Probably no WPA
display is of greater assistance to the home gardener than this functional
landscape, which is located just a short walk from the Graham Visitors
Center along the Hillside Trail. Created in 1949, the garden underwent
a substantial renovation in 1988-89, thanks to the Arboretum Foundation,
and was dedicated in honor of the long-time curator, Joseph A. Witt.
When many other areas of
the Arboretum are past their prime, the Winter Garden comes alive in
late November and, week by week until late March, showcases plants that
are at their best in usually the dullest season of the year. Winter
interest is found here in many forms--flowers, fruits, foliage, bark
and twigs, and structure.
The intensely-managed acreage has as its center a manicured lawn.
Surrounding the curving expanse of grass are more than a dozen beds,
each divided into areas suitable for plants of different heights and
densities and evergreen or deciduous habit. Cedars and firs provide
the dark, dense backbone to the color-laden clearing in the forest.
Among the roughly 115 species, many of which are rare or unusual,
are these attention-getters, each of which sports at least one feature
that illustrates its reason for being included in a winter garden.
For form, there's Harry Lauder's Walking Stick (Corylus avellana
'Contorta'), whose branches and twigs curl and twist every which
way to create a unique structure that dominates a bed of low-growing
hebes and heathers used as groundcovers.
The stewartias and paperbark maples display scaly or peeling bark
while the shrubby dogwoods show off red and yellow twigs.
Both hue and fragrance are supplied by the witch hazels, which form
a canopy over the main path on the western edge of the garden. Their
softly-scented petals close to the branch unroll on warm, sunny days
but curl up at night to ward off the cold.
Equally colorful in blossom are Viburnum x bodnantense 'Dawn'
with fragrant pink blossoms, Mahonia 'Arthur Menzies' with
its stiking yellow blossoms in spike-like clusters, and Camellia
sasanqua, which debuts in the fall and carries on through the
early winter months.
Disproving the common belief that only warm temperatures unlock the
pleasures of fragrance are several winter garden staples like Sarcococca
and Daphne odora 'Aureo-marginata.'
The following pages contain an interactive map of the Winter Garden
and links to each bed with a plant list and selected photos.
When many other areas of
the Arboretum are past their prime, the Winter Garden comes alive in
late November and, week by week until late March, showcases plants that
are at their best in usually the dullest season of the year. Winter
interest is found here in many forms--flowers, fruits, foliage, bark
and twigs, and structure.
Among the roughly 115 species, many of which are rare or unusual,
are these attention-getters, each of which sports at least one feature
that illustrates its reason for being included in a winter garden.
Both hue and fragrance are supplied by the witch hazels, which form
a canopy over the main path on the western edge of the garden. Their
softly-scented petals close to the branch unroll on warm, sunny days
but curl up at night to ward off the cold.
Disproving the common belief that only warm temperatures unlock the
pleasures of fragrance are several winter garden staples like Sarcococca
and Daphne odora 'Aureo-marginata.'