If you ever wondered what it's like to spend some time and saying Eagles nest well, just follow the bird footprints here at the Botanical Garden of the Ozarks in Fayetteville and you can do so.

It's all here for those who admire the beauty and science of the natural world.

Attracting more than 40,000 visitors a year, the mission of the Botanical Garden of the Ozarks is to increase our appreciation of the native and natural ecosystem of the Ozarks.

It's a learning experience and every day, we do something different or we plant some.

Every year and so that's the adventure for Maine is being a gardener that just loves to.

I've always said you could be 100 and still learning in this, if you're a horticulturist because you never can learn it all.

We as we add gardens or interest.

Here, like the butterfly house this year.

I'm learning more and more about butterflies.

Something I've always loved but never knew much about so but as a horticulture is too loves.

The plants every year and every season we change here, we try to keep it very interesting.

Lots of different color lots of different species and so.

We're always learning something that's what makes it great.

The butterfly house at the garden happens to be the only one in the region.

We're showcasing arkansa native butterflies and we've got about.

6 to 12 different kinds of butterflies that meaning one time typically and we tried to just show the plants that not only that are required for the nectar for the butterflies, but also the plants that the butterflies will lay their eggs on and then the caterpillars will grow so we're constantly moving things in and out to feed the Caterpillar.

So we can have more chrysalis so we have more butterflies.

So it's really an educational experience.

To to watch these butterflies and get Norma little bit better than you would just.

In fleeting out in awhile.

Working as a volunteer in the butterfly houses Kitty Sanders.

I moved here from Little Rock and I was so surprised to find this place is the gardens are just marvelous to me.

There's it's a hidden gym in my opinion and all the little pockets of things to look at and so there's so much to do here to help with the gardening, but many other things, the events and things like that, too.

I've mostly fallen in love with the butterfly houses.

I've learned about the native butterflies here in Arkansa and it's been a lot of fun working with children to teach them the life cycle and point out all the little things people generally come in and study butterflies and look around and enjoy that.

And and are not aware of all the other little parts that they can see like the Caterpillar's in the eggs and the chrysalids.

So it's just a whole lot of Thunder show them and I guess a lot of us really don't realize the life cycle of a butterfly kind of give us a little a lesson well.

When I wasn't trained for this.

They said generally there an egg for 2 weeks.

A Caterpillar for 2 weeks at crystals for 2 weeks and butterfly for 2 weeks.

That's really oversimplifying it, but it is a cycle like that and it.

Changes with the weather what time of year it is how much light.

There is but a lot of 'em the butterflies?

Do only last 2 weeks eggs.

Hatch out more like 3 to 5 days.

And so that's very interesting cycle that you can show people very quickly not to mention the migration to what S America well.

That's the Monarchs and we just think that's fascinating the first generation comes through here in the spring from Mexico and they lay their eggs and they keep traveling N and then come back through here in the fall and all those monarchs live.

About 2 weeks, but the last generation lives for months because it travels to Mexico.

Winters overwinters there comes back and lays the 1st next set of of eggs for the next year and it's just amazing that.

They know to do that.

The Ozark native garden with more than 30 native plants portrays why these plants are so vital to songbirds beneficial insects and butterflies for their existence.

Yeah, there is a great interest in that this week, every year.

We see more and more people being interested in Ozark native plants.

I think people are beginning to care more and more about the planet and if you love flowers and shrubs and trees.

You don't want to give up all the beautiful things that come from other places, but I think more of us are realizing that we don't need to neglect the beautiful plants that we have here in the Ozark region.

And so we do have a whole separate garden, where that is that the only kind of plants growing in that garden are Ozark natives and we have lots of people come and that is one garden.

They want to see because then we're revamp that garden this year.

We're wanting to make it more of a educational place where people can come and identify some of the plants that are Ozark regional plants and hopefully end up using them in their backyards or front yards.

Speaking of being educational that is one of the one of the big things you do here for visitors for school groups.

We have classes but we also have lots of schoolchildren come through here.

I don't have the number in my head, but we do have lots of school day trips where they come in and some of those or we have big events like Earth Day here where we have busloads of kids that get off and then.

Sometimes it's a specific idea or subject that's being talked about.

But other times and there are many visitors to the butterfly house children but education is always part of what we hope to do here is one of the main reasons that we exist and so we're constantly working on name tags for the plants and helping with and we have classes, particularly more classes in the fall were pretty busy planting things in the spring.

So we concentrate more on some of our classes in the fall.

The Botanical Garden of the Ozarks was quite a few years in the making and it still only the beginning.

But we're actually grassroots Botanic Garden that was funded started and was established 20 years ago and it took us about a decade to begin to come forward with some plans and get started and we started construction in 2005 and opened in 2007.

So we're entering our six year of the garden being open now, so tell us how the plants carry shaped up in all the different themes of and everything.

This is the first phase of what we hope will be a?

About 35 acre Botanic Garden, eventually at the moment.

We're on 6 acres of ground and what we've started with is are the display gardens are there are 9?

What we call backyard gardens that show different dis tiles and designs of creating a garden spaces?

What we had was a competition.

I wait about 35 plants admitted for the various gardens and then from that, we had a committee that selected the winners and then built the plans off of those.

Entries.

And you've got something like you estimate what 1200 a different varieties here playing at least you know, we really don't have a very good camp.

We were constantly changing out plants.

They the annuals that provide a lot of our summer color.

They come and go every year we use different things.

The perennials are with us a little bit longer.

Of course, the trees and shrubs will be with us long term.

We're beginning to get some size out of our plants now and you know after 6 or 7 years in the ground.

Uh they are beginning to show what they will be an?

They will even be better in the years to come.

And if you happen to be a keebler elf fan.

There's something for you here as well.

It was back in the late 1800s, when European families settled the Arkansa River Valley region around Altice attracted by the areas.

Fertile soil and moderate climate.

They determined that the area conditions here were very similar to those of the fine wine, making regions back home, we're exploring Arkansas' wine country in this segment and it takes us back about 5:00 generations.

Well, my.

Great Grand Father Jacob Post.

Come to American 1872.

And he was.

Yeah, who grapes in Germany and he also I wanted to grow grapes here.

He picked out oz this region here 'cause it very much resembled Atlanta.

Where do we come from Nederweert Walk in Germany?

First thing did you do was planning grapes grapes and made made wine?

Make that Carol natural tradition hallway up today, we My grandfathers you're supposed is it.

My father just James posted in.

In.

I started up my father in 1937.

In.

My son, Johnny Encina sexy how they have children together him.

You never run out of work.

Call Pamela.

It is kind of hard to get someone to do it exactly like you want to do it, so he keep on working yourself.

Of course, we have a lot of help with.

As soon as we get through Harazin.

At the Maybe the end of September October.

And we start pruning pruning goes over and since int in all during winter during the spring and your color Brian.

We have another harvest.

So it never ends.

Altis is a federally designated American Viticultural Area that is a recognized grape growing region of the US much like California's Napa Valley.

This is one of the older varieties and we have been growing analysis very, very beginning.

My great grand father.

Discovered what if he could be grafted this grape called camels.

Early on to certain rootstock.

Cinci Anna Armannsson that it would make larger bunches in the has a characteristic of being able to ship without refrigeration and back so they started out to Sala celebrates Fresh Market when they did have refrigeration.

You could set is Sandys all way to Chicago and they would it hold up so it's a is one of them made stays for for industry here for for a long time and where we still grow home.

This is my favorite great from the plumber To Saturn, At the table grape.

Another favorite is the native muscadine.

This Hills, you see in the background is the is the foothills of those arcs and that he'll you are looking at is makes it cut off line for where you can grow muscadines so we grow muscadines on the edge here in Altus.

And anything grown on the edge tends to be a little sweeter.

A little more fruity.

An have just a little more robust flavor so.

You're looking at at the limit right there.

To grow muscadines?

So we're really blessed to live in the Arkansa River Valley in the foothills of those arcs for the protection of the coldness from the Ozarks moderates the colder.

Missouri type temperatures by about 15 degrees.

And it it makes our harvest about 10 days earlier, an being located on the plateau here in Altus, where 500 feet above the are Consaul River in all the air drains off in the Springs for the Frost so the cold air falls and were relatively protected by spring Frost as well.

So I lived in a very, very unique area here in Altus, an we feel quite blessed and thankful to be here.

From passing all this down from generation to generation to generation.

It's I guess you could write your own book on it.

Yes, and it be a little more interesting than that TV show Falcon Crest.

Well, it's it's been great we learned as children knee high to a grasshopper.

We started in the vines and when we were tall enough.

We had sucker the grapes and let's get off the shoots from the trunk that are non adventitious to the crop, so we started there in working on bottling line filling bottles.

But non stamps and seals capsules and that's the place where we learned a lot of rhythm with the machinery working.

An some of the following generations were rather enamored by it and want to do some of these jobs.

It's very romantic working with wine.

Vitus is life, giving Latin term is Vytis for grapes.

Genus that means life, giving so.

Latin folks knew what they were talking about this Greeks when they when they named it.

Of course, God knew what he was doing when he made it to the grapes were so good for you all going back to biblical times.

Yes, way back there, and Noah took his grapes off the art planted a vineyard Doug Wine Press and.

And made wine.

And he lived to be 900 years old, and plus a little bit so.

Might take a clue right there.

A little wine is good for you, we saw that recommended one glass a day.

And that's that's a good recommendation.

I think in the?

Bissell Paul to Timothy he says drink a little wine for the stomach say can I frequent informa tease?

So that's pretty much a prescription that there.

The European immigrants who settled here and 1901 began building Saint Mary's Catholic Church atop St Mary's mountain overlooking altice.

We had sandstone here in the hillside and they quarried sandstone an shaped it in.

It took about 4000 days of man labor to do all of that and stack it.

So.

The men at the parish contributed their labor and that's why they were able to afford to do that.

Anyway, the cornerstone here was laid in 1901 May, the 24th.

The Feast of Our Lady help of Christians and that's what's written on it?

And you see the dedication of the church up here.

Dom at BMV that church is dedicated to God.

Most good most great and Blessid Virgin Mary at flat and course.

Deo Optimo Maximo at Beata Maria Beer Jeanae.

And you see the tripartite you know the three windows at 3 arch is.

Listed on the National Register of Historic Places Saint Mary's Catholic Church is known for its paintings and ornate gold leaf work, so pay a visit and take in all of what altice has to offer.

Situated in the Ark and saw Ozarks West of Jasper Horseshoe Canyon Ranch is one of the top 10.

Dude, ranches in America surrounded by Bluffs and rock walls.

It's also a favorite rock climbing destination and then there's this wait come back.

1/2 mile in length 300 feet high and zipping along at 50 miles an hour, the Iron Horse is the longest highest and fast.

The zip line in the state get along Little Doggies takes on a whole new meaning here.

Yeah, it's been great, it's been a great addition.

We've been doing zip lines for about a dozen years here on the ranch, but the iron horses.

Different animal altogether.

It's just it's length and its speed and its height and one of the top 5 in the country and it's really added a nicer dimension to the guest activities rather hear initially rock climbing and horseback riding, canoeing, other things we typically do.

Actually, the Iron Horse happens to be one of the top zip lines in North America and getting to the launch point is a thrill in itself after a wild ATV ride a little hiking and walking up a ramp you're finally there.

How you feeling Chuck?

Pretty good what I understand it's a smooth ride.

And you just relax and enjoy it.

Not nervous at all.

Go back and forth from your face and and once you're seated in the harness.

There's no changing your mind.

Was that really necessary?

Grandma from Kansas can zip than anyone can.

And I especially enjoyed the zip line.

I didn't.

I then on zip lines before and I didn't feel very safe, but I felt really safe on this one, so I really enjoyed it.

I never been on a zip line before my life and so it was pretty incredible.

Walking up there and then seeing seeing this cool structure and kind of the anticipation of getting on it, and then running down it would just create was crazy fun very, very funny.

Crazy fun crazy fine, you can you can use that so yeah, I mean, the setup is very professional team here really makes you feel comfortable which is a big thing.

It's kind of ominous looking down that big.

Pizza cable there, but they made us all feel real comfortable and very, very smooth.

Yeah, my fears quickly left as I started scooting down even wipe him who said she wasn't going went.

I can't believe you did it.

And at the Iron Horse zip line isn't enough of a thrill for you.

There's also the big swing or Screamer.

Cortana.

Yes, I did scream that was the most effort, handsome thing was to be dropped out over.

You drop off a Cliff and you're you're just hanging you know it was a lot of fun.

I've never done anything like that before I can do roller coasters as few times, but I get.

Very apprehensive and that was very scary, exhilarating yet.

I feel great that I did it.

Yes, crazy fun at Horseshoe Canyon Ranch.

Is awesome?

So find your own adventure at Horseshoe Canyon Ranch near Jasper whether it's the zip lining or any of the other activities.

And for more on this destination, plus many of our others, and to order a copy of an episode visit our expanded website at atn.org slash exploring Arkansas and don't forget to like us on our Facebook fan page.

And we'll see you again.

The next time for another exciting adventure on exploring Arkansas.