October 10, 2025 • 51 mins
In this episode of Keeping It Green, the team sits down with Jeff Jabco, Executive Director of the Scott Arboretum and Gardens, to explore his horticulture journey and the evolution of the Swarthmore Arboretum and Gardens. Jeff shares how the Scott Arboretum began as the Scott Foundation—established in 1929 by Swarthmore College alumni Mr. and Mrs. Scott to showcase exceptional plants for Delaware Valley home gardeners—and how it transformed into a dynamic space that blends curated plant collections with thoughtfully designed garden environments. He explains why “Gardens” was added to the name and how it better reflects the Arboretum’s mission to connect with the public. Jeff also discusses his deep ties to Penn State, where he earned his horticulture degree, launched his career with Penn State Extension, and later collaborated on research involving growing degree days and green roof systems. And what exactly is “Peony Palooza”? Tune in to find out.
Episode Hosts/Speakers:
Margaret Pickoff, Penn State Extension (host)
Sandy Feather, Penn State Extension (host)
Jeff Jabco, Executive Director of Scott Arboretum and Gardens
Photo Credit: Becky Robert
Keeping It Green has an email: keepingitgreen@psu.edu
Do you have a suggestion for a future episode? Want more information on something we talked about? Send us your questions and comments, or just say hello! We would love to hear from you!
Check out Penn State Extension's Green Industry Team website!
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker (00:06):
Welcome to Keeping It Green, a podcast for ornamental
plant professionals andenthusiasts with hosts Margaret
Pickoff and Sandy Feather.
Margaret Pickoff (00:24):
Hello and welcome to Keeping It Green, a
podcast from Penn StateExtension for ornamental plant
professionals and enthusiasts.
I'm one of your hosts, MargaretPickoff.
I'm a horticulture educatorwith Penn State Extension, and
on each episode, I'm joined bymy colleagues on the green
industry team as co-hosts.
On today's episode, my co-hostis Sandy Feather.
(00:46):
Hi, Sandy.
Sandy Feather (00:47):
Hey Margaret.
Margaret Pickoff (00:48):
Thanks for being here.
Sandy Feather (00:49):
Oh, thanks for inviting me.
I'm looking forward to thisone.
Margaret Pickoff (00:52):
Yeah.
On today's episode, we're goingto be joined by Jeff Jabko from
Swarthmore's Scott Arboretum.
But before we get to ourinterview with Jeff, we like to
start our uh conversations justchatting about what we are
seeing and experiencing anddoing in our uh in our work as
Penn State Extension educatorsand just plant people.
(01:15):
Um so Sandy, what are you uhyou're out in Allegheny County
in western Pennsylvania.
What are you seeing or doing orexperiencing right now?
Sandy Feather (01:25):
Rain.
Margaret Pickoff (01:27):
Thank God.
Sandy Feather (01:28):
Yeah, we got I I hadn't checked my rain gauge
today, but I had an inch and ahalf before yesterday.
So I think we probably gotabout two, two and a half inches
out of this this rain.
And God knows we needed it.
It was really stuff still lookspitiful.
I think the trees can't wait toshed their leaves and be done
with it for the year.
(01:49):
How about in your area?
Margaret Pickoff (01:51):
Yes.
Uh same.
My my sister lives in thePittsburgh area, and she's
always able to tell me whatweather to expect in the next
day or so.
And so she's like, There's raincoming.
Um so finally, I mean, we wedid get a few kind of like
little sprinkles or short uhlittle bursts.
Um, and I was kind of like, ohman, we really need like a nice
(02:13):
like soaking rain.
Um, and so far we've we havegotten um a couple, I think,
good rains.
It's not nearly enough, likeyou said.
Right.
Um, but everything out in thegarden perked up um that I've
been neglecting watering for theweek.
Sandy Feather (02:30):
Well, it's hard and it gets expensive.
I I was telling um uh Tim andand Jeff that I went to visit uh
there's a historic mansionhere.
It's called Elmcourt and it'sup in Butler, Pennsylvania.
And um I worked there like 30years ago as an estate gardener.
And um, you know, fast forwardto now when the the wealthy
(02:53):
owners passed away and you knowthey're scraping counting their
pennies and they weren't able toirrigate stuff.
So it was astonishing to seehow bad everything looked there.
Margaret Pickoff (03:05):
Yeah, I mean, it it is a lot of labor um to
keep things watered.
And um, I mean, I know thepeople who are growing crops um
are feeling it too.
Sandy Feather (03:16):
Right.
Um, absolutely.
Margaret Pickoff (03:18):
It just makes everything a lot harder.
So I know folks have beenreally grateful um for the rain.
Um, and then you know, we'llsee because uh we've had a
couple of pretty intense longdrought periods in the last
couple of years, and we'vedefinitely been able to see this
season the effect of lastsummer and fall being bone dry
(03:42):
um and entire landscapes reallyshifting, um, like established
trees, um, plants that have beenthere for a long time really
starting to struggle.
And so people are noticing notjust our clients in the
landscape industry, but alsohomeowners are their customers
are noticing.
Sandy Feather (04:02):
Yeah.
Yeah.
It's um, you know, I thinkthere's gonna have to be a lot
of care as we're selecting new,you know, particularly trees and
shrubs, those those long-termplants in the landscape.
I think we're gonna have torevisit our plant pallets if
this is gonna be our weatherfrom now on.
Margaret Pickoff (04:21):
Yeah, well, that's something um I'm looking
forward to asking Jeff hisopinion on.
Um so let's let's bring on ourguests today.
Jeff Jabco is the executivedirector of Scott Arboretum and
Gardens um here in SoutheastPennsylvania.
Uh, welcome.
Jeff, thanks for being on ourpodcast.
Speaker 1 (04:41):
Oh, thanks, Margaret.
I'm glad to be here.
Margaret Pickoff (04:43):
Um so we always start out by just asking
our guests to describe whattheir role is uh at their
organization or workplace.
Um, so uh what does your roleentail as executive director?
Speaker 1 (04:55):
Well, I am in charge of our um whole recently unified
departments.
Um I've been here for 35 yearsand for up until this past
summer, um, I was in charge ofuh coordinator of horticulture
and director of grounds.
So I oversaw that aspect.
(05:16):
We're at Swarthmore College,which is a private undergraduate
liberal arts college founded in1864 by the Society of Friends,
the Quakers.
Nice.
Um and we have we're relativelysmall.
Um we have uh a little over 400acres of property, about 200
acres of that is uh developed aspart of campus.
(05:37):
The other 200 acres is just onthe west side of campus, and it
is the Crumb Creek Valley.
Um, and so it's 200 acres ofwoodland with a creek running
through it, and that's that'spart of campus.
It has several miles of trailswithin it and everything.
But the other 200 acres is allof our area around academic
buildings, um, all of ouradministrative buildings,
(05:59):
athletic fields, and it's allthe Scott Arboretum.
So we don't have a separatearboretum that is separate and
distinct from the campus, butthe entire college campus is the
arboretum.
Uh so you know, we have uh allof our uh woody plants are
accessioned, computer mapped,all of that kind of thing.
Um, and so we have quite anextensive collection.
(06:21):
Um, and my role as executivedirector is to oversee all the
operations that are as part ofthat.
So we have an associatedirector of grounds operations
that takes care of all of ourturf, our athletic fields, um,
all of our paving areas, ourstormwater management uh
structures and programs, um, allof our faculty housing
(06:45):
properties and snow removal, iceremoval, you know, all of that
kind of thing, and all of ourtree care.
We also have another group thatis our horticulture division.
And so that is all of ourgardeners and uh and their
various supervisors so to carefor all everything that is, you
know, the crumb woods, as wellas all of our plant collections
(07:08):
and our garden areas on campus.
So we aren't just an arboretumwith a collection of trees.
Uh, we actually were working wechanged our name uh a little
while ago to Scott Arboretum andGardens, because really what
we're known for are collectionsof plants within our garden
spaces.
So we have some very intensivegardens like our uh our rose
(07:28):
garden, which was started in1957.
Um we have a pollinator'sgarden, we have several
courtyard gardens that havedifferent landscape features
associated with them.
We have a new root root andnewly reestablished winter
garden, um, so a number of thosegarden spaces.
(07:48):
And we still have our plantcollections, so uh collections
such as uh our collection ofcherry trees, our lilac
collection, viburnum collection,our famous Magnolia collection
and Holly collections.
Uh, there are a couple of ouroldest ones, a large pineedum
area.
So all of those are all aroundcampus and completely
encompassing campus.
(08:09):
Uh, and then our third groupwithin our structure of Scott R.
Breeman Gardens is our uh wholegroup that deals with uh
learning and communityengagement.
So we have a volunteersprogram.
So we have over 200 volunteersthat help us either with
gardening or in ourhorticultural library or our
(08:29):
events.
Um, we have a big educationprogram.
Um Swarthmore College isundergraduate liberal arts
college, but horticulture is nottaught here.
Uh, so it's a kind of an ironicthing, and I'll tell you kind
of our mission and backgroundand why that is in a minute.
Um, but we have educationalprograms.
We co-host a big perennialsconference, which is coming up
(08:52):
in October, and we'll get around500 people here for that.
Woody plant conference in thesummer.
We have lectures, workshops,day-long trips, multi-day trips,
uh, lots of other kinds of uhum learning and engagement types
of things that we do.
And then we also have um umkind of community and family
programming.
(09:12):
So we have different thingshappening here on campus as part
of the Arbretum, really toteach people about nature and
the outdoors and plants, uh,trying to start at a really
young age to do that.
And then we have a persontotally devoted to uh campus
engagement.
So this would be things thatwould involve mainly students,
but also would involve facultyand staff too, in somehow
(09:35):
learning about the arboretum orour naturals areas or plants or
nature in their daily lives.
So that's kind of my role is tooversee all of those various
aspects of what makes up ScottArbitum in Gardens.
Sandy Feather (09:49):
So sorry, long answer to a short that sounds
like you have your hands full.
Speaker 1 (09:55):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Uh all together, uh, on ourstaff, we have 28 people uh to
do all those various things.
Everyone from a um a mechanic,uh the folks who take care of
our athletic fields, ourgardeners, and all of those
people working in uh education,community engagement, um, our uh
fundraising aspect, um,publicity, um, communications,
(10:18):
all of that kind of thing, ourvolunteer program.
So uh all 28 of us doing thatkind of thing.
Margaret Pickoff (10:24):
And you had mentioned earlier um that these
different departments were usedto be separate and that they've
made the decision to unify theminto sort of one large
department.
Um and it seems like there areother public gardens um in the
area that are kind of takingthat um that strategy.
(10:46):
I I know that Morris recentlychanged their name from Morris
Arboretum to Morris Arboretumand Gardens, and I kind of
wonder if that has something todo with it.
But I wonder from yourperspective, um, what's behind
that kind of desire to unifyeverything?
Speaker 1 (11:02):
Yeah, well, let me talk about the name first.
Um I think it uh at one pointwe were called the Scott
Foundation up until the 1980s,and uh that's what the the
original uh donors that startedthe Scott Arbridom had set it up
as a Scott Foundation.
And um we would constantly getletters from groups wanting us
(11:25):
to give them money because theythink of a foundation, and
that's what foundations do, butthat's not what it was at all.
So at some point it was changedto the Scott Arboretum because
that was kind of the lingo atthe time for places that had
plant collections, and then overtime we moved more to not just
you know a plant collection, notjust having uh, you know, a
(11:46):
lilac collection over there andthe viburnum collection over
there and the tree peonycollection over there, but to
move to where we are integratingall those collections into
design spaces.
Um and so uh that became kindof the the idea of well, we're
more about gardens.
And a lot of our public now,they don't know what an
(12:08):
arboretum is.
Okay, so it's kind of a youknow, almost an antiquated word
for a lot of folks, and theydon't understand what an
arboretum is, but theyunderstand what we mean by
gardens.
So it's got arboretum andgardens, and so I think that's
why a number of otherinstitutions are also adding
that and gardens onto theirname.
Sandy Feather (12:27):
I know the the Pittsburgh Botanic Garden has
definitely taken that approach.
They're not gonna have thelilacs here and the viburnums
here and whatever, they're gonnabe incorporated into garden
spaces throughout the property.
Speaker 1 (12:39):
Yeah.
So the the college started in1864, as I said, but um the
arboretum did not start at thattime.
So as I said, it's anundergraduate liberal arts
college.
Uh in 1929, um, two graduatesof Swarthmore College who
graduated in the 1890s, Mr.
and Mrs.
Scott, hence we get the ScottArboretum, um, set up the
(13:02):
endowment, which started theScott Arboretum in 1929.
And the mission of the ScottArboretum, as they outlined it,
and in this is kind of medistilling it down into kind of
today's lingo, was to grow anddisplay the best plants uh that
did well here in the DelawareValley area to inspire home
(13:23):
gardeners.
So it wasn't about a botanicalcollection for the biology
department, it wasn't a uh arepository for botanical study
or anything like that.
Uh, it really was a collectionof plants to inspire home
gardeners.
So at that point, um, you know,people could come out and they
could look on campus and wereopen every day of the year from
(13:46):
sunup to sundown, no admissionfee, no gates, no fencing, you
know, just come on campuswhenever you want to during
daylight hours.
And you can walk around campus,you can uh take a look at our
plant collections, all of that.
But when they originally set itup, it was these different
groups of plants kind of plantedin different areas around
(14:06):
campus.
So if someone wanted to seereally nice magnolias, they
could come out, you know, inMarch and April and kind of see,
and it's like, oh, I reallylike that one better than that
one.
Oh, yeah, let me get let me getthat uh uh that one called
Pinky.
I really like that one, uh Iguess compared to some of the
other ones.
Well, that was good for pickinga plant, but that's kind of as
far as it would go.
(14:27):
And then um the Arbedum decidedwe really need to teach people
more, but how to use theseplants in their garden, also.
So then it was the idea ofokay, let's combine some of the
best plants we have into moregarden spaces.
And so kind of spaces inbetween campus buildings became
more intimate garden spaces.
(14:48):
Because in reality, therearen't that many suburban
gardeners that have 200 acres tolandscape, but they might have
this small space that it likeexisted between gardens or
gardens that or buildings thatwould kind of form a kind of a
courtyard space that could bedesigned.
It's like, oh, I couldtranslate that into my front
(15:09):
garden, or that look, I could dothat off of my patio and do
something like that.
So around the 1980s, it startedbeing more of, oh, let's take
those courtyards and let'sincorporate many different
plants in there.
So they're really more designedgarden spaces representing all
different types of conditionsand structures around them and
different sizes and spaces andeverything.
(15:30):
So that's kind of how all ofthat happened from the very
beginning to what we are today.
Margaret Pickoff (15:37):
It's interesting.
Before we started recording,um, we were talking about how
you um you used to be anextension um agent for Penn
State, like us.
Um, and and that you when youstarted, it was around the time
that the Master Gardener programwas starting up and there was
kind of a shift.
Um, this was before I was born.
(15:58):
But a shift from what Iunderstand, a little bit kids
towards, I know, um, towards uhconsumer horticulture.
Um and so recognizing, okay,people have properties, they
have questions, they're gettinginterested in gardens.
So and the horticulture agentcan't spend all day answering
questions from the public.
So we need to train thesevolunteers to do this.
(16:20):
And it's interesting, likearound the 80s, when um when the
Scott Arboretum also kind ofhad that awareness that, okay,
um, like the average person isnot gonna have like a magnolia
grove.
Um, they're gonna have like andand all these other things in a
(16:41):
smaller space.
Um, so I think that's a coolexample of kind of how the the
use of the grounds kind ofshifted in in relation to what
the public needed.
Speaker 1 (16:52):
Yeah.
So yeah, so I was anundergraduate at Penn State in
horticulture from 1978 to 82.
And that was like a big peakfor enrollment in horticulture
departments all around thecountry.
Um, it was kind of like the thegreen revolution time.
And, you know, at that point,like people were rediscovering
(17:13):
house plants and tractor trailerloads of foliage plants would
come up from Florida to variousplaces.
And you know, you couldn't goto a new restaurant or cocktail
lounge and there weren't fernshanging from the ceiling.
Uh, so it was like a really bigtime for people kind of
discovering plants, whether theybe indoor house plants or
(17:35):
outdoor gardening, that kind ofthing, uh, vegetable gardening,
all of that stuff.
So lots of people getting intohorticulture.
And then uh I graduated fromPenn State degree in
horticulture.
Uh, my emphasis was actually inplant breeding.
Uh, so I had a history of that,uh, working in the hort
department at Penn State anddoing research uh on plant
(17:57):
breeding.
And um then I went on tograduate school at North
Carolina State, and I wasbreeding small fruit crops, uh
mainly focusing on grapes, but Ialso worked on brambles and I
also worked on peaches too.
Um, so doing that in graduateschool.
And it was a summer between myjunior and senior year.
(18:20):
No, yeah, actually between myjunior and senior year at Penn
State, um, I did an internshipwith Penn State Cooperative
Extension, and I was doinghorticultural work in Lebanon
County, Pennsylvania.
So I was there for the wholesummer.
Uh, and I was doing basically alot of home horticulture stuff,
but I would go out with the oneof the other agents if they
(18:42):
would do commercial calls andall of that kind of thing.
Um, I was in graduate schooland I was finishing up, and I
was actually planning on goingon for a PhD at that time, but
my car died and I had no money.
And uh a one of the extensioneducators from Penn State called
me up at North Carolina andsaid, We know you're gonna be
graduating soon.
(19:02):
And we have this position thatis open.
We're just seeing if you mightbe interested.
As I said, my car died and Ihad no money.
And uh it's like, okay, yeah,I'll take that job.
And I think I would do that forjust a bit and go on for a PhD.
Um, but uh it ended up beingthe role of a essentially a
multi-county horticultural agentworking with commercial growers
(19:23):
here in southeasternPennsylvania, uh, and I was
headquartered in DelawareCounty.
And uh at that time,horticultural agents in each of
the counties around here, wekind of had our specialties.
So I became the specialist forsmall fruit production.
Uh, also I worked withgreenhouse growers and I worked
with the arborist industry.
So those were kind of the threebig things I was working with.
(19:45):
And then a fellow agent wasworking on turf, and another one
was working on tree fruits, andanother one was working on
mushrooms, and another one wasworking with uh nursery
producers.
Um, so we all kind of had ourspecialties that we would share
back and forth and help to doprogramming for that.
And it was while during thattime I got to know the folks at
the Scott R.
Reedom, they had a job open.
(20:07):
It's like, okay, I'll try that.
And uh I've been here 35 yearssince then.
Speaker 2 (20:13):
So yeah.
Um definitely found your place.
Speaker 1 (20:16):
Big changes uh yeah in the industry, you know,
during that time and kind of thethe emphasis of what what
people were doing.
So it's interesting to kind ofsee how things have changed uh
over that time.
Sandy Feather (20:29):
And it's interesting that you remember
like the beginning of the MasterGardener program here in
Pennsylvania because it hasreally grown into a huge, huge,
very successful program.
Speaker 1 (20:40):
Yeah.
So when I started in DelawareCounty, I mean I was doing that
regional work, but then youknow, I was still the
horticulture agent for DelawareCounty.
And we would have you know somany calls during the growing
season that actually we hadenough of money that we would
hire a part-time person whowould come in.
I think at that point it waslike three days a week.
So anyone who had calls, it'slike, okay, call back on
Tuesday, Wednesday, or Thursdaybetween you know nine and three
(21:03):
in the afternoon, and you'll beable to talk to someone because
I couldn't sit at the desk allthe time and I couldn't answer
all of those calls.
Um, and so we had the persondoing that.
And yeah, then just towardsthat the that time in the uh the
kind of the mid to late 80s,there started being some
programs of this this mastergardening program, and I know it
(21:24):
was happening in some otherstate, I can't remember exactly
where.
Sandy Feather (21:27):
Uh I want to say we kind of got it like start in
Washington state or Oregon.
Speaker 1 (21:33):
I I really don't, I really don't remember.
Sandy Feather (21:34):
Yeah, yeah.
David Gibby is the educator whowho started it.
Speaker 1 (21:39):
Yeah, and at the same time, we were working with
urban gardening.
Okay.
So the uh the Philadelphiagroup of cooperative extension
was way into urban gardening,and I was able to get a really
large grant that we werestarting an urban gardening
program in the city of Chester,which is in Delaware County.
Uh, and so we were able to hiretwo people to kind of run that
(22:00):
program, the urban gardeningprogram in Chester, also.
So all those things were like,you know, really, really coming
on at that time.
Master gardening program, urbangardening initiatives and
programs, uh, as well as thisbig emphasis on commercial
horticulture.
Margaret Pickoff (22:17):
Yeah, um I do want to ask, um, well, I have a
lot of questions about how theum the arboretum functions and
how it has changed in terms ofvisitors and and responding to
what visitors like, but I dowant to start out by just asking
about the plants.
And obviously there's lots andlots of species represented
(22:38):
there um on all those acres.
And um I guess I I wonder justto like narrow it down a little
bit, if there is a particularplant collection um that has
sort of stood the test of timeas being either really um really
popular or really resilient.
(22:59):
Um, you know, you had mentionedroses and and roses are getting
harder to grow for a number ofreasons, as are a lot of plants
actually, that probably used tobe sort of the mainstays of
public gardens and and arborita.
Um, but I wonder, is there inyour time at Scott, is there a
(23:19):
plant collection that has kindof just continued to thrive
through that time and sort ofmaintain its uh its shine and
its draw?
Speaker 1 (23:28):
Um yeah, I would say there's a couple.
We have a really notedcollection of magnolias.
Um they've been we've had yourmagnolia collection for a long,
long time.
Um and when you say somethinglike that, it can be really,
really diverse.
Uh you kind of a collection.
So, and it's just interestingover time, some of the things we
were starting with.
So um Magnolia Virginiana, youknow, one of our native
(23:52):
magnolias.
It's really not native to thisarea, but just not far south
from here it is.
So you'll find it in Delaware,you'll find it in southern New
Jersey, uh likes really, reallymoist conditions and everything.
And we had a uh cultivar hereprobably since the 1940s called
Magnolia Virginiana VarietyAustralis cultivar Henry Hicks.
(24:15):
And actually, that was namedhere at the Scott Arboretum, and
it was named from Henry Hicksfrom the Hicks nursery on Long
Island, uh, an old, old nurserythat was there, been around for
generations.
Um, and that was a selectionbecause it was hardier and it
would hold on to the majority ofits leaves through the winter.
Uh, where if you could possiblygrow Magnolia virginina in this
(24:38):
area before, but they would bedeciduous, they would just drop
all of their leaves.
Uh so that that was you knowlike the one.
And since then, there are anumber of other cultivars, and I
think now you can grow MagnoliaVirginia quite a bit farther
north uh and west than what itwas previously.
So some things about you knowhow the climate has changed
(25:01):
during that time.
We did be we didn't used to beable to grow Lagostromia, crepe
myrtles.
Speaker 2 (25:06):
Okay.
Speaker 1 (25:06):
You know, we we had maybe one or two on campus.
Um if we had one, we couldnever think of planting it in
the fall.
If we had planted in thespring, we would know probably
for the first three years itwould die back to the ground.
And these were some of thehardiest ones we were trying to
grow.
And then if we got it past yearthree, then it might have wood
that would be mature, rootsystem that's mature enough to
(25:29):
withstand having some upabove-ground stems that would
last through the winter.
Now we can pretty much grow anyof them.
Sandy Feather (25:35):
Yeah, not that they can still be dieback shrubs
for us out here in thehinterlands.
Speaker 1 (25:41):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Yeah, for us, they they don'tdie back at all.
And so we can pretty much growany.
But so you know, a magnoliacollection is really important.
We have a really uh extensivecollection of hollies, uh, both
deciduous and evergreen holliesand all different species.
Uh, we have a really oldpineedum collection, probably
one of our most uniquecollections, one of the things
(26:01):
we're really known for is ourtree peony collection.
And we do know that some ofthose original plants we have in
a collection date from around1930, 1931.
Uh, we have correspondence fromDr.
Wister, who is our firstdirector and our director for
many, many years, um about thoseplants.
Uh, and so we know that we havethat.
And we have a very goodcollection of Saunders hybrids,
(26:26):
Dr.
A.P.
Saunders, who was a, I think itwas a chemistry professor at
Hamilton College in upstate NewYork, and he bred peonies, tree
peonies.
Uh, he also bred herbaceoustoo, but we have a really nice
uh collection of his saundertree peonies, and they are kind
of going through this bigrevival right now.
Um, so since then I've starteduh co co-founded the
(26:49):
Mid-Atlantic Peony Society.
We have a big peony Paloozaevery year.
Uh we're actually hosting theAmerican Peony Society to this
area next May, first weekend ofMay, uh here in uh in Delaware
and Chester counties.
And um yeah, so that that'skind of a unique plant
collection that we have.
(27:10):
Uh, but you know, we have uhyou know a plant that's probably
kind of out of favor andfashion, the lilacs I'd
mentioned, but also, you know,viburnums and in a huge number
of different things, otherthings that we had.
Once perennials started gettingreally popular, and that was uh
in the 1980s, actually, is whenI was in Extension.
The first perennials conferencewas held during that time.
(27:32):
So this perennials conferencethat I said is coming up in
October that we host here at theScott Arbedom has always been
here.
It involves uh at one point umCooperative Extension was a
co-sponsor of it in the verybeginning years.
Now it is run and managed bythe Scott Arbor Breedham,
Longwood Gardens, Chanticleer,uh, Hardy Plant Society,
Mid-Atlantic Chapter, and thePennsylvania Hort Society.
(27:54):
So those are the groups thatkind of organize and run that.
And we will get 500 people inperson and maybe 100 people uh
virtual uh for that one-dayconference in October.
But at that point, perennialswere just getting started.
So it was you know Cedum AutumnJoy, and um oh, what were a
couple of the other ones?
(28:15):
Uh Penicetum, Alleopecyroides,Hamilin, uh uh Goldsturm
Rubecia.
Goldsturm Rebecca, those werelike the three biggies.
Uh and uh yeah, so uh it's comea long way since then.
So that was you know a reallypopular thing at the very
beginning.
But now, you know, uh youmentioned about the rose garden.
(28:35):
So we've had the rose gardensince 1957.
Um, and it was to honor one ofuh the dean of students for the
college, and it was right in themiddle of college, and it was a
relatively formal rose garden,not that it was rectilinear, but
formal beds of roses wherethere would be solid blocks of
each different cultivar of rose.
(28:57):
So it's mainly made up of thehybrid T's, the florabundas, the
grandi floras, had some postand chain around the outside for
the climbers and ramblers, andthen there was one other bed
that had some of the species andshrub roses in it.
All of the roses were plantedabout two feet apart from each
other, solid cultivar.
So you'd have a solid bed ofyou know, 30 Mr.
(29:18):
Lincoln roses, which weregorgeous when they would flower,
you know, in late May, earlyJune.
And then within a couple ofweeks, they would have no leaves
left on them from black spotand all of that kind of thing.
At that point, the roses weresprayed every 10 days to two
weeks, fungicide, uh,insecticide, and that's what the
program was.
(29:38):
Well, even when I started herein 1990, we early on, we started
experimenting with well, whatother things could we use?
Um, we had a big uh, and thiswas through cooperative
extension, we had a big researchuh project.
This was along with DaveShoshanik, who actually followed
in my footsteps in in DelawareCounty.
(29:59):
Um, and Rick Johnson at our IPMresearch program.
And we were working with GregHoover, who was a professor in
entomology at Penn State.
And we did a lot of research ongrowing degree days, plant
phonology, all of that kind ofthing was some of the big work
that we had done.
And we had, you know, oh, 12 or12 to 20 different
(30:20):
institutions, depending on theyear, collecting data to add
into that program.
Um, but at that point with theroses, we were trying things
such as baking soda on.
Uh so all these differentthings to try to control some of
the diseases like black spotand anthrachnose and all of that
kind of stuff.
Um, and then we started usingsome beneficial insects.
(30:42):
And all with limited success, Iwould say, for roses.
And then it was probably alittle more 10 years ago,
probably at least, maybe alittle more, maybe 12 years ago,
I finally said, okay, this hasgot to change.
This is an endowed garden oncampus.
You know, it's meant to be arose garden.
What can we do to make it moreapplicable to now here and now?
(31:05):
Okay.
We still need to have roses init.
So we started looking to seewhere we could get the best,
most disease-resistant rosesthat we had.
So you all probably rememberknockout rose, which is pretty
disease resistant.
So everything we were findingat that point were shrub roses,
okay?
And we didn't want a fullgarden just full of knockout
(31:26):
roses.
You know, there's knockout andnot much more at that point.
So uh we started finding otherbreeders, rose breeders who were
doing work with roses to reallylook for disease resistance,
especially is what they wereworking for, disease resistance.
We kind of figured outdifferent ways of managing the
insect part.
If we spread the roses apart,gave more air movement between
(31:49):
them, that if we planted othercompanion plants, other
flowering plants to attractbeneficial insects in, we
actually have very few insectproblems in our rose garden.
Yeah, if it's a bad year forJapanese beetles, we'll still
get that.
They're here for a couple ofweeks, then they're gone.
We just kind of accept that'swhat it is.
Uh, but diseases were still aproblem.
So we've uh actually what wedecided was we're not going to
(32:13):
have those solid beds of rosesanymore.
We're going to give each of theroses more space.
We'll still have blocks ofcultivars, but a lot of space in
between them, where we have allkinds of other plants,
everything from lavender andclematis and salvias and alliums
and all kinds of other thingsuh growing in between them.
Um, so that really has interestall through the gardening year,
(32:37):
uh, not just you know that timein May and June when roses
flower and then maybe somerepeat flowering in the fall,
but it's all through the year.
And then also realizing we'renot going to keep those same
cultivars of roses all the time.
Just because Mr.
Lincoln's been there from 1957.
Sorry, Mr.
Lincoln, you know, you'reyou're you've got every kind of
(32:58):
disease, we're not going tospray you.
Um, so it is actually um uh agroup in Germany uh that is
doing a lot of the research.
Uh and there are a number ofother ones now, they aren't the
only ones, but uh they have beenvery prolific in what they've
been introducing uh fordisease-resistant roses.
And those are available in theUS now.
(33:19):
So we participated a number ofyears with the American Rose
Trial for Sustainability, ARTSarts program.
And we had a whole separate, wehave a whole separate nursery
area, and we would do trials,blind trials of roses to see how
they did in this area.
Uh, and then we'd feed thatinformation back, and then I
would go into a trial, then thatinformation would get published
(33:39):
to the public.
So we have a good set of rosesnow.
As we get newer and betterthings, then that's you know,
five years ago, there's afabulous rose we were growing,
Julia Child, uh beautiful color,nice, uh more of a short
floribunda.
Sorry, Julia, you're just notcutting it anymore.
You get you get black spot moreeasily than some of these other
(34:01):
ones.
So I don't think we're gonnahave Julia Child in our rose
garden a whole lot longer, butwe have many other ones that are
doing really well.
So that's one of the ways it'slike just that one garden space,
how it's changed.
Uh and we don't use we actuallyin that rose garden, uh, we
were saying that it it actually,since we did that change, it
was organic.
So we weren't doing any spray,it was all totally organic.
(34:25):
Starting last year, we had themodifying that saying it is now
sustainable because we're havinga problem with rose rosette
disease.
Sandy Feather (34:33):
I was just gonna ask about rose rosette.
Speaker 1 (34:35):
We have rose rosette disease, and we're trying to
break the cycle of the area fyedmite.
So we are using a mitocide, butthat is the only chemical that
we are using in the rose garden.
Everything else about it isorganic.
So we're not organic, we'resaying it's sustainable now
because we're using thatmitocide.
Sandy Feather (34:53):
How are you scouting for those mites?
Speaker 1 (34:56):
Every week, we're actually we have some volunteers
that we've trained uh actuallylooking for the rose rosette.
Uh it's almost impossible toscout for them because they're
tiny, they're minuscule, yeah.
Yeah, they're very tiny and andthey want to be in those buds,
yeah.
So yeah, so you really can'tsee them.
So we look for the symptoms,trying to eliminate the symptoms
(35:17):
uh, you know, as soon as wefind them.
So basically looking at everyplant uh all of that time like
that.
And if we see something that wesuspect, we rogue it out.
So we've lost lots of plantsover the past, you know, six,
eight years because of roserosette.
Um, hopefully at some pointwe'll have better choices of
roses that are more resistant torose rosette disease.
(35:39):
And I think you know, Texas AMespecially is working on that in
some other places.
Sandy Feather (35:44):
So University of Tennessee was pretty involved.
Yep.
Speaker 1 (35:47):
Okay.
Yeah.
So that's that's you know, onegarden space and how it's
changed over the years.
Margaret Pickoff (35:52):
Yeah, I mean, I that is such a an a
fascinating example because Ikind of misspoke a little bit
earlier when I said it's gottenharder to grow roses.
And I think I was thinking roserosette disease because we hear
about that a lot.
Um but in this case and and ina lot of landscapes, um we do
have really uh species that havebeen really important parts of
(36:17):
landscapes for a long time inour region that are starting to
suffer from various kind ofclimate stressors and drought
and just the changing growingseason.
Um in this case though, it'skind of it's it's kind of like
our tolerance for doing weeklyfungicide applications has also
(36:38):
changed.
And and I think that's trueamong the public, and I'm sure
you know the college students ifyou ask them, and and so it's
such an interesting strategythat kind of um aligns with the
greater theme of of sort ofdiversifying, like rather than
having it used to be veryfashionable to have you know a
(37:01):
lot of the same plant in onearea, and look how beautiful
this looks, and it's veryuniform, and and it just seems
like the theme is adding in morediversity, and within that,
that kind of creates a moreresilient, um uh maybe disease
pest resistant uh collection ofplants.
And so you haven't had tocompletely get rid of the rose
(37:25):
garden, and I'm not sure you'reable to because the endowment,
but it's an endowment.
But I think that's a reallyinteresting example of kind of
um the the spirit of this gardenis still the same, and we're
still you know enjoying thisplant uh and and um you know
allowing visitors to experienceit, but it's just in a slightly
(37:46):
different configuration um sothat we don't have to be
constantly spraying and um yeah,so I think that's a really cool
example.
Speaker 1 (37:55):
We have a uh one late afternoon evening in late May.
We have our rose celebration.
So we'll have food and drinkand talks and tours about the
rose garden, and we'll have abunch of giveaways, and that's a
couple of food trucks here, butwe give everyone who comes who
wants a rose plant that is oneof the newer disease-resistant
(38:16):
roses.
So it's like, yes, you can growthis in the garden and you
don't have to spray it fordiseases.
Uh so it's one of our way oftrying to get some of these
better plants out to people.
And you were mentioning aboutuh how the students'
appreciation of things.
Uh, we have several acres oforganic lawns on campus, and
it's the main lawns thatstudents are using, okay?
(38:37):
Where they where they playfrisbee, where they want to, you
know, lay out in the sun with abook on a nice sunny day and
that kind of thing, uh, wherethey just want to gather with
their friends and chat, thatkind of stuff.
And we have a new um diningcenter and community commons,
and all around that building aremeadows.
So now in their third andfourth year, uh, around some of
(39:02):
them, and they are lookingreally spectacular right now.
I mean, even with the dryweather, yeah, some of the
things came and went a littlefaster, but you know, and it's
on a slope too.
Uh but a number of thoseplants, it's like, okay, they
can handle that and they canstill flower, you know, the
asters or actually not asters,they're now symphiatricums are
in flower now, and uh, you know,a number of other things.
(39:23):
So that is like a real changein how campus looks uh from 30
years ago.
Sandy Feather (39:30):
And it's interesting, my office just
moved uh from uh a non-PennState building uh to one of the
Commonwealth campuses.
That's the Greater Alleghenycampus.
And the man the groundsmanagers there are kind of
interested in turn they they mowa lot.
I honestly don't know how manyacres we have on campus, but um
(39:53):
they mow a lot and they wouldlike to mow less.
So they're looking to us to tohelp them maybe come up with
some meadows, which would bewonderful.
Speaker 1 (40:04):
I mean, meadows are a whole different thing.
And actually, it is something Ireally need to learn about
more.
Uh, and I keep encouraging mystaff.
It's like, okay, I need acouple of you to get really
excited about meadows because Ineed help with them.
Um, I kind of did that withgreen roofs.
Okay.
We have a number of green roofson campus, and much of that
(40:25):
came from my association with uhDave Beattie and Barbara Age
from Penn State, Penn Stateprofessors in the Hort
department who are doingresearch on green roofs.
And I was co-teaching a classhere at the college in
engineering, and I'm not anengineer at all, but it was on
water, water management andstormwater.
(40:46):
And that's something I had tobe responsible for here on a
campus.
Um, and so the class duringthat semester was really looking
about stormwater management,and green roofs were just a
really brand new thing at thattime.
So I brought Dave Beattie downfrom Penn State.
He gave a lecture to them, andthen we started studying it
more.
And there was one row house infell in Philadelphia where the
(41:08):
owner had put a green roof on.
So we went and took a look atthat and talked to the owner.
Um, and then we started talkingto other people.
Lo and behold, two years later,we put a green roof on a
student residence hall, thefirst one in the United States.
Uh, and that happened here, andnow we have green roofs on many
(41:29):
of our buildings.
Yeah.
Nice.
But if the building doesn'thave solar panels on it, it has
green roofs on it.
Nice.
Yeah.
Margaret Pickoff (41:37):
Um, I did want to ask, and you have you had
mentioned um the perennial plantconference and um, I think the
Woody Plant Conference isanother one that happens at
Scott.
Speaker 1 (41:47):
Um yeah, so the uh the perennial plant conference
is Friday, October 17th thisyear.
Uh, and you can go online uhactually to any of those
sponsoring organizations or justuh Google Perennial Plant
Conference and you'll get to it.
Registration's still open forthat.
And then the Woody PlantConference typically is in
mid-July, and that's a one-dayevent, and that's also on a
(42:10):
Friday in mid-July.
Margaret Pickoff (42:11):
So and and obviously this is a pleasure.
Um sorry, Sandy.
Um I was gonna say thatobviously this is a
long-standing collaborationbetween you'd mentioned
Chanticleer, Longwood, HardyPlant Society, and um PHS.
Um and I just kind of wonderbecause here in Southeast PA, we
(42:33):
are totally spoiled by thenumber of horticultural
offerings.
And I just wonder, um, youknow, like uh what um what do
you gain from a collaborationlike that?
Um obviously, I mean, I Iassume that it it helps in in
all sorts of ways, but can wekind of talk about what that is
(42:54):
like to be part of that?
Speaker 1 (42:56):
Well, it's just great to have such a division of
labor because there are a lot ofthings to do.
I mean, if you think about,okay, who are we gonna have for
speakers?
Okay, the more people that areyou know represented in a
meeting room, then the moreideas you have for speakers.
Then you have to contact thespeaker and you have to kind of
figure out what they're gonnatalk about and then do the
write-up.
So someone has to do thebrochure, which they do at PHS,
(43:16):
someone has to do the publicity,which Santa Claire handles much
of that.
Someone has to take care of theregistration, Longwood takes
care of that.
Here at the Scot ArbreBreedham, we we have the
facilities, we host it.
We always we have it at thattime of year in October because
that's fall break.
And so all the students are onbreak that week.
Therefore, we can use you knowthe big facilities of the
(43:36):
auditorium and all of that.
Um, so just having that kind ofsynergy with all of those
different groups represented,and it's a great way to talk to
the neighbors too.
Sometimes you can get soisolated, even though we have a
bunch of horticulturalinstitutions around the area, if
you're all doing your ownthing, you're not talking to
each other.
But I I think it here insoutheastern Pennsylvania, we
(43:59):
really have a closehorticultural community.
I mean, we have a couple ofother programs too, um, at
Gardens Collaborative, um, thethe Philadelphia, the Greater
Philadelphia Gardens Group.
So where everyone's kind oftrying to cooperate.
And even you know, thestatewide organization uh of
Pennsylvania of uh publicgardens uh has a a group for
(44:21):
promotion of gardens, uh publicgardens and what they mean for
the residents of Pennsylvaniaand visitors.
Um so there are all those typesof collaborative things that
are going on.
Um so really you can get somereally good energy about all of
that.
You know, then the PhiladelphiaFlower Show.
Most of us in the public gardenworld, you know, we volunteer
(44:41):
for a day or more helping to puton that big show.
Uh and you know, PHS couldn'tdo it all themselves just for
that thing.
Yeah.
Margaret Pickoff (44:50):
Yeah, I'm sure that it it helps to be able to,
when you're experiencing somesort of challenge to
horticulturally or the way thatthe uh the organization's being
run, or you know, uh things arechanging, which is kind of a
theme throughout this wholeconversation.
Speaker 1 (45:07):
And um You know, and we have we have great bigger
groups too.
You know, I've been a member ofthe Perennial Plan Association
for a long time.
They have a great yearlymeeting and regional meetings
now that are very good.
Um American Public GardensAssociation, which is kind of
the professional organizationfor public gardens.
Uh, they have regionalmeetings, and actually I think
there's going to be one out inPittsburgh soon.
(45:28):
Um, and uh there are uh otherorganizations.
So I always tell people ifyou're really passionate in
plants, join a plant society.
You'll meet a bunch of weirdpeople.
But uh, you know, I said aboutthe Mid-Alantic Peony Society,
so I'm active in that, and wehave a program coming up uh at
the end of October, October forour we call it our dig and
(45:50):
divide, where we teach peopleabout fall is the time for
digging your peonies anddividing them, and we show them
how to do that.
And so we'll show them forherbaceous peonies and the
intersectional hybrids, theetopes and tree peonies.
The other night we were had uhover subscribe for tree peony
grafting, because that's howtree peonies are propagated.
(46:11):
So we're teaching people how tograft tree peonies, and it's a
really, really weird graftingthing.
So, how because you're taking ajust a one or two bud piece of
your cyan and grafting it ontoan herbaceous rootstock, so it's
the weirdest looking thing whenyou're finished because you
keep it buried under the soilfor a year and it'll sprout next
spring, and you'll have a newtree peony that's using that
(46:34):
herbaceous peony as a rootstock.
Grafting are also I'm involvedin the International Clemidist
Society, so very involved inthat group.
But I really enjoy the plantsociety things.
Margaret Pickoff (46:45):
Yeah, that seems like a great way to get
information and um share uhvaluable, you know, uh insights
and experiences.
Speaker 4 (46:55):
Um and you just meet a bunch of other plant geeks,
it's a wonderful thing.
Sandy Feather (47:00):
Yeah, that's what we like.
Margaret Pickoff (47:02):
Um well, um, Jeff, thank you so much for uh
for the conversation today.
It's been um I think that wecould probably keep you here for
a whole nother hour and ask youmore questions.
Um but it's just great to tospeak to someone who's
obviously, you know, reallyenthusiastic about this work.
Um and so we we always wrap upour conversations by asking our
(47:23):
guests what they like to do whenthey're not working.
Um so what um do you findyourself doing when you're not
at the arboretum?
Speaker 1 (47:32):
Um I'm really interested in art architecture
and food.
So I like to travel a bit.
So usually every year I'll douh a nice trip somewhere.
Um and much of my time reallythat I spend uh during decent
weather months, so basicallyfrom March through early
(47:53):
November, um, I have propertywith some cabins on it up in the
Pocanoos, and they are90-year-old buildings, and I'm
trying to rescue them fromcollapsing on themselves.
And so we're learning how to doeverything ourselves.
So I learned to be anelectrician.
So I've really two of thecabins so far, and I can do the
masonry work, we do thecarpentry work, putting in
(48:15):
windows, and all of that kind ofthing.
So, and it's on a beautifulmountain stream.
Um, in a in a very beautifulnorth slope that is a threatened
woods because there arehemlocks on it, which are not
well, and that's what shades themountain stream.
So sad.
Uh, we do have some beachesthere, but we're a north slope,
so not too many, but our beachesdo have the beech leaf disease.
(48:38):
That's something we're reallyworried about here at the
Arboretum too in our woodland.
We have some big stands ofbeech trees.
Sandy Feather (48:45):
Are you doing some some planting to uh try to,
you know, some of the uhalternatives to hemlocks or even
some of the the hybrids withsuga genensis, you know,
anything like that?
Speaker 1 (48:58):
At the mountain property, no.
I mean it's 50 acres, so it'dbe a lot to try to take on to do
that.
And also a north slope, veryrocky.
It it's a plant is growingthere because somehow it found a
bit of soil in between therocks.
unknown (49:12):
Okay.
Speaker 1 (49:13):
And so if you just think of going out and planting,
uh we still have a greatunderstory of rhododendron
maximum.
Nice, but those are suchthickets you could never plant
into the thing to grow.
So it's like we're just kind ofwaiting to see what happens.
So there's a good stand of umuh and I think what will
probably take over are uh yellowbirch and uh and black birch um
(49:36):
kind of take over.
Um, because you know we have alot of those around, and that
that seems to be like the firstsuccessional thing that will
come in, uh, even before redmaple will come in.
Okay.
So I think that's what it'll befor a while, and then who knows
what will be the next thing.
Yeah.
But so that's what I do.
That's what and fly fishingwhen I get a chance to do that.
Sandy Feather (49:57):
Yeah.
That was one of our passions.
Speaker 1 (50:01):
That's what I grew up in Belfont, so that's what I
kind of miss from that area.
Uh being able to go out and dosome fly fishing close by.
Margaret Pickoff (50:07):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (50:07):
Yeah.
Margaret Pickoff (50:08):
Wow, that all sounds really dreamy.
I hope you get a lot of.
Speaker 1 (50:12):
I wish I had more time to do all that.
Of course.
Some things to talk about.
Margaret Pickoff (50:17):
Um, well, hopefully this this fall we'll
get some some good time outsideand some good cabin time as
well.
Um, and um, yeah, again, we'dappreciate your time and and
coming to to share uh about thework that you do.
And um hopefully we'll be ableto follow up with you and uh and
you know hear how those uhthose yellow birches and all
(50:37):
those chooses.
All right.
Speaker 4 (50:42):
Okay, thanks so much, Jeff.
Speaker 1 (50:44):
Thanks for having me.
Really appreciate it.
Speaker 4 (50:45):
Thank you.
Speaker 1 (50:46):
Come and visit the Scott Arboretum.
Speaker 4 (50:48):
We definitely will.
Yep.
All right, all right, takecare.
Speaker 1 (50:52):
Take care.
Thanks.
Welcome to Keeping It Green, a podcast for ornamental
plant professionals andenthusiasts with hosts Margaret
Pickoff and Sandy Feather.
Margaret Pickoff (00:24):
Hello and welcome to Keeping It Green, a
podcast from Penn StateExtension for ornamental plant
professionals and enthusiasts.
I'm one of your hosts, MargaretPickoff.
I'm a horticulture educatorwith Penn State Extension, and
on each episode, I'm joined bymy colleagues on the green
industry team as co-hosts.
On today's episode, my co-hostis Sandy Feather.
(00:46):
Hi, Sandy.
Sandy Feather (00:47):
Hey Margaret.
Margaret Pickoff (00:48):
Thanks for being here.
Sandy Feather (00:49):
Oh, thanks for inviting me.
I'm looking forward to thisone.
Margaret Pickoff (00:52):
Yeah.
On today's episode, we're goingto be joined by Jeff Jabko from
Swarthmore's Scott Arboretum.
But before we get to ourinterview with Jeff, we like to
start our uh conversations justchatting about what we are
seeing and experiencing anddoing in our uh in our work as
Penn State Extension educatorsand just plant people.
(01:15):
Um so Sandy, what are you uhyou're out in Allegheny County
in western Pennsylvania.
What are you seeing or doing orexperiencing right now?
Sandy Feather (01:25):
Rain.
Margaret Pickoff (01:27):
Thank God.
Sandy Feather (01:28):
Yeah, we got I I hadn't checked my rain gauge
today, but I had an inch and ahalf before yesterday.
So I think we probably gotabout two, two and a half inches
out of this this rain.
And God knows we needed it.
It was really stuff still lookspitiful.
I think the trees can't wait toshed their leaves and be done
with it for the year.
(01:49):
How about in your area?
Margaret Pickoff (01:51):
Yes.
Uh same.
My my sister lives in thePittsburgh area, and she's
always able to tell me whatweather to expect in the next
day or so.
And so she's like, There's raincoming.
Um so finally, I mean, we wedid get a few kind of like
little sprinkles or short uhlittle bursts.
Um, and I was kind of like, ohman, we really need like a nice
(02:13):
like soaking rain.
Um, and so far we've we havegotten um a couple, I think,
good rains.
It's not nearly enough, likeyou said.
Right.
Um, but everything out in thegarden perked up um that I've
been neglecting watering for theweek.
Sandy Feather (02:30):
Well, it's hard and it gets expensive.
I I was telling um uh Tim andand Jeff that I went to visit uh
there's a historic mansionhere.
It's called Elmcourt and it'sup in Butler, Pennsylvania.
And um I worked there like 30years ago as an estate gardener.
And um, you know, fast forwardto now when the the wealthy
(02:53):
owners passed away and you knowthey're scraping counting their
pennies and they weren't able toirrigate stuff.
So it was astonishing to seehow bad everything looked there.
Margaret Pickoff (03:05):
Yeah, I mean, it it is a lot of labor um to
keep things watered.
And um, I mean, I know thepeople who are growing crops um
are feeling it too.
Sandy Feather (03:16):
Right.
Um, absolutely.
Margaret Pickoff (03:18):
It just makes everything a lot harder.
So I know folks have beenreally grateful um for the rain.
Um, and then you know, we'llsee because uh we've had a
couple of pretty intense longdrought periods in the last
couple of years, and we'vedefinitely been able to see this
season the effect of lastsummer and fall being bone dry
(03:42):
um and entire landscapes reallyshifting, um, like established
trees, um, plants that have beenthere for a long time really
starting to struggle.
And so people are noticing notjust our clients in the
landscape industry, but alsohomeowners are their customers
are noticing.
Sandy Feather (04:02):
Yeah.
Yeah.
It's um, you know, I thinkthere's gonna have to be a lot
of care as we're selecting new,you know, particularly trees and
shrubs, those those long-termplants in the landscape.
I think we're gonna have torevisit our plant pallets if
this is gonna be our weatherfrom now on.
Margaret Pickoff (04:21):
Yeah, well, that's something um I'm looking
forward to asking Jeff hisopinion on.
Um so let's let's bring on ourguests today.
Jeff Jabco is the executivedirector of Scott Arboretum and
Gardens um here in SoutheastPennsylvania.
Uh, welcome.
Jeff, thanks for being on ourpodcast.
Speaker 1 (04:41):
Oh, thanks, Margaret.
I'm glad to be here.
Margaret Pickoff (04:43):
Um so we always start out by just asking
our guests to describe whattheir role is uh at their
organization or workplace.
Um, so uh what does your roleentail as executive director?
Speaker 1 (04:55):
Well, I am in charge of our um whole recently unified
departments.
Um I've been here for 35 yearsand for up until this past
summer, um, I was in charge ofuh coordinator of horticulture
and director of grounds.
So I oversaw that aspect.
(05:16):
We're at Swarthmore College,which is a private undergraduate
liberal arts college founded in1864 by the Society of Friends,
the Quakers.
Nice.
Um and we have we're relativelysmall.
Um we have uh a little over 400acres of property, about 200
acres of that is uh developed aspart of campus.
(05:37):
The other 200 acres is just onthe west side of campus, and it
is the Crumb Creek Valley.
Um, and so it's 200 acres ofwoodland with a creek running
through it, and that's that'spart of campus.
It has several miles of trailswithin it and everything.
But the other 200 acres is allof our area around academic
buildings, um, all of ouradministrative buildings,
(05:59):
athletic fields, and it's allthe Scott Arboretum.
So we don't have a separatearboretum that is separate and
distinct from the campus, butthe entire college campus is the
arboretum.
Uh so you know, we have uh allof our uh woody plants are
accessioned, computer mapped,all of that kind of thing.
Um, and so we have quite anextensive collection.
(06:21):
Um, and my role as executivedirector is to oversee all the
operations that are as part ofthat.
So we have an associatedirector of grounds operations
that takes care of all of ourturf, our athletic fields, um,
all of our paving areas, ourstormwater management uh
structures and programs, um, allof our faculty housing
(06:45):
properties and snow removal, iceremoval, you know, all of that
kind of thing, and all of ourtree care.
We also have another group thatis our horticulture division.
And so that is all of ourgardeners and uh and their
various supervisors so to carefor all everything that is, you
know, the crumb woods, as wellas all of our plant collections
(07:08):
and our garden areas on campus.
So we aren't just an arboretumwith a collection of trees.
Uh, we actually were working wechanged our name uh a little
while ago to Scott Arboretum andGardens, because really what
we're known for are collectionsof plants within our garden
spaces.
So we have some very intensivegardens like our uh our rose
(07:28):
garden, which was started in1957.
Um we have a pollinator'sgarden, we have several
courtyard gardens that havedifferent landscape features
associated with them.
We have a new root root andnewly reestablished winter
garden, um, so a number of thosegarden spaces.
(07:48):
And we still have our plantcollections, so uh collections
such as uh our collection ofcherry trees, our lilac
collection, viburnum collection,our famous Magnolia collection
and Holly collections.
Uh, there are a couple of ouroldest ones, a large pineedum
area.
So all of those are all aroundcampus and completely
encompassing campus.
(08:09):
Uh, and then our third groupwithin our structure of Scott R.
Breeman Gardens is our uh wholegroup that deals with uh
learning and communityengagement.
So we have a volunteersprogram.
So we have over 200 volunteersthat help us either with
gardening or in ourhorticultural library or our
(08:29):
events.
Um, we have a big educationprogram.
Um Swarthmore College isundergraduate liberal arts
college, but horticulture is nottaught here.
Uh, so it's a kind of an ironicthing, and I'll tell you kind
of our mission and backgroundand why that is in a minute.
Um, but we have educationalprograms.
We co-host a big perennialsconference, which is coming up
(08:52):
in October, and we'll get around500 people here for that.
Woody plant conference in thesummer.
We have lectures, workshops,day-long trips, multi-day trips,
uh, lots of other kinds of uhum learning and engagement types
of things that we do.
And then we also have um umkind of community and family
programming.
(09:12):
So we have different thingshappening here on campus as part
of the Arbretum, really toteach people about nature and
the outdoors and plants, uh,trying to start at a really
young age to do that.
And then we have a persontotally devoted to uh campus
engagement.
So this would be things thatwould involve mainly students,
but also would involve facultyand staff too, in somehow
(09:35):
learning about the arboretum orour naturals areas or plants or
nature in their daily lives.
So that's kind of my role is tooversee all of those various
aspects of what makes up ScottArbitum in Gardens.
Sandy Feather (09:49):
So sorry, long answer to a short that sounds
like you have your hands full.
Speaker 1 (09:55):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Uh all together, uh, on ourstaff, we have 28 people uh to
do all those various things.
Everyone from a um a mechanic,uh the folks who take care of
our athletic fields, ourgardeners, and all of those
people working in uh education,community engagement, um, our uh
fundraising aspect, um,publicity, um, communications,
(10:18):
all of that kind of thing, ourvolunteer program.
So uh all 28 of us doing thatkind of thing.
Margaret Pickoff (10:24):
And you had mentioned earlier um that these
different departments were usedto be separate and that they've
made the decision to unify theminto sort of one large
department.
Um and it seems like there areother public gardens um in the
area that are kind of takingthat um that strategy.
(10:46):
I I know that Morris recentlychanged their name from Morris
Arboretum to Morris Arboretumand Gardens, and I kind of
wonder if that has something todo with it.
But I wonder from yourperspective, um, what's behind
that kind of desire to unifyeverything?
Speaker 1 (11:02):
Yeah, well, let me talk about the name first.
Um I think it uh at one pointwe were called the Scott
Foundation up until the 1980s,and uh that's what the the
original uh donors that startedthe Scott Arbridom had set it up
as a Scott Foundation.
And um we would constantly getletters from groups wanting us
(11:25):
to give them money because theythink of a foundation, and
that's what foundations do, butthat's not what it was at all.
So at some point it was changedto the Scott Arboretum because
that was kind of the lingo atthe time for places that had
plant collections, and then overtime we moved more to not just
you know a plant collection, notjust having uh, you know, a
(11:46):
lilac collection over there andthe viburnum collection over
there and the tree peonycollection over there, but to
move to where we are integratingall those collections into
design spaces.
Um and so uh that became kindof the the idea of well, we're
more about gardens.
And a lot of our public now,they don't know what an
(12:08):
arboretum is.
Okay, so it's kind of a youknow, almost an antiquated word
for a lot of folks, and theydon't understand what an
arboretum is, but theyunderstand what we mean by
gardens.
So it's got arboretum andgardens, and so I think that's
why a number of otherinstitutions are also adding
that and gardens onto theirname.
Sandy Feather (12:27):
I know the the Pittsburgh Botanic Garden has
definitely taken that approach.
They're not gonna have thelilacs here and the viburnums
here and whatever, they're gonnabe incorporated into garden
spaces throughout the property.
Speaker 1 (12:39):
Yeah.
So the the college started in1864, as I said, but um the
arboretum did not start at thattime.
So as I said, it's anundergraduate liberal arts
college.
Uh in 1929, um, two graduatesof Swarthmore College who
graduated in the 1890s, Mr.
and Mrs.
Scott, hence we get the ScottArboretum, um, set up the
(13:02):
endowment, which started theScott Arboretum in 1929.
And the mission of the ScottArboretum, as they outlined it,
and in this is kind of medistilling it down into kind of
today's lingo, was to grow anddisplay the best plants uh that
did well here in the DelawareValley area to inspire home
(13:23):
gardeners.
So it wasn't about a botanicalcollection for the biology
department, it wasn't a uh arepository for botanical study
or anything like that.
Uh, it really was a collectionof plants to inspire home
gardeners.
So at that point, um, you know,people could come out and they
could look on campus and wereopen every day of the year from
(13:46):
sunup to sundown, no admissionfee, no gates, no fencing, you
know, just come on campuswhenever you want to during
daylight hours.
And you can walk around campus,you can uh take a look at our
plant collections, all of that.
But when they originally set itup, it was these different
groups of plants kind of plantedin different areas around
(14:06):
campus.
So if someone wanted to seereally nice magnolias, they
could come out, you know, inMarch and April and kind of see,
and it's like, oh, I reallylike that one better than that
one.
Oh, yeah, let me get let me getthat uh uh that one called
Pinky.
I really like that one, uh Iguess compared to some of the
other ones.
Well, that was good for pickinga plant, but that's kind of as
far as it would go.
(14:27):
And then um the Arbedum decidedwe really need to teach people
more, but how to use theseplants in their garden, also.
So then it was the idea ofokay, let's combine some of the
best plants we have into moregarden spaces.
And so kind of spaces inbetween campus buildings became
more intimate garden spaces.
(14:48):
Because in reality, therearen't that many suburban
gardeners that have 200 acres tolandscape, but they might have
this small space that it likeexisted between gardens or
gardens that or buildings thatwould kind of form a kind of a
courtyard space that could bedesigned.
It's like, oh, I couldtranslate that into my front
(15:09):
garden, or that look, I could dothat off of my patio and do
something like that.
So around the 1980s, it startedbeing more of, oh, let's take
those courtyards and let'sincorporate many different
plants in there.
So they're really more designedgarden spaces representing all
different types of conditionsand structures around them and
different sizes and spaces andeverything.
(15:30):
So that's kind of how all ofthat happened from the very
beginning to what we are today.
Margaret Pickoff (15:37):
It's interesting.
Before we started recording,um, we were talking about how
you um you used to be anextension um agent for Penn
State, like us.
Um, and and that you when youstarted, it was around the time
that the Master Gardener programwas starting up and there was
kind of a shift.
Um, this was before I was born.
(15:58):
But a shift from what Iunderstand, a little bit kids
towards, I know, um, towards uhconsumer horticulture.
Um and so recognizing, okay,people have properties, they
have questions, they're gettinginterested in gardens.
So and the horticulture agentcan't spend all day answering
questions from the public.
So we need to train thesevolunteers to do this.
(16:20):
And it's interesting, likearound the 80s, when um when the
Scott Arboretum also kind ofhad that awareness that, okay,
um, like the average person isnot gonna have like a magnolia
grove.
Um, they're gonna have like andand all these other things in a
(16:41):
smaller space.
Um, so I think that's a coolexample of kind of how the the
use of the grounds kind ofshifted in in relation to what
the public needed.
Speaker 1 (16:52):
Yeah.
So yeah, so I was anundergraduate at Penn State in
horticulture from 1978 to 82.
And that was like a big peakfor enrollment in horticulture
departments all around thecountry.
Um, it was kind of like the thegreen revolution time.
And, you know, at that point,like people were rediscovering
(17:13):
house plants and tractor trailerloads of foliage plants would
come up from Florida to variousplaces.
And you know, you couldn't goto a new restaurant or cocktail
lounge and there weren't fernshanging from the ceiling.
Uh, so it was like a really bigtime for people kind of
discovering plants, whether theybe indoor house plants or
(17:35):
outdoor gardening, that kind ofthing, uh, vegetable gardening,
all of that stuff.
So lots of people getting intohorticulture.
And then uh I graduated fromPenn State degree in
horticulture.
Uh, my emphasis was actually inplant breeding.
Uh, so I had a history of that,uh, working in the hort
department at Penn State anddoing research uh on plant
(17:57):
breeding.
And um then I went on tograduate school at North
Carolina State, and I wasbreeding small fruit crops, uh
mainly focusing on grapes, but Ialso worked on brambles and I
also worked on peaches too.
Um, so doing that in graduateschool.
And it was a summer between myjunior and senior year.
(18:20):
No, yeah, actually between myjunior and senior year at Penn
State, um, I did an internshipwith Penn State Cooperative
Extension, and I was doinghorticultural work in Lebanon
County, Pennsylvania.
So I was there for the wholesummer.
Uh, and I was doing basically alot of home horticulture stuff,
but I would go out with the oneof the other agents if they
(18:42):
would do commercial calls andall of that kind of thing.
Um, I was in graduate schooland I was finishing up, and I
was actually planning on goingon for a PhD at that time, but
my car died and I had no money.
And uh a one of the extensioneducators from Penn State called
me up at North Carolina andsaid, We know you're gonna be
graduating soon.
(19:02):
And we have this position thatis open.
We're just seeing if you mightbe interested.
As I said, my car died and Ihad no money.
And uh it's like, okay, yeah,I'll take that job.
And I think I would do that forjust a bit and go on for a PhD.
Um, but uh it ended up beingthe role of a essentially a
multi-county horticultural agentworking with commercial growers
(19:23):
here in southeasternPennsylvania, uh, and I was
headquartered in DelawareCounty.
And uh at that time,horticultural agents in each of
the counties around here, wekind of had our specialties.
So I became the specialist forsmall fruit production.
Uh, also I worked withgreenhouse growers and I worked
with the arborist industry.
So those were kind of the threebig things I was working with.
(19:45):
And then a fellow agent wasworking on turf, and another one
was working on tree fruits, andanother one was working on
mushrooms, and another one wasworking with uh nursery
producers.
Um, so we all kind of had ourspecialties that we would share
back and forth and help to doprogramming for that.
And it was while during thattime I got to know the folks at
the Scott R.
Reedom, they had a job open.
(20:07):
It's like, okay, I'll try that.
And uh I've been here 35 yearssince then.
Speaker 2 (20:13):
So yeah.
Um definitely found your place.
Speaker 1 (20:16):
Big changes uh yeah in the industry, you know,
during that time and kind of thethe emphasis of what what
people were doing.
So it's interesting to kind ofsee how things have changed uh
over that time.
Sandy Feather (20:29):
And it's interesting that you remember
like the beginning of the MasterGardener program here in
Pennsylvania because it hasreally grown into a huge, huge,
very successful program.
Speaker 1 (20:40):
Yeah.
So when I started in DelawareCounty, I mean I was doing that
regional work, but then youknow, I was still the
horticulture agent for DelawareCounty.
And we would have you know somany calls during the growing
season that actually we hadenough of money that we would
hire a part-time person whowould come in.
I think at that point it waslike three days a week.
So anyone who had calls, it'slike, okay, call back on
Tuesday, Wednesday, or Thursdaybetween you know nine and three
(21:03):
in the afternoon, and you'll beable to talk to someone because
I couldn't sit at the desk allthe time and I couldn't answer
all of those calls.
Um, and so we had the persondoing that.
And yeah, then just towardsthat the that time in the uh the
kind of the mid to late 80s,there started being some
programs of this this mastergardening program, and I know it
(21:24):
was happening in some otherstate, I can't remember exactly
where.
Sandy Feather (21:27):
Uh I want to say we kind of got it like start in
Washington state or Oregon.
Speaker 1 (21:33):
I I really don't, I really don't remember.
Sandy Feather (21:34):
Yeah, yeah.
David Gibby is the educator whowho started it.
Speaker 1 (21:39):
Yeah, and at the same time, we were working with
urban gardening.
Okay.
So the uh the Philadelphiagroup of cooperative extension
was way into urban gardening,and I was able to get a really
large grant that we werestarting an urban gardening
program in the city of Chester,which is in Delaware County.
Uh, and so we were able to hiretwo people to kind of run that
(22:00):
program, the urban gardeningprogram in Chester, also.
So all those things were like,you know, really, really coming
on at that time.
Master gardening program, urbangardening initiatives and
programs, uh, as well as thisbig emphasis on commercial
horticulture.
Margaret Pickoff (22:17):
Yeah, um I do want to ask, um, well, I have a
lot of questions about how theum the arboretum functions and
how it has changed in terms ofvisitors and and responding to
what visitors like, but I dowant to start out by just asking
about the plants.
And obviously there's lots andlots of species represented
(22:38):
there um on all those acres.
And um I guess I I wonder justto like narrow it down a little
bit, if there is a particularplant collection um that has
sort of stood the test of timeas being either really um really
popular or really resilient.
(22:59):
Um, you know, you had mentionedroses and and roses are getting
harder to grow for a number ofreasons, as are a lot of plants
actually, that probably used tobe sort of the mainstays of
public gardens and and arborita.
Um, but I wonder, is there inyour time at Scott, is there a
(23:19):
plant collection that has kindof just continued to thrive
through that time and sort ofmaintain its uh its shine and
its draw?
Speaker 1 (23:28):
Um yeah, I would say there's a couple.
We have a really notedcollection of magnolias.
Um they've been we've had yourmagnolia collection for a long,
long time.
Um and when you say somethinglike that, it can be really,
really diverse.
Uh you kind of a collection.
So, and it's just interestingover time, some of the things we
were starting with.
So um Magnolia Virginiana, youknow, one of our native
(23:52):
magnolias.
It's really not native to thisarea, but just not far south
from here it is.
So you'll find it in Delaware,you'll find it in southern New
Jersey, uh likes really, reallymoist conditions and everything.
And we had a uh cultivar hereprobably since the 1940s called
Magnolia Virginiana VarietyAustralis cultivar Henry Hicks.
(24:15):
And actually, that was namedhere at the Scott Arboretum, and
it was named from Henry Hicksfrom the Hicks nursery on Long
Island, uh, an old, old nurserythat was there, been around for
generations.
Um, and that was a selectionbecause it was hardier and it
would hold on to the majority ofits leaves through the winter.
Uh, where if you could possiblygrow Magnolia virginina in this
(24:38):
area before, but they would bedeciduous, they would just drop
all of their leaves.
Uh so that that was you knowlike the one.
And since then, there are anumber of other cultivars, and I
think now you can grow MagnoliaVirginia quite a bit farther
north uh and west than what itwas previously.
So some things about you knowhow the climate has changed
(25:01):
during that time.
We did be we didn't used to beable to grow Lagostromia, crepe
myrtles.
Speaker 2 (25:06):
Okay.
Speaker 1 (25:06):
You know, we we had maybe one or two on campus.
Um if we had one, we couldnever think of planting it in
the fall.
If we had planted in thespring, we would know probably
for the first three years itwould die back to the ground.
And these were some of thehardiest ones we were trying to
grow.
And then if we got it past yearthree, then it might have wood
that would be mature, rootsystem that's mature enough to
(25:29):
withstand having some upabove-ground stems that would
last through the winter.
Now we can pretty much grow anyof them.
Sandy Feather (25:35):
Yeah, not that they can still be dieback shrubs
for us out here in thehinterlands.
Speaker 1 (25:41):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Yeah, for us, they they don'tdie back at all.
And so we can pretty much growany.
But so you know, a magnoliacollection is really important.
We have a really uh extensivecollection of hollies, uh, both
deciduous and evergreen holliesand all different species.
Uh, we have a really oldpineedum collection, probably
one of our most uniquecollections, one of the things
(26:01):
we're really known for is ourtree peony collection.
And we do know that some ofthose original plants we have in
a collection date from around1930, 1931.
Uh, we have correspondence fromDr.
Wister, who is our firstdirector and our director for
many, many years, um about thoseplants.
Uh, and so we know that we havethat.
And we have a very goodcollection of Saunders hybrids,
(26:26):
Dr.
A.P.
Saunders, who was a, I think itwas a chemistry professor at
Hamilton College in upstate NewYork, and he bred peonies, tree
peonies.
Uh, he also bred herbaceoustoo, but we have a really nice
uh collection of his saundertree peonies, and they are kind
of going through this bigrevival right now.
Um, so since then I've starteduh co co-founded the
(26:49):
Mid-Atlantic Peony Society.
We have a big peony Paloozaevery year.
Uh we're actually hosting theAmerican Peony Society to this
area next May, first weekend ofMay, uh here in uh in Delaware
and Chester counties.
And um yeah, so that that'skind of a unique plant
collection that we have.
(27:10):
Uh, but you know, we have uhyou know a plant that's probably
kind of out of favor andfashion, the lilacs I'd
mentioned, but also, you know,viburnums and in a huge number
of different things, otherthings that we had.
Once perennials started gettingreally popular, and that was uh
in the 1980s, actually, is whenI was in Extension.
The first perennials conferencewas held during that time.
(27:32):
So this perennials conferencethat I said is coming up in
October that we host here at theScott Arbedom has always been
here.
It involves uh at one point umCooperative Extension was a
co-sponsor of it in the verybeginning years.
Now it is run and managed bythe Scott Arbor Breedham,
Longwood Gardens, Chanticleer,uh, Hardy Plant Society,
Mid-Atlantic Chapter, and thePennsylvania Hort Society.
(27:54):
So those are the groups thatkind of organize and run that.
And we will get 500 people inperson and maybe 100 people uh
virtual uh for that one-dayconference in October.
But at that point, perennialswere just getting started.
So it was you know Cedum AutumnJoy, and um oh, what were a
couple of the other ones?
(28:15):
Uh Penicetum, Alleopecyroides,Hamilin, uh uh Goldsturm
Rubecia.
Goldsturm Rebecca, those werelike the three biggies.
Uh and uh yeah, so uh it's comea long way since then.
So that was you know a reallypopular thing at the very
beginning.
But now, you know, uh youmentioned about the rose garden.
(28:35):
So we've had the rose gardensince 1957.
Um, and it was to honor one ofuh the dean of students for the
college, and it was right in themiddle of college, and it was a
relatively formal rose garden,not that it was rectilinear, but
formal beds of roses wherethere would be solid blocks of
each different cultivar of rose.
(28:57):
So it's mainly made up of thehybrid T's, the florabundas, the
grandi floras, had some postand chain around the outside for
the climbers and ramblers, andthen there was one other bed
that had some of the species andshrub roses in it.
All of the roses were plantedabout two feet apart from each
other, solid cultivar.
So you'd have a solid bed ofyou know, 30 Mr.
(29:18):
Lincoln roses, which weregorgeous when they would flower,
you know, in late May, earlyJune.
And then within a couple ofweeks, they would have no leaves
left on them from black spotand all of that kind of thing.
At that point, the roses weresprayed every 10 days to two
weeks, fungicide, uh,insecticide, and that's what the
program was.
(29:38):
Well, even when I started herein 1990, we early on, we started
experimenting with well, whatother things could we use?
Um, we had a big uh, and thiswas through cooperative
extension, we had a big researchuh project.
This was along with DaveShoshanik, who actually followed
in my footsteps in in DelawareCounty.
(29:59):
Um, and Rick Johnson at our IPMresearch program.
And we were working with GregHoover, who was a professor in
entomology at Penn State.
And we did a lot of research ongrowing degree days, plant
phonology, all of that kind ofthing was some of the big work
that we had done.
And we had, you know, oh, 12 or12 to 20 different
(30:20):
institutions, depending on theyear, collecting data to add
into that program.
Um, but at that point with theroses, we were trying things
such as baking soda on.
Uh so all these differentthings to try to control some of
the diseases like black spotand anthrachnose and all of that
kind of stuff.
Um, and then we started usingsome beneficial insects.
(30:42):
And all with limited success, Iwould say, for roses.
And then it was probably alittle more 10 years ago,
probably at least, maybe alittle more, maybe 12 years ago,
I finally said, okay, this hasgot to change.
This is an endowed garden oncampus.
You know, it's meant to be arose garden.
What can we do to make it moreapplicable to now here and now?
(31:05):
Okay.
We still need to have roses init.
So we started looking to seewhere we could get the best,
most disease-resistant rosesthat we had.
So you all probably rememberknockout rose, which is pretty
disease resistant.
So everything we were findingat that point were shrub roses,
okay?
And we didn't want a fullgarden just full of knockout
(31:26):
roses.
You know, there's knockout andnot much more at that point.
So uh we started finding otherbreeders, rose breeders who were
doing work with roses to reallylook for disease resistance,
especially is what they wereworking for, disease resistance.
We kind of figured outdifferent ways of managing the
insect part.
If we spread the roses apart,gave more air movement between
(31:49):
them, that if we planted othercompanion plants, other
flowering plants to attractbeneficial insects in, we
actually have very few insectproblems in our rose garden.
Yeah, if it's a bad year forJapanese beetles, we'll still
get that.
They're here for a couple ofweeks, then they're gone.
We just kind of accept that'swhat it is.
Uh, but diseases were still aproblem.
So we've uh actually what wedecided was we're not going to
(32:13):
have those solid beds of rosesanymore.
We're going to give each of theroses more space.
We'll still have blocks ofcultivars, but a lot of space in
between them, where we have allkinds of other plants,
everything from lavender andclematis and salvias and alliums
and all kinds of other thingsuh growing in between them.
Um, so that really has interestall through the gardening year,
(32:37):
uh, not just you know that timein May and June when roses
flower and then maybe somerepeat flowering in the fall,
but it's all through the year.
And then also realizing we'renot going to keep those same
cultivars of roses all the time.
Just because Mr.
Lincoln's been there from 1957.
Sorry, Mr.
Lincoln, you know, you'reyou're you've got every kind of
(32:58):
disease, we're not going tospray you.
Um, so it is actually um uh agroup in Germany uh that is
doing a lot of the research.
Uh and there are a number ofother ones now, they aren't the
only ones, but uh they have beenvery prolific in what they've
been introducing uh fordisease-resistant roses.
And those are available in theUS now.
(33:19):
So we participated a number ofyears with the American Rose
Trial for Sustainability, ARTSarts program.
And we had a whole separate, wehave a whole separate nursery
area, and we would do trials,blind trials of roses to see how
they did in this area.
Uh, and then we'd feed thatinformation back, and then I
would go into a trial, then thatinformation would get published
(33:39):
to the public.
So we have a good set of rosesnow.
As we get newer and betterthings, then that's you know,
five years ago, there's afabulous rose we were growing,
Julia Child, uh beautiful color,nice, uh more of a short
floribunda.
Sorry, Julia, you're just notcutting it anymore.
You get you get black spot moreeasily than some of these other
(34:01):
ones.
So I don't think we're gonnahave Julia Child in our rose
garden a whole lot longer, butwe have many other ones that are
doing really well.
So that's one of the ways it'slike just that one garden space,
how it's changed.
Uh and we don't use we actuallyin that rose garden, uh, we
were saying that it it actually,since we did that change, it
was organic.
So we weren't doing any spray,it was all totally organic.
(34:25):
Starting last year, we had themodifying that saying it is now
sustainable because we're havinga problem with rose rosette
disease.
Sandy Feather (34:33):
I was just gonna ask about rose rosette.
Speaker 1 (34:35):
We have rose rosette disease, and we're trying to
break the cycle of the area fyedmite.
So we are using a mitocide, butthat is the only chemical that
we are using in the rose garden.
Everything else about it isorganic.
So we're not organic, we'resaying it's sustainable now
because we're using thatmitocide.
Sandy Feather (34:53):
How are you scouting for those mites?
Speaker 1 (34:56):
Every week, we're actually we have some volunteers
that we've trained uh actuallylooking for the rose rosette.
Uh it's almost impossible toscout for them because they're
tiny, they're minuscule, yeah.
Yeah, they're very tiny and andthey want to be in those buds,
yeah.
So yeah, so you really can'tsee them.
So we look for the symptoms,trying to eliminate the symptoms
(35:17):
uh, you know, as soon as wefind them.
So basically looking at everyplant uh all of that time like
that.
And if we see something that wesuspect, we rogue it out.
So we've lost lots of plantsover the past, you know, six,
eight years because of roserosette.
Um, hopefully at some pointwe'll have better choices of
roses that are more resistant torose rosette disease.
(35:39):
And I think you know, Texas AMespecially is working on that in
some other places.
Sandy Feather (35:44):
So University of Tennessee was pretty involved.
Yep.
Speaker 1 (35:47):
Okay.
Yeah.
So that's that's you know, onegarden space and how it's
changed over the years.
Margaret Pickoff (35:52):
Yeah, I mean, I that is such a an a
fascinating example because Ikind of misspoke a little bit
earlier when I said it's gottenharder to grow roses.
And I think I was thinking roserosette disease because we hear
about that a lot.
Um but in this case and and ina lot of landscapes, um we do
have really uh species that havebeen really important parts of
(36:17):
landscapes for a long time inour region that are starting to
suffer from various kind ofclimate stressors and drought
and just the changing growingseason.
Um in this case though, it'skind of it's it's kind of like
our tolerance for doing weeklyfungicide applications has also
(36:38):
changed.
And and I think that's trueamong the public, and I'm sure
you know the college students ifyou ask them, and and so it's
such an interesting strategythat kind of um aligns with the
greater theme of of sort ofdiversifying, like rather than
having it used to be veryfashionable to have you know a
(37:01):
lot of the same plant in onearea, and look how beautiful
this looks, and it's veryuniform, and and it just seems
like the theme is adding in morediversity, and within that,
that kind of creates a moreresilient, um uh maybe disease
pest resistant uh collection ofplants.
And so you haven't had tocompletely get rid of the rose
(37:25):
garden, and I'm not sure you'reable to because the endowment,
but it's an endowment.
But I think that's a reallyinteresting example of kind of
um the the spirit of this gardenis still the same, and we're
still you know enjoying thisplant uh and and um you know
allowing visitors to experienceit, but it's just in a slightly
(37:46):
different configuration um sothat we don't have to be
constantly spraying and um yeah,so I think that's a really cool
example.
Speaker 1 (37:55):
We have a uh one late afternoon evening in late May.
We have our rose celebration.
So we'll have food and drinkand talks and tours about the
rose garden, and we'll have abunch of giveaways, and that's a
couple of food trucks here, butwe give everyone who comes who
wants a rose plant that is oneof the newer disease-resistant
(38:16):
roses.
So it's like, yes, you can growthis in the garden and you
don't have to spray it fordiseases.
Uh so it's one of our way oftrying to get some of these
better plants out to people.
And you were mentioning aboutuh how the students'
appreciation of things.
Uh, we have several acres oforganic lawns on campus, and
it's the main lawns thatstudents are using, okay?
(38:37):
Where they where they playfrisbee, where they want to, you
know, lay out in the sun with abook on a nice sunny day and
that kind of thing, uh, wherethey just want to gather with
their friends and chat, thatkind of stuff.
And we have a new um diningcenter and community commons,
and all around that building aremeadows.
So now in their third andfourth year, uh, around some of
(39:02):
them, and they are lookingreally spectacular right now.
I mean, even with the dryweather, yeah, some of the
things came and went a littlefaster, but you know, and it's
on a slope too.
Uh but a number of thoseplants, it's like, okay, they
can handle that and they canstill flower, you know, the
asters or actually not asters,they're now symphiatricums are
in flower now, and uh, you know,a number of other things.
(39:23):
So that is like a real changein how campus looks uh from 30
years ago.
Sandy Feather (39:30):
And it's interesting, my office just
moved uh from uh a non-PennState building uh to one of the
Commonwealth campuses.
That's the Greater Alleghenycampus.
And the man the groundsmanagers there are kind of
interested in turn they they mowa lot.
I honestly don't know how manyacres we have on campus, but um
(39:53):
they mow a lot and they wouldlike to mow less.
So they're looking to us to tohelp them maybe come up with
some meadows, which would bewonderful.
Speaker 1 (40:04):
I mean, meadows are a whole different thing.
And actually, it is something Ireally need to learn about
more.
Uh, and I keep encouraging mystaff.
It's like, okay, I need acouple of you to get really
excited about meadows because Ineed help with them.
Um, I kind of did that withgreen roofs.
Okay.
We have a number of green roofson campus, and much of that
(40:25):
came from my association with uhDave Beattie and Barbara Age
from Penn State, Penn Stateprofessors in the Hort
department who are doingresearch on green roofs.
And I was co-teaching a classhere at the college in
engineering, and I'm not anengineer at all, but it was on
water, water management andstormwater.
(40:46):
And that's something I had tobe responsible for here on a
campus.
Um, and so the class duringthat semester was really looking
about stormwater management,and green roofs were just a
really brand new thing at thattime.
So I brought Dave Beattie downfrom Penn State.
He gave a lecture to them, andthen we started studying it
more.
And there was one row house infell in Philadelphia where the
(41:08):
owner had put a green roof on.
So we went and took a look atthat and talked to the owner.
Um, and then we started talkingto other people.
Lo and behold, two years later,we put a green roof on a
student residence hall, thefirst one in the United States.
Uh, and that happened here, andnow we have green roofs on many
(41:29):
of our buildings.
Yeah.
Nice.
But if the building doesn'thave solar panels on it, it has
green roofs on it.
Nice.
Yeah.
Margaret Pickoff (41:37):
Um, I did want to ask, and you have you had
mentioned um the perennial plantconference and um, I think the
Woody Plant Conference isanother one that happens at
Scott.
Speaker 1 (41:47):
Um yeah, so the uh the perennial plant conference
is Friday, October 17th thisyear.
Uh, and you can go online uhactually to any of those
sponsoring organizations or justuh Google Perennial Plant
Conference and you'll get to it.
Registration's still open forthat.
And then the Woody PlantConference typically is in
mid-July, and that's a one-dayevent, and that's also on a
(42:10):
Friday in mid-July.
Margaret Pickoff (42:11):
So and and obviously this is a pleasure.
Um sorry, Sandy.
Um I was gonna say thatobviously this is a
long-standing collaborationbetween you'd mentioned
Chanticleer, Longwood, HardyPlant Society, and um PHS.
Um and I just kind of wonderbecause here in Southeast PA, we
(42:33):
are totally spoiled by thenumber of horticultural
offerings.
And I just wonder, um, youknow, like uh what um what do
you gain from a collaborationlike that?
Um obviously, I mean, I Iassume that it it helps in in
all sorts of ways, but can wekind of talk about what that is
(42:54):
like to be part of that?
Speaker 1 (42:56):
Well, it's just great to have such a division of
labor because there are a lot ofthings to do.
I mean, if you think about,okay, who are we gonna have for
speakers?
Okay, the more people that areyou know represented in a
meeting room, then the moreideas you have for speakers.
Then you have to contact thespeaker and you have to kind of
figure out what they're gonnatalk about and then do the
write-up.
So someone has to do thebrochure, which they do at PHS,
(43:16):
someone has to do the publicity,which Santa Claire handles much
of that.
Someone has to take care of theregistration, Longwood takes
care of that.
Here at the Scot ArbreBreedham, we we have the
facilities, we host it.
We always we have it at thattime of year in October because
that's fall break.
And so all the students are onbreak that week.
Therefore, we can use you knowthe big facilities of the
(43:36):
auditorium and all of that.
Um, so just having that kind ofsynergy with all of those
different groups represented,and it's a great way to talk to
the neighbors too.
Sometimes you can get soisolated, even though we have a
bunch of horticulturalinstitutions around the area, if
you're all doing your ownthing, you're not talking to
each other.
But I I think it here insoutheastern Pennsylvania, we
(43:59):
really have a closehorticultural community.
I mean, we have a couple ofother programs too, um, at
Gardens Collaborative, um, thethe Philadelphia, the Greater
Philadelphia Gardens Group.
So where everyone's kind oftrying to cooperate.
And even you know, thestatewide organization uh of
Pennsylvania of uh publicgardens uh has a a group for
(44:21):
promotion of gardens, uh publicgardens and what they mean for
the residents of Pennsylvaniaand visitors.
Um so there are all those typesof collaborative things that
are going on.
Um so really you can get somereally good energy about all of
that.
You know, then the PhiladelphiaFlower Show.
Most of us in the public gardenworld, you know, we volunteer
(44:41):
for a day or more helping to puton that big show.
Uh and you know, PHS couldn'tdo it all themselves just for
that thing.
Yeah.
Margaret Pickoff (44:50):
Yeah, I'm sure that it it helps to be able to,
when you're experiencing somesort of challenge to
horticulturally or the way thatthe uh the organization's being
run, or you know, uh things arechanging, which is kind of a
theme throughout this wholeconversation.
Speaker 1 (45:07):
And um You know, and we have we have great bigger
groups too.
You know, I've been a member ofthe Perennial Plan Association
for a long time.
They have a great yearlymeeting and regional meetings
now that are very good.
Um American Public GardensAssociation, which is kind of
the professional organizationfor public gardens.
Uh, they have regionalmeetings, and actually I think
there's going to be one out inPittsburgh soon.
(45:28):
Um, and uh there are uh otherorganizations.
So I always tell people ifyou're really passionate in
plants, join a plant society.
You'll meet a bunch of weirdpeople.
But uh, you know, I said aboutthe Mid-Alantic Peony Society,
so I'm active in that, and wehave a program coming up uh at
the end of October, October forour we call it our dig and
(45:50):
divide, where we teach peopleabout fall is the time for
digging your peonies anddividing them, and we show them
how to do that.
And so we'll show them forherbaceous peonies and the
intersectional hybrids, theetopes and tree peonies.
The other night we were had uhover subscribe for tree peony
grafting, because that's howtree peonies are propagated.
(46:11):
So we're teaching people how tograft tree peonies, and it's a
really, really weird graftingthing.
So, how because you're taking ajust a one or two bud piece of
your cyan and grafting it ontoan herbaceous rootstock, so it's
the weirdest looking thing whenyou're finished because you
keep it buried under the soilfor a year and it'll sprout next
spring, and you'll have a newtree peony that's using that
(46:34):
herbaceous peony as a rootstock.
Grafting are also I'm involvedin the International Clemidist
Society, so very involved inthat group.
But I really enjoy the plantsociety things.
Margaret Pickoff (46:45):
Yeah, that seems like a great way to get
information and um share uhvaluable, you know, uh insights
and experiences.
Speaker 4 (46:55):
Um and you just meet a bunch of other plant geeks,
it's a wonderful thing.
Sandy Feather (47:00):
Yeah, that's what we like.
Margaret Pickoff (47:02):
Um well, um, Jeff, thank you so much for uh
for the conversation today.
It's been um I think that wecould probably keep you here for
a whole nother hour and ask youmore questions.
Um but it's just great to tospeak to someone who's
obviously, you know, reallyenthusiastic about this work.
Um and so we we always wrap upour conversations by asking our
(47:23):
guests what they like to do whenthey're not working.
Um so what um do you findyourself doing when you're not
at the arboretum?
Speaker 1 (47:32):
Um I'm really interested in art architecture
and food.
So I like to travel a bit.
So usually every year I'll douh a nice trip somewhere.
Um and much of my time reallythat I spend uh during decent
weather months, so basicallyfrom March through early
(47:53):
November, um, I have propertywith some cabins on it up in the
Pocanoos, and they are90-year-old buildings, and I'm
trying to rescue them fromcollapsing on themselves.
And so we're learning how to doeverything ourselves.
So I learned to be anelectrician.
So I've really two of thecabins so far, and I can do the
masonry work, we do thecarpentry work, putting in
(48:15):
windows, and all of that kind ofthing.
So, and it's on a beautifulmountain stream.
Um, in a in a very beautifulnorth slope that is a threatened
woods because there arehemlocks on it, which are not
well, and that's what shades themountain stream.
So sad.
Uh, we do have some beachesthere, but we're a north slope,
so not too many, but our beachesdo have the beech leaf disease.
(48:38):
That's something we're reallyworried about here at the
Arboretum too in our woodland.
We have some big stands ofbeech trees.
Sandy Feather (48:45):
Are you doing some some planting to uh try to,
you know, some of the uhalternatives to hemlocks or even
some of the the hybrids withsuga genensis, you know,
anything like that?
Speaker 1 (48:58):
At the mountain property, no.
I mean it's 50 acres, so it'dbe a lot to try to take on to do
that.
And also a north slope, veryrocky.
It it's a plant is growingthere because somehow it found a
bit of soil in between therocks.
unknown (49:12):
Okay.
Speaker 1 (49:13):
And so if you just think of going out and planting,
uh we still have a greatunderstory of rhododendron
maximum.
Nice, but those are suchthickets you could never plant
into the thing to grow.
So it's like we're just kind ofwaiting to see what happens.
So there's a good stand of umuh and I think what will
probably take over are uh yellowbirch and uh and black birch um
(49:36):
kind of take over.
Um, because you know we have alot of those around, and that
that seems to be like the firstsuccessional thing that will
come in, uh, even before redmaple will come in.
Okay.
So I think that's what it'll befor a while, and then who knows
what will be the next thing.
Yeah.
But so that's what I do.
That's what and fly fishingwhen I get a chance to do that.
Sandy Feather (49:57):
Yeah.
That was one of our passions.
Speaker 1 (50:01):
That's what I grew up in Belfont, so that's what I
kind of miss from that area.
Uh being able to go out and dosome fly fishing close by.
Margaret Pickoff (50:07):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (50:07):
Yeah.
Margaret Pickoff (50:08):
Wow, that all sounds really dreamy.
I hope you get a lot of.
Speaker 1 (50:12):
I wish I had more time to do all that.
Of course.
Some things to talk about.
Margaret Pickoff (50:17):
Um, well, hopefully this this fall we'll
get some some good time outsideand some good cabin time as
well.
Um, and um, yeah, again, we'dappreciate your time and and
coming to to share uh about thework that you do.
And um hopefully we'll be ableto follow up with you and uh and
you know hear how those uhthose yellow birches and all
(50:37):
those chooses.
All right.
Speaker 4 (50:42):
Okay, thanks so much, Jeff.
Speaker 1 (50:44):
Thanks for having me.
Really appreciate it.
Speaker 4 (50:45):
Thank you.
Speaker 1 (50:46):
Come and visit the Scott Arboretum.
Speaker 4 (50:48):
We definitely will.
Yep.
All right, all right, takecare.
Speaker 1 (50:52):
Take care.
Thanks.
Popular Podcasts
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
Ruthie's Table 4
For more than 30 years The River Cafe in London, has been the home-from-home of artists, architects, designers, actors, collectors, writers, activists, and politicians. Michael Caine, Glenn Close, JJ Abrams, Steve McQueen, Victoria and David Beckham, and Lily Allen, are just some of the people who love to call The River Cafe home. On River Cafe Table 4, Rogers sits down with her customers—who have become friends—to talk about food memories. Table 4 explores how food impacts every aspect of our lives. “Foods is politics, food is cultural, food is how you express love, food is about your heritage, it defines who you and who you want to be,” says Rogers. Each week, Rogers invites her guest to reminisce about family suppers and first dates, what they cook, how they eat when performing, the restaurants they choose, and what food they seek when they need comfort. And to punctuate each episode of Table 4, guests such as Ralph Fiennes, Emily Blunt, and Alfonso Cuarón, read their favourite recipe from one of the best-selling River Cafe cookbooks. Table 4 itself, is situated near The River Cafe’s open kitchen, close to the bright pink wood-fired oven and next to the glossy yellow pass, where Ruthie oversees the restaurant. You are invited to take a seat at this intimate table and join the conversation. For more information, recipes, and ingredients, go to https://shoptherivercafe.co.uk/ Web: https://rivercafe.co.uk/ Instagram: www.instagram.com/therivercafelondon/ Facebook: https://en-gb.facebook.com/therivercafelondon/ For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iheartradio app, apple podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com
The Joe Rogan Experience
The official podcast of comedian Joe Rogan.