Southeastern Conifer

Volume 22

October 2014

American Conifer Society—Southeastern Region ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ _

Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia, West Virginia __________________________________________________________________________________________________________

From the Editor

Inside This Issue From the SE Editor By Maud Henne

Page 1

SE Reference Gardens And Official Data

Page 2

Lockerky Arboretum, GA By Jana Otis, GA Page 3 Lewis Ginter Bot. Garden By Elisabeth Fogel, VA

Page 4

Conifers in Public Places in Charlottesville VA By Maud Henne, VA Pages 5,6

Headline Photos : Conifers in Public Places Maud Henne Charlottesville, VA

I am thinking that this is going to be the last issue of the ACS SE bimonthly newsletter that I developed and published since June 2011. At that time, my friend Flo Chaffin from GA talked me into doing it. It took a lot of effort, but as I have MS Publisher on my computer I learned how to use it, to develop and design the “Southeastern Conifer”. And I got enthusiastic about doing it. And I did it through my cancer treatment in 2012 and the year after when I felt exhausted and tired and had to recover from the year-long chemo, 35 daily sessions of radiation and the medications, and afib due to the radiation, the irregular heart beat, and it took 6 months to remedy that. I am making the same experience that the Editor for the Central Region newsletter had: our regional ACS members do not participate. I have pleaded several times to the SE membership to send me ideas

and to participate. Nobody except for Alan Solomon in TN and Jim Hanger in VA did anything. I received a lot of material from professionals and ACS volunteers though for which I am grateful. But nobody contacted me to ask why I did not publish a newsletter this past August. If I had not been approached by the 2 contributors from Lockerly Arboretum in GA and from the Lewis Ginter Botanical Garden in Richmond VA, I would not even have made a move to get this October issue out. I have been a member of ACS since 1987 or 1988 due to my late husband, and I have been doing a lot of work and volunteer work for ACS. I was the National Office for almost 5 years before John Martin, arranged the overseas tour to the Netherlands and Germany together with J.R.P van. Hoey Smith, Netherlands, in 2000, was SE Treasurer and SE President. I feel I have served plenty. Under the circumstances I better turn to other activities. Maud B. Henne

Page 2 Southeastern Conifer October 2014 ________________________________________________________________________________________ In Lewis Ginter Bot. Garden, VA

The 15 ACS SE Region Conifer Reference Gardens Florida Gardens of the Big Bend, Quincy, FL

Georgia Atlanta Botanical Garden, Atlanta, GA Lockerly Arboretum, Milledgeville, GA Smith Gilbert Gardens, Kennesaw, GA State Botanical Garden of Georgia, Athens, GA

North Carolina JC Raulston Arboretum , Raleigh, NC

South Carolina Hatcher Garden, Spartanburg, SC South Carolina Botanical Gardens, Clemson, SC

Tennessee East Tennessee State University Arboretum Johnson City, TN Memphis Botanical Garden, Memphis, TN University of TN-Jackson West TN Research & Ed Center Gardens, Jackson, TN University of Tennessee Gardens, Knoxville, TN

Virginia American Conifer Society—SE Region www.conifersociety.org www.southeasternconifers.com SE President: Dr. John Ruter, - [email protected] SE Vice President: Dr. Sue Hamilton, [email protected] SE Treasurer: J.&J.Harvey, –[email protected] Regional Dir. ACS Board: Tom Neff,[email protected] Ref. Gardens: Beth Jimenez—[email protected], chair Amelia Lane—[email protected], co-chair SE Webmaster: Ford, —[email protected] SE Newsletter Editor: Maud Henne,[email protected] SE Technical Advisor: Tom Cox, [email protected]

Al Gardner Memorial Garden-J.Sargeant Reynolds Community College, Goochland, VA Lewis Ginter Botanical Garden, Richmond, VA Norfolk Botanical Garden, Norfolk, VA State Arboretum of Virginia, Boyce, VA All of these gardens have websites with addresses, directions and events.

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Lockerly Arboretum, Milledgeville GA By Jana Otis, Director of Horticulture

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Lockerly Arboretum is located in Milledgeville, Georgia and has been open to the public since 1966. Lockerly sits on over 50 acres just outside the city limits of Milledgeville. Visitors here can see a wide variety of hardwood and evergreen trees, ornamental shrubs and perennials. In addition to the gardens, Lockerly is also home to Rose Hill, an example of Greek Revival architecture that dates back to the 1850’s.

Lockerly Arboretum was founded by Edward J. Grassman and established as a garden open to the public and a place for everyone to enjoy nature and plants of all kinds. Mr. Grassman’s love of horticulture and botany inspired him to create a garden for teaching and educational purposes, as well as for the beauty and enjoyment of the property.

One of Lockerly’s most extensive collections is the conifer collection. It was started in the 1980’s and has been expanded on several occasions. In 2010 Lockerly became one of the American Conifer Society Southeast Region’s (ACS SE) Reference Gardens. In 2013 we received a generous grant from the ACS SE for an expansion of our collection. By utilizing this grant we were able to add over 115 plants to our collection, put them on drip irrigation and label the new conifers. The expansion enabled us to add plants from 11 different genera and 44 different species or cultivars.

Photo left: Cryptomeria japonica ‘Globosa Nana’ Photo above: Chamaecyparis pisifera ‘Devon Cream’

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New Signs in the Conifer Collection In Lewis Ginter Garden, VA By Elizabeth Fogel, Richmond, VA I’ve often had the impression that the visitors wandering through our conifer collection do not know much about the plants they are passing. They walk too quickly without stopping to study individual plants. Their hands don’t reach out to feel the different textures along their way. Are they noticing the amazing diversity of color, shape, size and texture? I think that a better understanding of what they are seeing would inspire them to slow down and take more notice. While I enjoy reaching out to our visitors to share information and my enthusiasm for our plants, there are only so many hours in my work week. I once overheard an earnest father tell his children with confidence that these plants were called cone-i-fers because most of them were shaped like cones. Since then I have wanted some signage in the conifer collection to help educate more of our over 300,000 annual visitors. In 2013 the garden was very pleased to be awarded grant monies from the ACS Southeast Regional Reference Garden program to make these signs a reality. In 2013 the garden was very pleased to be awarded grant monies from the ACS Southeast Regional Reference Garden program to make these signs a reality. Through this grant support, two new permanent signs have been created and installed in our conifer collection. The first sign is entitled “What is a Conifer” and provides basic information on conifers, their importance, and uses. Images on the sign show several different types of both needles and cones, demonstrating that conifers are more than just pine trees. It also directs the reader to visit our library for more in-depth information on conifers. The second sign, entitled “Using Conifers in the Garden” draws attention to the beauty and diversity of conifers available. Basic information on selection and care is provided along with images of beautiful conifer gardens. Hopefully, this sign will inspire our visitors to plant more conifers in their own gardens.

The installation of these signs was delayed by a construction project that has improved the walkways through the conifer collection and surrounding garden areas. Once the construction was complete in summer 2014, it was safe to install the signs. Prominent locations were chosen by the two main entrances to the collection. These two signs are part of a new effort to increase the educational signage available throughout the garden. They match a new design standard created to make our signage inviting, effective, and engaging. The metal mounts are unique to the garden and should last well into the future. The sign faces themselves should last 10 years, even in full weather exposure, and are easily replaceable in the mounts. By funding the creation of the two conifer signs, the SE Regional ACS also helped the garden leverage additional funding for more educational signs in the garden. Through their support of this project, the SE Regional ACS has not only brought a pair of much-needed interpretive signs to my little corner of the world, it has helped to shape the look and the experience at Lewis Ginter for decades to come. We are truly grateful. Lewis Ginter Botanical Garden Awarded 2014 Jean Iseli Memorial Grant By Beth Jimenez and Amelia Lane We are happy to announce another bit of good news for our S.E Regional Reference Garden Program. Elizabeth Fogel of Lewis Ginter Botanical Garden in Richmond, Va. applied for and was awarded the American Conifer Society 2014 Jean Iseli Memorial Grant in the amount of $4000. The garden will use the money to increase the size and diversity of its conifer collection. The boundaries of the Margaret Johanna Streb Conifer Garden have recently grown to increase the space available for the conifer collection. In addition, a number of flowering plants have been removed to reduce overcrowding and create new space for conifers. Money from the Iseli grant will be spent on purchasing new specimen conifers, with small amounts helping to pay for soil amendments, mulch and labels for the new plants. The garden will focus on selecting plants that will be happy in the hot and humid climate of the Southeast. Well done, Elizabeth. And we hope anyone interested in applying for this grant for their own Reference Garden will do so by going to conifersociety.org/jeaniseli-memorial-grant and filing out the application.

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Conifers in Public Places in Charlottesville VA By Maud Henne, VA Charlottesville is a green city. I am always amazed how many conifers there are in public places aside from the native White Pine (Pinus strobus), Eastern Red Cedar (Juniperus virginiana), Norway spruces (picea abies) the latter most likely have served as Christmas trees before they were planted out, and an occasional hemlock. I was sur-

Above: Cryptomeria japonica and Hilton Garden Inn Below: Juniperus procumbens ‘Nana’

Below: Juniperus horizontalis’Maiden Gold’ or similar at the corner of a small shopping area on Rt. 29 N

prised to see many Japanese cedars (Cryptomeria japonica). As so many people here, I do not care for the Eastern Red Cedar (Juniperus virginiana) springing up like weeds in neglected places. But I do love the alleys of old juniper trees lining country roads and alleys on farms and estates. Let us have a look of what I found.

Above: About 20 Deodar cedars in the court of the newspaper complex ‘Daily Progress’

Cryptomerias in front of Martha Jefferson Hospital and on State Farm Blvd.

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Conifers in Public Places in Charlottesville, VA—Continued

Top left and Top right: Dawn Redwood at UVA (Metasequoia glyptostroboides) Center left: Arborvitae (Thuja occidentalis) Center right: Serbian Spruce Picea omorica Below left: Hemlock Tsuga canadensis Below right: Eastern Red Cedar –old trees Juniperus virginiana