Arboretum & Botanical Garden Bulletin Board
Plant of the Month
Black Mondo Grass
Ophiopogon planiscapus ‘Nigrescens’
Location: Grid T3 lower west edge of the Hosta walk
Black Mondo Grass has been surprisingly successful in the Arboretum. Most sources say it is not reliably winter hardy throughout zone 6 but ours has thrived even through severe winters. It has fleshy, broad leaf evergreen foliage which often means it would be prone to winter-burn in our cold, relatively dry winters.
It does best in a protected shady, moist location. The spot it is growing in the Arboretum seems to qualify, although there are likely better spots other places. Probably the biggest challenge to growing it in Moscow is finding a spot where it is protected from west wind and direct winter sun. But, surprisingly most of the shade on ours is provided by maples and crabapples, neither one are providing much winter protection.
Black Mondo Grass comes pretty close to the impossible dream of a plant that requires no maintenance other than some summer irrigation. The only thing we have ever done to it is cut back some winter damaged foliage and clean out fallen leaves that can mat up and bury it. It does spread but only very politely gradually filling its allotted space.
Monthly Projects
January has continued our remarkably mild winter, no catastrophic wildfires or once in a lifetime snowstorms happening here.
Wintertime is traditionally the time to catch up on ‘behind-the-scenes’ activities like updating the database, mapping new plantings and creating labels for those new things. Another somewhat daunting project that we have taken on this year is to update the botanical family names in the collection. Over the past years, genetic testing and DNA analysis has provided a way for botanists to more accurately determine how plants are related. That has resulted in some plants being assigned to different botanical families and some families being eliminated entirely. The biggest changes in our collections are the Maples (298 trees) and the Cypresses (59 trees).
We had to verify each of those trees and now we are creating and replacing both the smaller accession labels and the larger display labels. Major kudos to Lucy Falcy who came up with a way to print a corrected family name for the display label, instead of replacing the entire label, saving more than $10 per label (essentially paying for her part-time salary for the entire winter…).
Upcoming Events
- Arboretum Associates Annual Meeting
6:30 p.m. on Wednesday, April 9
1912 Center Great Room- 25 years of progress in the Arboretum
- Paul Warnick reporting on his career
- Plant Sale
10 a.m. to noon on Saturday, May 17
U of I Facilities Greenhouse (875 Perimeter Drive)- Traditional favorites and new things to try
- Annuals, perennials, natives and xerirscape
When visiting the Arboretum, please remember that for your safety, the safety of others and for the protection of wildlife and plant collections, no pets are allowed. Ice on ponds is very unstable — stay off any ice.