Jane Davis pruning back a rock rose in the Greenhouse border, with Yucca filamentosa in bloom.
For 65 years, our Pat Calvert Greenhouse volunteers have provided an invaluable service, propagating plants from specimens in the Arboretum collection and re-selling them to the public to raise funds for the park. But the role description doesn’t quite encapsulate all the work the volunteers do. For instance, many of the greenhouse crew also help to hand-craft the holiday wreaths for our annual Gifts & Greens Galore sale. And since the mid-1980s, a subset of the volunteers has also been taking care of a little slice of horticultural heaven on the south side of the big Education Greenhouse, next to the Calvert propagation house.
A “secret garden” filled with fabulous, summer-blooming perennials, it’s one of the best places to see floral color and busy pollinators at the Arboretum during the hotter months of the season. Highlights include globe thistle, sea holly, Adam’s needle (Yucca filamentosa), mallow, white gaura, and various rock roses (Cistus). The woody collection plants include a beautiful, double-flowered pomegranate (Punica granatum ‘Pleniflora’) and two stunning specimens of the unusual Japanese food-wrapper plant (Mallotus japonicus)—all of which are now in bloom.
Alvetina ‘Tina’ Balina, a new volunteer and Garden Steward, weeding the border.
It all started with Jan Fong, who volunteered at the Pat Calvert Greenhouse from around 1986 to 2012.
“There were some woody plants in the border back in the mid-1980s, but no real ‘garden’ per se,” says lead Pat Calvert volunteer Ann O’Mera, who started at the greenhouse a few years after Jan. “Jan approached the University of Washington hort staff and offered to do something special with the border, and they graciously agreed.”
“She had a degree in landscape architecture and was wonderful at color combinations,” continues Ann. “Jan turned what was a modest site with a few formally accessioned plants into a stunning ornamental display devoted to showcasing drought-tolerant species and varieties. Jan was from California and really loved Mediterranean-style gardens. The border is in a very sunny, fast-draining, exposed site, and it’s perfect for these kinds of plants.”
Planting a Mediterranean border in this location also enabled the volunteers to take cuttings and increase their stock of sun-loving, drought-tolerant plants in the greenhouse to sell to local gardeners.
“Over the years, Jan continually added new plants, replaced old ones, removed ones that didn’t do well, and refined the best times for us to take cuttings and divisions. Our sunhouse was always filled with plants from the border! During plant sales, Jan was always directing customers to the border to show them what the full-grown plants would look like.”
The border, photographed in 2016.
Jan moved back to California when her husband retired in 2012, and another amazing Arboretum Foundation volunteer, Suzette Birrell, who was working at the adjacent Plant Donations Nursery (now the Cloney-Harris Plant Nursery), took over the care of the border.
“Then the pandemic hit,” says Ann, “and Suzette’s daughter developed long Covid. Suzette helped to take care of her, and she’s doing better now. But Covid really did a number on all the volunteer programs here, and sadly the border was neglected for a few years. Now, we have another wonderful volunteer lead, Jane Davis, who’s working to restore the garden to its former glory.”
Jane actually helped care for the border back in the early 1990s for a couple of years and is happy to be back working on it again.
Sea holly (Eryngium) in the border, being visited by a honeybee.
On Tuesdays and Thursdays, from 10 a.m. to noon, she and a couple of new volunteer recruits—Tina Balina and Vanessa O’Brien—weed and tidy the border, and do a little watering. (They also help the propagation team in the greenhouse, when needed.)
“Since the goal of the garden is drought-tolerance, we try to do as little watering as possible,” says Jane. “In the long run, this will help us create a more resilient, low-maintenance garden. We also have a wish list of new plants that we’re hoping Arboretum supporters might donate. They include sunny border staples like Cistus, rosemary, coneflowers, wild lilac (Ceanothus), and salvias, and folks are welcome to drop them off at the Pat Calvert Greenhouse during our usual volunteer hours.”
A hybrid rock rose, Cistus × purpureus ‘Alan Fradd’, blooming in the border in June.
“The border’s looking great,” adds Jane. “But it’s going to take a while to get it back to where Ann can again take regular cuttings for the greenhouse.”
I asked Jane and Tina, who were on site this week, if they had a favorite plant in the border.
“I especially love the white form of the California fuschia, Epilobium canum, which is growing along the edge of the border near the purple smoke tree,” says Jane. “It’s drought tolerant, has lovely summer flowers, and needs no special care or love.”
“English lavender is one of my favorites,” says Tina, who also volunteers in our Garden Stewards program. “It’s always covered in bees, has wonderful medicinal properties, and is said to bring good luck!”
A pink mallow (Malva) in bloom in July.
Jane says the border team could use another volunteer or two, preferably with a little bit of horticultural experience. If you’re interested, please contact our volunteer program at volunteer@arboretumfoundation.org.
“We’ll be working on the border almost year-round, taking a break in December, but back at it again in March. Come pay us a visit!”
