UW undergraduate Jeanine Carlson developed a draft proposal for the Campus Sustainability Fund as her Capstone project. The proposal imagines a cafe and permaculture demonstration garden at the Washington Park Arboretum.
Jeanine shares her vision for the proposal:
The Permaculture Perennial Guild Garden is a display and study of permaculture perennial plant guilds in an event hosting site. It provides visual demonstration, experiential learning, and a place for community to gather in sharing, learning and celebration. 

Historically the Azalea Way lawn path experiences 8-9 months a year that are very wet making access difficult. In 2009 a crushed rock path was added to the middle of Azalea Way from Boyer Parking lot to the Woodland Garden. The proposed improvement will add 700 feet of 6 foot wide crushed rock path from the Woodland Garden to the Lynn Street Bridge Trail. 

Get bogged down in Cascadia and see firsthand how the horticulturalists at the Washington Park Arboretum recreate a native bog.

Join in the public meeting for the North Entry and Multi-use Trail projects for the Washington Park Arboretum on Wed. June 8, 2011 from 6:30 – 8 p.m. at the Graham Visitor Center in the Arboretum.

UWBG arboretum horticulture staff are taking Tuesdays by storm!  The 6 member crew, along w/ the 2 recent temporary gardener hires, plus Tuesday volunteers are now making an immediate impact on improving plant collections care and general garden aesthetics. For example, this past Tuesday, there were 10 busy bees working in the Sorbus (Mountain Ash) collection, weeding and mulching. Check out the finished product (photos). 

One of the most widespread problems with trees in the urban environment is the failure to recognize the tree’s mature size.  If one doesn’t take into account the space required when the tree grows up, conflicts are sure to arise.  To make matters worse, the tree is often faulted for encroachment!
Several trees surrounding the Arboretum’s Boyer Parking Lot have grown up and encroached on the gravel parking spaces.  

Thanks to a grant from the Jiji Foundation the Garden-based Restoration and Outreach Workgroups (G.R.O.W.) Program was launched in January, 2011 and is actively engaged with three high school classes and one after school teen center program.

If any of you have visited the north end of our holly collection in Washington Park Arboretum recently, you probably observed what appears to be a developing wetland. As you may well imagine, standing water where we’re trying to grow healthy hollies just don’t mix very well. See Chris Watson’s post on “Spring Pruning in the Arboretum“.   Why all the standing water? 

With the goal of enhancing pollination efforts, several mason bee houses have been placed throughout the Arboretum.  What are mason bees?  Well, according to the provider of the pollinators, Dave Richards of JohnnyAppleBeez, LLC:
“The charming Mason Bee is a gentle, shiny blue-black metallic bee, and slightly smaller than a honey bee. They are a superior pollinator, but do not produce honey. 

A turkish pine (Pinus brutia) and a Chinese white pine (Pinus armandii) were recently removed from the Canal Reserve area near the Museum of History and Industry.  Both trees declined suddenly over the past year and died over the winter.  Blue staining was evident in the wood of both trees.  We’re not sure exactly how these trees are infected with the fungus, but one theory is that a bark boring insect (red turpentine beetle) carries the pathogen into the tree.