Beautiful photographs on exhibit and on sale in the Miller Library Jan. 2 through Feb. 12th.

Annie Bilotta is a Gardener, working at the Center for Urban Horticulture. She is originally from New York State, and she moved to Seattle in 1989. Annie started working at the UW Botanic Gardens in 1993 at the Washington Park Arboretum as a Gardener.  She moved over to the Center for Urban Horticulture around 2005.
Annie is especially fond of vegetable gardening. 

Meet Richard Fleenor. Richard is a Rare Care volunteer with UW Botanic Gardens. He monitors rare plant populations on the east side of the state and usually takes one to two assignments a year. Rare Care volunteers live in all parts of the state of Washington, plus northern Oregon.
Richard grew up in Vancouver and loved playing in the woodlands surrounding their house as a kid. 

Boughs used as winter decoration are often from plants in the genus Ilex. Many Ilex, or holly species are dioecious, meaning that male and female reproductive organs are separated on individual plants. This trait promotes cross-fertilization which increases genetic variability, but can decrease seed-setting efficiency.  Solitary individuals are unable to be pollinated, therefore it is necessary that male and female plants grow in close proximity or female plants will not produce berries. 

By John A. Wott, Director Emeritus
It is said that humans “have a habit of growing.” We grow tall in our formative years, and most of us also grow wider in the later years. We could also say that trees have a habit of growing. Tree species grow to specific heights and widths. Some smaller trees obtain their normal mature size in a few years, while the larger species may grow for years and years. 

Conifer trees occasionally mutate into unusual forms, often slow-growing natural dwarfs. Thousands of these have been in cultivation for centuries. The Arboretum has only a few in its collection, sadly neglected in grid 37-1W – a corner of the Oaks area.  Here are five examples:
1)  Chamaecyparis lawsoniana  ‘Lycopodioides’

Translated: “a form of Lawson’s false cypress that looks like Lycopodium” – a genus of club moss that’s said to resemble a wolf’s foot. 

Tuesdays, 4:30-5:20 at the UW Botany Greenhouse

Professor Jennifer Ruesink is leading a one-credit Agro-ecology Reading Group in Winter 2016. This will be a weekly seminar in which students/staff/faculty read and discuss articles covering various aspects of agroecology.

Agroecology represents the interaction of farming with the environment, in which “environment” can be variously defined in terms of how much of the human environment is included. 

(A letter from Academic Advisor, Joe Kobayashi). 
The UW is a great place for food studies: from growing food at the UW Farm to studying food issues related to society, the natural environment, the built environment, and human health. Now a committee of faculty from the College of Built Environments, the College of the Environment, and the College of Arts and Sciences are in the process of developing a proposal for a new Interdisciplinary Food Studies Minor, and we need your help. 

Traditionally, this plant’s stems were used to make spindles to twine wool and flax into yarn. Learn more about this month’s featured plant.

By John A. Wott, Director Emeritus
One of the four primary forest trees of the Pacific Northwest is Thuja plicata, or the Western red cedar. There are “giants” of this species still growing after hundreds of years in protected sites in this state, but most were logged in great quantities as the lumber mills in the Pacific Northwest grew. The Washington Park Arboretum land, originally owned by the Pope Lumber company, was logged in the late 1880s and then basically clear cut of any remaining harvestable trees a few years later.