It's been 10 years or so since the American Boxwood Society has met at the Arboretum. Even though we didn't have newly refurbished meeting space available as we had hoped we would, we couldn't have picked a more beautiful day to host. We had planned to spend a good deal of time in the National Boxwood Collection, and the weather cooperated. Curator Lynn Batdorf provided a tour, highlighting the latest developments. He's been working steadily on removing old layers that have rooted and grown into neighboring plants. In the process he unearthed this wonderful prostrate form of boxwood. It's a wonderfully irregular octopus of a boxwood that is quite old and no taller than eight inches.
Dr. Richard Olsen was there also. He's been working on Catalpa, and they obliged by displaying some fine fall foliage. He was there to talk about the work he has just started to try to find resistance to boxwood blight caused by Cylindrocladium pseudonaviculatum and breed new boxwood with resistance to the disease. He'll continue to work on Catalpa, too. This tree is interesting because of the large burl on the trunk, and it has a witches broom on it that Richard has propagated.
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