There is a song which I used to sing all the time, “What a Difference a Day Makes”! Every day, the news is filled with stories about new plans to increase density and building heights in the city of Seattle, and especially in the University District. The University of Washington has just released a new Campus Master Plan which also increases building density and height. 

Our eleventh Arboretum Earth Day event partnering with Student Conservation Association was the largest ever with 340 total participants!
Opening ceremony speakers representing the three Washington Park Arboretum partners; Paige Miller, Executive Director of Arboretum Foundation; Elizabeth Van Volkenberg, Interim Director of UW School of Environmental Sciences (UW Botanic Gardens academic arm); and Christopher Williams, Seattle City Parks and Recreation Deputy Superintendent addressed the attentive crowd of eager volunteers of how valuable our Arboretum is to the local community and the importance of continual community stewardship. 

Seattle Parks and Recreation is undertaking a project to learn of ways to improve the specialty gardens in the Park system, including the Washington Park Arboretum. The project is funded by the Specialty Gardens division of the Seattle Parks Department and is being conducted by HR2 Research and Analytics.
HR2 Research and Analytics are conducting focus groups, with a $25 compensation (participants must confirm attendance with Haley Brown at hbrown@hr2researchandanalytics.com or 425-777-6718 -to receive compensation and ensure seating). 

The following are five of the best flowering cherries suitable for growing in the Pacific Northwest. All have good resistance to brown rot blossom blight disease and are good choices size-wise for the home garden.  All specimens below are currently in some stage of flowering along our historic Azalea Way Promenade.
1)   Prunus  x yedoensis  ‘Akebono’                 Daybreak Yoshino Cherry

‘Akebono’ (“Daybreak”) – This form has pinker flowers than the original Yoshino-type, and the petals are more frilled. 

1)   Acer triflorum                Three Flower Maple

A small, slow-growing deciduous 20’ to 45’ tree, where it is native to Manchuria and Korea. An excellent landscape tree boasting light-grey vertically furrowed bark and vivid red and orange fall color. The specific epithet makes reference to its flowers, which are borne in clusters of three.
This tree was discovered by noted plant explorer, Ernest H. 

The American Horticultural Society has announced the five winners of their 2017 Book Awards.  Read about these great new books and visit the Miller Library to check them out.
The seven-member award review committee consisted of horticulturists, garden book writers and publicists, and one horticultural librarian (me!) from across the country.  We met virtually and by conference call in January to review some 40 nominees – it was both an exciting and challenging project. 

The long-term success of an institution often resides in the vision, dexterity, intellect, ambition and intuitiveness of an individual. On February 22, 2017, Valerie Easton announced that she was no longer writing her weekly column in the Pacific NW Magazine, bringing her 25 year career there to an end. For me, it seems like Val only recently started as the Library Manager at the Elisabeth C. 

1)   Cornus mas                     Cornelian Cherry

A native of Europe, C. mas has been cultivated for centuries in Britain. Flowers are produced in February and March on the leafless stems in short-stalked umbels from the joints of the previous year’s wood.
Oblong-ellipsoid, fleshy, bright red fruit are produced in late summer, and are edible when ripe.
Found throughout the Arboretum, these shrubs or small trees are easily identified at this time. 

Corokia cotoneaster may not be the first plant that you notice in the landscape, but it might be the plant keeps your attention the longest. This plant’s divaricate branching (having branches of wide angles) and its tiny dark evergreen leaves give it a sparse and angular look which is not a common sight among the green gardens in the Pacific Northwest. 

The Washington Park Arboretum has long been known as a “tree place.” In fact, two sister volunteers from Mercer Island (Lee Clark and Marion “Nukie” Fellows) were instrumental in getting bumper stickers printed in the 1990s which said “Tree Cheers for the Arboretum”. The Arboretum, as with every park in Seattle, has a matrix of native plants composed of the four primary Pacific Northwest forest trees: Douglas fir (Pseudotsuga menziesii), Western red cedar (Thuja plicata), Western hemlock (Tsuga heterophylla), and Big-leaf maple (Acer macrophyllum).