Roan Mountain State Park will host the annual Winter Naturalists Rally Saturday, Feb. 8, with speakers and field trips exploring the natural history of the Roan.

Indoor presentations will be held from 9:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. in the park conference center and will include speakers, Marquette Crockett, Highlands of Roan Stewardship Director; Michelle Bouton, Director of HERBalachia School, Johnson City; and Bob Fulcher, park manager for the Cumberland Trail State Park and State Scenic Trail.

Crockett will present a photographic tour from family arms to sky islands, which are among the landscapes, resources, and habitats protected by the Southern Appalachian Highlands Conservancy.

Bouton will do a presentation of the Medicinal Plants of the Roan Highlands. Those attending can smell and taste some teas and tinctures made from plants native to the Roan. This hands-on class will acquaint the audience with plants of the Roan that can boost health and help heal the body.

Fulcher will do a presentation of John Muir’s Forgotten Travels On and Around the Roan. Muir is the preeminent American wilderness advocate and nature writing, who brought his brilliant senses and intellect to the East in 1898.

Muir never publicly shared the story of the journey that led him to the Roan, then deeper into the mountains of the East, though his observations and commentary were kept in a journal and letters. Building upon previously published research, this presentation will add more details and speculation regarding the notes Muir left for his family and today’s Roan adventurers.

Following the morning session, lunch will be catered by City Market of Elizabethton at 12:30 p.m.

Afternoon activities include three hikes as well as an indoor conservation confab led by Dr. Frosty Levy, professor emeritus of biology at East Tennessee State University, who will lead a discussion about conservation management of Gray’s Lily and other rare plants of the Roan Highlands.

Hikes will include high-elevation hike led by Marquette Crockett to Roan’s grassy balds, which will identify visible mountain peaks.

Also, Jamey Donaldson, depending on weather condition, will lead a winter botany and ecology hike at either Carvers Gap, Twin Springs, or to Ravens Rock Trail.

The third hike will be led by Marty Silver and will include wildlife tracking and an animal signs hike near the Doe River.

To register online go to the website: http://friendsofroanmtn.org