Arboretum & Botanical Garden Bulletin Board
Plant of the Month
Cold hardy cacti
Opuntia, Echinocereus, Cylindropuntia
Location: Grid P31 gravel beds in the middle of the Xeriscape Garden
I think the new cactus garden that we planted last spring has been one of the most popular planting projects we have ever done. Pretty much every day I see people walking over for a closer look.
Essentially all of the plants seem to have adjusted to life in Moscow so far. A few look somewhat unhappier since the few cold nights have come along but overall still look remarkably good.
Most of the plants were transplanted from the Orton Botanic Garden in Twin Falls, Idaho this past spring. They have been growing for nearly 20 years there in Twin Falls which seems like a good recommendation for their survival here in Moscow.
Monthly Projects
The big news for this month is that I have decided the time has come for me to step aside and let someone else be in charge of the Arboretum. The university has accepted my application for a 鈥榩hased retirement鈥�. In my case, that means I will be working half time for up to a year with the intention that I will be training a successor. Hopefully that position will be created and posted soon, and they can get someone hired in time to jump into the busy spring season.
I have been very lucky in that I have always had jobs I enjoyed, and the Arboretum has certainly been all of that. As I tell people, I can get dirty every day and spend other people鈥檚 money on interesting plants! I also get to associate with lots of other passionate plant people and others who just appreciate and enjoy the outdoor space. Words of thanks from all those people were a big reason I enjoyed working in the Arboretum.
One of the unfortunate realities of the Arboretum is that we fairly often have to remove some plants. This month we might have taken that to an extreme when we removed 100 poplar trees from the field north of the barn. Those poplars were a research project with the College of Natural Resources measuring the growth on poplars from various locations around the west from Alaska to Wyoming. It was a three year project that ended this fall. I thought about leaving some of the trees, but decided we didn鈥檛 really need more poplars in the collection and that they would only make maintaining that slope more difficult. So, we tore them all out while the graduate student collected root samples to complete the research. We were able to salvage some of the trees and sent them to good homes, and after removing the trees we seeded the area back to grass to match the surrounding buffer strip.
Upcoming Events
- TBD
When visiting the Arboretum, please remember that for your safety, the safety of others and for the protection of wildlife and plant collections, no pets are allowed. Ice on ponds is very unstable 鈥� stay off any ice.