby—are part of a larger Como Friends’ Conservation Champions project designed to call attention to the beauty, diversity, and environmental benefits of the region’s expansive bogs. 

A Growing Partnership

One of the best places to see this unique ecosystem is in northern Minnesota’s Sax-Zim Bog, a three-hundred square mile peatland about an hour’s drive northwest of Duluth. Well known to birders who flock there to see northern owls, warblers, finches, and other boreal birds, the bog is just as impressive for its diverse plant life, which includes more than 750 species of wildflowers and terrestrial plants, trees, shrubs, grasses, mosses, and ferns.

“Bogs are having a moment and this is definitely one to see, so we came up with the idea of building a partnership with the Friends of the Sax-Zim Bog, a support organization like Como Friends,” says Housewright. Together, Housewright and Akinkuotu wrote a Conservation Champions request proposing a donation to help the organization buy additional land to conserve, as well as the opportunity to bring home a sampling of the bog’s most interesting plants to expand Como’s educational collections. “We wanted it to be a partnership. They’re the ones with the expertise and resources to protect and preserve the bog,” she says, “and here at Como we have nearly two million annual visitors that we can help get excited not just about this incredible ecosystem, but also about why conserving bogs matters so much for climate change.”

All Sax-Zim Bog photographs taken by Naturalist Kelly Beaster

Wild Collecting for Como

In June, the pair traveled north to work with a naturalist at Sax-Zim Bog who helped them to identify and wild collect some of the peatland’s most notable species, like pitcher plants and sundews, leatherleaf and bog bean, pink lady’s slippers and heart-leaved twayblade. To minimize impact on other plants, the pair took only tiny samples and cuttings. “You can’t really dig in an environment as soggy as that—instead you’re just gently untangling roots from one plant to the next,” Akinkuotu explains.

The team took home nearly 60 individual plants that are now taking root behind the scenes in Como’s 30,000-square-foot greenhouse. Once established, Akinkuotu says he’s looking forward to incorporating more of these bog beauties beyond the Water Garden, where the “mini bogs” have already been a big hit with visitors—and with volunteer ducks who’ve been caught nestling in the moss, grasses, and pitcher plants. 

“Even at this scale, you can see these mini bogs creating their own little biomes. We come out here to care for them every day and discover new spiders that have started webbing, more and more bugs that are attracted to these plants, and little tadpoles and frogs that will actually move in,” he says. “By bringing a little more attention to the Sax-Zim Bog, we want people to see how special these places are—and to know that conservation isn’t just something that happens far away. It’s right here at home.”

Bog plants in order of appearance: bog bean, bog rosemary, pitcher plant, bog laurel, star flower, Labrador tea, sundew, lantern sedge, cotton grass

Como’s teen Nature Walk volunteers make conservation look cool

Once again, the Nature Walk station focused on climate adaptations proved the most popular, setting a new record for interactions with more than 325 visitors in just a few hours. 

Nature Walk just concluded its 2025 summer season, recruiting 45 conservation-minded teens between the ages of 13 and 17, and teaching them how to share and interpret what they’ve learned about Como’s plants and animals at interactive stations around campus. This year, Nature Walk volunteers helped to bring Como a little closer to about 150,000 visitors who spent time learning at one of several stations arrayed around Como Park Zoo & Conservatory Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays. While younger kids are the target audience for the conservation role-modeling program, Becker reports that older visitors are also big fans of their infectious enthusiasm, engaging materials, and touchable bio-facts, updated with recent grants from Como Friends. 

As part of the program, Nature Walk volunteers receive training about how to engage visitors of different ages, tips for handling the challenges that can come up on Como’s busy campus, and coaching about career paths ahead in conservation. But Becker says they don’t need much additional prodding to start connecting with Como visitors during the busy summer months. 

“We’re giving them the space to demonstrate competency, which is so important for teenagers who can often feel overlooked, or like no one is listening to them,” Becker says. “This year, we’ve ​​really tried to open things up more to their ideas and their suggestions, which are always so valuable. They’re so capable, and so good at connecting.”

While Como Zoo’s Nicky and Cerberus are easy to spot, wild wolves can be elusive during the summer months. Not only does heavy summer foliage make them harder to see, but wolves are most active at dawn and dusk, saving their energy when the sun is at its peak.

If you’ve been camping in the north woods this summer, chances are good you’ve heard the eerie call of the gray wolf echoing in the distance. But it’s rare to actually see a wolf during the summer months—a fact that’s left gaps in our understanding of wolf behavior and ecology. 

So what exactly do wolves do during the summer?

That’s the question driving the researchers with the Voyageurs Wolf Project, a University of Minnesota initiative aimed at creating a deeper understanding of the summer ecology of wolves in northern Minnesota’s Greater Voyageurs Ecosystem. Voyageurs Wolf Project is a research organization whose work contributes to wolf conservation. It’s a topic that’s also fascinated Tieran Rosefield, a former Como Zoo attendant turned temporary hoofstock keeper, who just earned a Conservation Champions grant from Como Friends to help support this nonprofit initiative.

As part of her pitch to Como Friends’ selective microgrant program, Rosefield suggested a contribution to support the Voyageurs Wolf Project’s nonprofit operations, combined with new interpretive signage at Como Zoo’s wolf habitat to teach visitors more about why wolf conservation matters. Though wolves sometimes get a bad rap, from fairytales to farmers concerned about predation, recent findings from the reintroduction of wolves to Yellowstone National Park and other habitats show that wolves help many other species thrive, from boosting beaver populations, to protecting trees from over-browsing. 

Raising public awareness about wolves and other conservation stories is also part of Como’s growing commitment to empathy-focused education, a campus-wide strategy aimed at deepening connections between Como’s visitors and animal ambassadors. Through Como’s growing partnership with Advancing Conservation through Empathy (ACE) for Wildlife, a nationwide learning network, Como’s education programs and interpretive signage are being updated to reflect the growing body of research that shows that fostering empathy with animals and plants is a powerful tool in building life-long conservation behaviors. Como Friends’ funding, as well as special projects like Conservation Champions, has helped to drive the initiative, which will continue this year with updated signage for polar bears and other animals.

To cap off her Conservation Champions project, Rosefield also created a new keeper talk to highlight what’s happening with Como Zoo’s animal ambassadors, Nicky and Cerberus, and to share new findings from the Voyageurs Wolf Project and other wolf conservation efforts. “I feel like wolves are a little underappreciated, and so I wanted to call attention to this really important species,” she says. “Wolves are highly contended all over the world, and that is why I wanted to bring attention to this incredible species. I also wanted to bring attention to the work done by the Voyageurs Wolf Project, because their research can provide the framework for our care here at Como as well as conservation efforts in Minnesota. I would love to see what else they can do with a little help from Como.”  

Como Zoo’s life support specialist EJ Smith traveled to the Caribbean to support a promising project to rebuild the vanishing coral reefs

Vivid with color and teeming with life, coral reefs are among the most amazing ecosystems on the planet, accounting for just one percent of the ocean floor’s surface, yet supporting nearly a quarter of all marine species. 

But with growing greenhouse gas emissions, rising sea temperatures, ocean acidification, and a host of other factors, reefs around the world are in danger of dying out. While more than half of the world’s living coral has been lost since 1950, scientists predict more than 90 percent could disappear by 2050. 

While the challenges are daunting, Como Zoo life support specialist EJ Smith recently found some cause for hope in the Caribbean where a new conservation group called the Elkhorn Marine Conservancy is working on a solution. With the help of a Como Friends Conservation Champions grant, Smith spent three weeks at the EMC’s sites in Antigua and Barbuda helping the small nonprofit with a promising approach to reef restoration. 

“To help these reefs rebound, they’re working to create coral nurseries,” Smith explains. “They’ll look for healthy, [stress resistant] coral colonies out on the reefs, and take small chunks of them back to the nursery where they’re broken into micro fragments. Corals grow at an incredibly slow pace, but these micro fragments are found to grow faster in small colonies, speeding up that process of coral growth.” Corals are cultivated on ropes and coral “trees” made of PVC piping that can then be replanted onto degraded reefs. EMC’s nurseries are currently fostering 14 species of reef-building corals, many of which are critically endangered. 

An expert diver, Smith is responsible for all of Como’s aquatic habitats, ensuring water quality for dozens of species, from polar bears to pacus, and regularly diving into Como Zoo’s aquatic habitats to troubleshoot. “I once did the math and figured that professionally and recreationally, I’ve spent about two months of my life submerged in the water,” he says. “But diving with [EMC’s staff] was like working with superheroes. Some of these folks had such amazing physical capabilities they could hold their breath for minutes at a time. It was just astounding.” 

The water chemistry skills Smith has honed at Como Zoo are valuable to EMC’s work, and their plans to expand their coral nursery operations. To deepen the connections between conservation efforts in the Caribbean and at Como Zoo, Smith’s colleague Asher Berg, Como Zoo’s Aquatics Keeper, will be taking a Conservation Champions trip of his own this fall to support the renewal of coral near Antigua’s Green Island, York Island, and Cades Reef.

With a new tank of coral beds coming soon to the Aquatics Building, Smith says he’s looking forward to sharing his insights about coral conservation in upcoming keeper talks. While the health of the world’s coral hangs in the balance, Smith says he finds hope in the visit he made to Antigua’s St. Andrew’s School, where he talked with elementary school students about his work in life support, and how coral restoration can benefit the local economy, food chain, and climate resilience. 

“This next generation of island people are already tied to conservation, because their lives really are impacted by the health of the reefs,” he says. “To hear these kids talk about how they want to work in conservation, or maintaining fish stocks, or protecting the reefs when they grow up was really heartwarming, to be honest. It makes you hopeful that conservation projects like this are making an impact.”  

One of the Marjorie McNeely Conservatory’s most interesting plant collections plays the starring role in this season’s Summer Flower Show

The Summer Flower Show at the Marjorie McNeely Conservatory typically features hundreds of tropical annuals that require warm temperatures, lots of water, and frequent swap-outs as they bloom and fade. 

But this season, Como’s horticultural team decided to highlight a plant species that’s a little more sustainable, but no less sensational—the bromeliad. 

“We’ve never used the Sunken Garden as a showcase room for a plant collection before, but we have such a variety of bromeliads currently,” says Como Senior Horticulturist Ariel Dressler. “We always want to put plants in a place where they’ll thrive and be happy, and since the Summer Flower Show is our longest show of the year, we know our bromeliads will do well. They’re such a charismatic plant that to see them in mass is a real treat.”

In fact, bromeliads have long been a favorite for Como visitors, who recently bestowed the “Cutest Plant” award on a tiny pineapple bromeliad. With a collection first launched in 1975, The Marjorie McNeely Conservatory currently has 638 living bromeliads in its collection, from 350 different species, the best of which are often displayed in the understory of the historic Palm Dome. 

With more than 2,700 known species, the diversity of bromeliads is part of their wide appeal. Unlike other plants, bromeliads only use their roots for balance—all the water and nutrients they need are delivered through their leaves. And while many bromeliads only bloom once in their lifetimes, the mother plant can produce many new offshoots, known as “pups.” 

To create the sheer number of plants needed for the Summer Flower Show display, horticulturist Diane Rafats, and a dedicated team of volunteers, propagated hundreds of bromeliad “pups” from Como’s own collection, timing their care and life cycle to ensure they were ready to bloom in time for the show, which runs from June 13 to September 14. Meanwhile, horticulturist Rylee Werden went about taking cuttings from Tropical Encounters and the North Garden to amass the hundreds of tropical accent plants that are also part of the display. Horticulturists worked to acclimate the plants to the unique conditions of the Sunken Garden prior to their June debut. 

“Taking divisions of plants requires a little recovery period, because sometimes plants can be a little dramatic or wilty,” says Werden. “We also give them a little bit of shade and cooler temperatures as they move their way into the Sunken Garden, where it’s going to be hot, but not quite as humid as in a misting tropical greenhouse. Our goal is to get them through that drama phase before they go into the show and are ready for that bright sun and heat.” 

Como Friends’ board of directors is pleased to announce the appointment of Katie Hill as its next president, effective July 14, 2025.

Como Friends’ board of directors is pleased to announce the appointment of Katie Hill as its next president, effective July 14, 2025. Hill succeeds Jackie Sticha, whose 25 years of visionary leadership transformed Como Friends into a nationally recognized model for public-private partnership and helped secure a vibrant, accessible future for Como Park Zoo & Conservatory.

The current vice president of engagement and chief innovation officer at Milkweed Editions, Hill has consistently reimagined how the public connects with such treasured civic institutions as the Walker Art Center and the Minneapolis Institute of Art.

“Katie brings a rare blend of creativity, strategy, and heart,” says Andy Davis, board chair of Como Friends. “She understands what it means to lead with purpose and partnership. Her deep roots in the Twin Cities, her passion for equity and access, and her track record of innovation make her exactly the right leader to guide Como Friends into its next chapter.”

A lifelong Saint Paul resident and longtime Como champion, Hill brings a personal commitment to Como’s future. “Como is where I bring my kids to explore, reflect, and recharge. It’s not just a place—it’s a living ecosystem of wonder, learning, and belonging,” she says. “I’m honored to join Como Friends at this important moment and excited to reimagine how communities connect with public cultural spaces.”

Prior to joining Milkweed Editions—a nationally respected independent publisher of literary fiction, nonfiction, and poetry—Hill spent more than a decade in art museum communications, digital strategy, and public engagement. She launched her career in innovation as creator of the first Internet Cat Video Film Festival at the Walker Art Center in 2012. Hill moved on to help launch the practice of audience engagement at the Minneapolis Institute of Art, where she headed the engagement strategy department and oversaw the marketing operation. Hill holds a BA in English language and literature from Kenyon College, and an MA in art history from the University of St. Thomas.

Selected after an extensive search conducted by Ballinger | Leafblad, Hill will join Como Friends in July. Como Friends supporters will have their first chance to connect with Hill on July 17 at Sunset Affair, the organization’s annual summer gala. The nonprofit fundraising partner to Como Park Zoo & Conservatory, Como Friends has delivered more than $54 million in private contributions to Minnesota’s most visited cultural destination, safeguarding the free admission policy Como’s 1.9 million annual visitors value.

What’s the best time of day to come to Como? With more than a dozen free daily programs offered throughout the summer, the answer is all the time, and again and again. As summer heats up, make the most of every visit to Como with this roster of family-friendly programs and special events, all free to every visitor. 

Special Programs

Conservation Champion Andrea Persson traveled to Sausalito’s Marine Mammal Center to learn the secrets of seal and sea lion care

If you’ve been to a Blaze Sparky Show at Como Zoo, you know that sea lions like Sparky are capable of some amazing feats, from diving nearly 60 stories below the ocean’s surface, to holding their breath for up to 20 minutes at a time. 

But some of the adaptations that work swimmingly in the sea can make veterinary care very complicated for seals and sea lions, particularly when it comes to anesthesia and  other medical interventions. “They’re so trainable and willing to participate in their own health care that you can accomplish quite a lot when they’re awake,” says Como Zoo veterinary technician Andrea Persson. “But it can be much trickier when they’re sick and need to be immobilized, in part because of the dive response that allows them to conserve oxygen and also because we just don’t have to do it very often.”

That’s why Persson recently traveled to Sausalito, California, to attend an intensive veterinary training program at the Marine Mammal Center, the largest marine mammal teaching hospital in the country. Made possible by a grant from Como Friends’ Conservation Champions program, the five-day program allowed Persson to support the Center’s work, rehabilitating stranded seals and sea lions, while learning veterinary tips and tricks from experts who provide daily care to more than 80 elephant seals, harbor seals, and sea lions.

Drawing blood from a seal requires making a puncture near the animal’s spine. “One of my main objectives was to become proficient in blood collection. Blood samples are very important in providing information on the health of the animals we care for and with our relatively small population of seals at the zoo I had limited opportunities to refine my venipuncture techniques. It was great to be able to collect blood on multiple animals each day while I was at the MMC and I am now very confident in my ability to collect blood from our animals at the zoo.” 

Since 1975, the Marine Mammal Center has rescued more than 26,000 marine animals along 600 miles of California coastline and in Hawai’i, typically answering more than 10,000 distress calls about sick, injured, or entangled marine mammals every year. During Persson’s stay in April, the Center was providing safe harbor to dozens of orphaned elephant seal pups, which are born at about 75 pounds and weigh nearly 300 pounds just a month later when they’re fully weaned from their mothers. In spite of their impressive size, young seals can often be separated prematurely when strong storms wash them off of beaches before they’ve learned how to survive on their own. Climate change makes the problem worse, as rising sea level and storm surges are more likely to sweep mothers and pups away from each other. 

Distressed elephant seal pups are routinely rehabilitated at the Marine Mammal Center, but before they can be returned to the ocean, they need to be taught how to eat an adult diet of fish, squid, krill, and algae. “But you have to do it in such a way that you’re not habituating them to people,” says Persson. “It’s very difficult to get them to eat, because if they get even a little bit of water in their mouth with the fish they don’t know what to do, and they start gagging.” 

The time Persson spent with pinniped pups may soon come in handy thanks to a new breeding recommendation for Como Zoo’s Atlantic gray seals, Wally and Medusa. And getting the chance to see wild harbor seals and sea lions on the California coast gave her even more appreciation for the species. “I would say the whole experience was invaluable, and gave me so many ideas to bring back to Como Zoo to improve care for our animals,” says Persson. “I’m very grateful.”

The Marjorie McNeely Conservatory’s Summer Flower Show opens June 13, and regular visitors will notice it has a whole different vibe.

Bromeliads are also celebrating a birthday of sorts at Como. Fifty years ago, in September 1975, the horticultural staff established the Marjorie McNeely Conservatory’s first bromeliad garden. Como currently has 638 living bromeliads in its collection, from 350 different species, the best of which are often displayed in the understory of the historic Palm Dome. 

To create the sheer number of plants needed for the Summer Flower Show display, horticulturist Diane Rafats propagated hundreds of bromeliad “pups” from Como’s own collection, coordinating their care to ensure they’re ready to bloom in time for the show. Hibiscus and citrus, colorful coleus, orange-red canna, coral-flowered fuchsia, and purple gomphrena will also be featured in the display, transforming Minnesota’s most beautiful room into a tropical paradise.

Your support for Como Friends helps ensure the Marjorie McNeely Conservatory’s seasonal flower shows are always free to every visitor. Thank you!

As she prepares to retire this year, founding president Jackie Sticha looks back on 25 years with Como Friends 

Nearly every day, Como Friends President Jackie Sticha takes a walk around the grounds of Como Park Zoo and Conservatory, but those first bright days of spring are always her favorites. “There’s really nothing like being at Como on a beautiful busy day, with thousands of people of all backgrounds and ages, tourists and teenagers, senior citizens, families and kids on field trips,” she says. “I often overhear conversations that are quite inspiring, or that make me chuckle. And I love the way the whole place buzzes with energy.” 

The long-tenured president of Como Friends, Sticha can claim credit for a lot of that buzz. Since the organization’s founding in 2000, she’s led annual fundraising strategy, advocacy initiatives, and three successful capital campaigns that have contributed $52 million in new funding for the historic Como Zoo and the Marjorie McNeely Conservatory and leveraged an additional $50 million in state funds made possible through Como Friends’ advocacy work. These funds have had a big impact, creating new classroom space that serves thousands of students every year; unveiling cutting-edge habitats like Como Harbor, Polar Bear Odyssey, and The Ordway Gardens; and expanding programs that connect visitors to the wonders of the living world. 

But 25 years ago, as an early hire of the newly formed Como Zoo and Conservatory Society, a merger of four different nonprofits and docent groups, Sticha’s first job was figuring out how to establish a strong public/private partnership that could protect the future of one of the Twin Cities’ most beloved institutions. “With 100 years of history, nearly everyone has a memory of coming to Como as a child, with their children, with their grandchildren,” she says. “Another strength was the passion and knowledge and commitment of the Zoo and Conservatory staff, and their vision for what could make Como even better.”

With strong support from the city and its parks department, an engaged board of directors, and such visionary volunteer leaders as Leonard Wilkening, Arlene Scheunemann, Bob Piram, and Paul Verret, the Society (renamed Como Friends in 2008) launched a major capital campaign to unite the Zoo and Conservatory through the Visitor Center, and to provide much-needed updates to the historic campus with new spaces for animal support, plant collections and administration. “What drew me is that this was a brand new organization with some really big ideas,” she says. “We all had to build new relationships to move forward, and while we definitely made mistakes along the way, it was often out of an excess of enthusiasm for what was possible.”  

During the most challenging times, Como Friends’ first board chair, the late Leonard Wilkening, would give Sticha this advice: “Just give it five years, and it will all work out.” His timeline was prophetic—within the first five years of their partnership, Como Friends and Como Park Zoo and Conservatory unveiled the new Visitor Center, Tropical Encounters, the new Fern Room and the first ever Orchid House to the public, with behind-the-scenes improvements that included a new Animal Support Building and administrative offices retrofitted in Como Zoo’s iconic WPA-era building. “As we all began working together, we started having more and more success,” Sticha says. “But unveiling the Visitor Center was the real turning point, because it was the first visual demonstration of what the future at Como would look like.”

Since then, Como Friends has led the charge on two additional capital campaigns, one for Como Harbor, and another to create Polar Bear Odyssey and The Ordway Gardens. Como Friends also secured the major gift that renamed the Marjorie McNeely Conservatory, and a $1 million endowment to create a permanent source of support for the Charlotte Partridge Ordway Japanese Garden. 

During Sticha’s tenure, Como Friends finished each fiscal year with an operating surplus and increased the annual contribution to Como Park Zoo and Conservatory. Como Friends’ steady growth provided stability for Como, creating a dependable source for their annual operations and funding for ongoing improvements. 

When public funding for Gorilla Forest was threatened, Como Friends expanded its profile to include advocacy work, joining Como each legislative season to support the campus’s role as both a community asset and an economic powerhouse that welcomes nearly two million visitors each year—the largest audience for any cultural institution in the state. Como Friends also successfully diversified its revenue streams with a mix of popular fundraising events like Bouquets, Sunset Affair, and Como After Hours; strong relationships with foundations and corporate funders; growing individual giving programs; and a successful gift shop operation, Garden Safari Gifts. “We’ve grown and learned a lot since our early years, but we’re still a relatively small team for the amount of money we raise, and for the extensive retail operation that we have, but we have a smart and nimble staff who are so innovative and creative in coming up with solutions for how we can be successful, and then working together to execute them,” Sticha says.

As she looks ahead to retiring this summer, Sticha says many of her favorite memories were made learning from supporters energized by their love of plants and animals, and working with families who have passed their commitment to Como from one generation to the next. She also thinks often of community leaders like Wilkening; the late Nancy Nelson, who raised funds for the Polar Bear Odyssey campaign with her husband Russ; and fundraising consultant Jim Scarpetta and others who were instrumental in making Como Friends’ vision a reality. “Every time we finish a new project, I think how pleased they would be to see how much progress Como has made.” She also thinks about some of her favorite animal ambassadors, including the late Amanda the orangutan, who once spiced up a behind-the-scenes tour by spitting a mouthful of water and orangutan kibble in Sticha’s direction. “Orangutans can hold a lot of water in their mouths, so it was like walking into a lake,” she laughs. “But I wasn’t offended at all. I felt like she’d chosen me.”  

As Como Friends looks ahead to announcing the appointment of its next leader, she has some advice for her successor: “Have fun. Being at a job for 25 years is a long time to be in one place, but I’ve never been bored because Como is so dynamic, with living animals and gardens that are always changing and evolving. Between our staff, our board, and our donors, there are so many wonderful people connected to Como and it’s fun working with them, and working together for something that is so meaningful to our community.”