Grown for their delicate showy flowers rather than pungent leaves, the ornamental oreganos deserve a place in Pacific Northwest gardens.

This western native shrub will spice up your garden with showy burgundy flowers in June.

The bark of this tree is lightweight, impermeable, elastic, and a great insulator. Humans have used it to close up wine bottles for centuries.

I was walking around the grounds at the Center for Urban Horticulture last week looking for a plant to feature in the May edition of our Plant Profiles. While walking through the Fragrance Garden a really cool-looking rhododendron caught my eye, just about to bloom. Little did I know just how cool this rhododendron was until I started researching it! Rhododendron edgeworthii is a species rhododendron and belongs to the lepidote (scaly leaved) group. 

The Beauty Japanese plum first entices bees in early spring with sweet-smelling flowers and then temps humans with luscious red fruit in mid summer.

The April Plant Profile is the stunning Cornus purpurea-flavus, also known as the Purple and Gold Dawgwood. Native to Western Washington, this shrub has the potential to be boundless, so don’t try and fence it in. It can tolerate a lot of rain, but can be affected by heavy snowfall. These Dawgwoods can flower at any time of the year, but blooms are most prolific in June. 

If you’ve been dreaming of escaping our cold, snowy Pacific Northwest, to a sunny and warm Mediterranean climate, dream no more! The ‘Frantoio’ is one of the most successful olive trees for the Pacific Northwest. Touted as the hardiest olive for our climate, 10° F or below and apparently gains cold hardiness the older it gets. Beautiful silvery foliage is attractive year-round. 

Eucalyptus gunnii is the tallest eucalyptus in the Arboretum and is now one of the taller broadleaf trees—being nearly 80’ tall at present—and enjoys a prominent position in the future footprint of the Australian Forest.
Part of its longevity and good performance is also likely due to its provenance.  Eucalyptus are generally grown from seed, and seed from higher elevation trees have proven to be much hardier.  

Your neighborhood hummingbirds will appreciate the nectar producing flowers on these winter blooming shrubs.

This sculptural marvel requires perfect drainage to thrive in Pacific Northwest gardens.