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April 2023
A Publication of the Colonial Williamsburg Landscape Department
Seasonal Changes
After a mild and uneventful winter, the magic of the spring season has been on full display in the Historic
Area this week. It has been quite a show with dogwood, red buds, fruit trees, and tulips all blooming at the
same time! No wonder our visitors love strolling through the Historic Area at this time of year!
Governor’s Palace Ballroom Garden 4-6-2023
Landscape Department Transition
I want to bring you up to date on the changes taking
place with the Landscape Department. Last November
the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation Board of
Trustees voted to bring landscape maintenance
services back in house for the Historic Area, Merchant
Square, and the Museum properties. Nineteen new
positions were created and added to the 2023
Landscape Department budget, and landscape
manager and I have been extremely busy interviewing
to fill new lead horticulturist, horticulturist,
groundskeeper, arborist apprentice and irrigation
technician position. Three horticulturists, Patrick Nee,
Johnny Stafford and Jacob Eisenhart were promoted
to Lead Horticulturists and David Stull was promoted
to the Irrigation Technician position.
The Landscape Department assumed landscape
maintenance responsibilities for Merchant Square and
the Art Museum on March 1 and the Historic Area on
April 1. Many of the new groundskeeper and
horticulturist positions have been filled at the time of
this writing, but there are a few more to fill before we
are fully staffed.
We are in a state of transition, but it is an exciting time
for the department.
Page | 1
�Gallery
New Irrigation Technician: David Stull
New Lead Horticulturists: Patrick Nee, Johnnie Stafford,
and Jacob Eisenhart
New Horticulturists: Kaitlin Altland, Shomari Horton and John Ryan
New Arborist Apprentice: Tristyn Hosford
New Groundskeepers: L-R Jameel James, Cole McGee, James Griffin, Robert Coles, Rolanda Atkins,
Katie Barnes and Corey Jenkins
Page | 2
�Garden Programs continue to highlight
horticulture at Colonial Williamsburg. Several DIY floral
arranging workshops were offered early spring,
providing registrants tips on decorating in the
Williamsburg style with spring flowers. Our new tour,
Bassett Hall Trace, has been well received since it was
launched in April. Offered on Saturday mornings, the
tour focuses on Virginia's wildlife and native habitats
and ways to conserve Virginia’s forests. Colonial
Williamsburg’s Arboretum Tour in the Historic Area
discusses the colonial uses of trees and their
importance in our ecosystem today. During the
summer, the Arboretum Tour will be led around the
Griffin Hotel and focus on best practices for
maintaining trees. We hope you can join us on a tour
soon.
complete with irrigation, electricity, as well as roll-up
sides, which we have rolled up now that the weather
has warmed up a bit. We held a Master Gardener
training class for new Master Gardeners at the nursery,
where Scott, Melody, and Goldie taught them how to
propagate plants asexually via cuttings as well as how
to sow seeds in our greenhouse setting.
Currently, we are
arranging plant
pickups for the
historic gardens,
having meetings
about our longawaited and
necessary new
greenhouse
improvements,
and gearing up
Covered hoop house provided
for hosting the
protected winter storage for boxwood
Garden
and other plants
Symposium at
the end of the month. Scott, Melody, and Goldie will
be demonstrating various plant-related topics, so
maybe they’ll see you around!
Master Naturalist, Shirley Devan leads the weekly Nature
Walk on the Bassett Trace Nature Trail, Saturday, April 22nd
for a group of 13 visitors to Colonial Williamsburg .
Production Nursery Update
Colonial Williamsburg’s production nursery had an
amazing Christmas season. Our annual wreath sale was
very successful and produced a record profit for the
landscape department. The beautiful decorations were
completed by our wonderful volunteers, and they were
hung with the joint efforts of the landscape
department and our capable carpenters. Before we
knew it, Christmas was over and put away for next year,
and we started on our spring crop for the historic
gardens. So far, we have been able to grow almost
2,500 vegetables, 650 herbs, and 1,000 flowers, with
many more to come. A new covered hoophouse was
built to hold plants outside that aren’t quite ready for
the full strength of the elements. This hoophouse is
Thousands of vegetable and flower seedings in the production
greenhouse.
Page | 3
�Donor Event
On March 25th, the Landscape Department was
happy to host a tour of the Landscape Production
Nursery for the Burgesses and Goodwin Society
donor groups. Goldie Daniels demonstrated our
seed starting procedures, Scott Hemler shared his
Pelargonium collection and toured the group
through the greenhouse full of the beautiful
plants, Charles Gardener explained how he has
established a small tree nursery that supports the
Arboretum, Melody Mosbaugher shared the trial
garden area where we test new plants that may
be used in Historic Area gardens and we
concluded with Jon Lak sharing the plans for the
renovations that will be taking place at the
Nursery in the next year or two.
Melody Mosbaugher discussing heirloom plants.
We received so many positive comments from the
group and they enjoyed their afternoon with us
and we are quite sure the Landscape Department
made some new friends.
Goldie Daniels demonstrating seed starting of heirloom
vegetables and flowers.
Jon Lak sharing the plans for the improvements of the
production nursery.
Scott Hemler’s Pelargoniums in the glass house.
Page | 4
�Volunteer Highlight
Our wonderful Arboretum volunteers do so much for
Colonial Williamsburg Foundation and the Landscape
Department. During the past two years their team of
twelve Master Gardener Tree Stewards have led 51
Arboretum tours reaching more than 1,000 visitors on
the tours.
They competed inventories of all 310 acres of the
Historic Area, plus the Griffin Hotel Campus, Bassett Hall
Garden and the newly expanded Art Museum landscape
and a large portion of the greenspace areas. They have
identified over 560 distinct species of plants that make
up the Arboretum inventory and placed 750 plant
identification tags on trees and shrubs. During one of
their regular workdays the team planted new azaleas
and camellias on the Rockefeller Vista behind Bassett
Hall. Due to the deer pressure in the area, all the plants
need to be protected with wire cages until they are fully
established. It was quite a logistical task and required a
great deal of physical work, but the volunteers worked
tirelessly and were able to get half of the 40 plants in the
ground and protected by cages before they ran out of
wire. The remaining 20 plants will be planted at their
next workday scheduled in a week from now. Thanks to
the efforts of our Arboretum volunteers, the Rockefeller
Vista is becoming a real show place for blooming shrubs.
The mature rhododendrons on the site should start
blooming very soon.
Page | 5
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Horticultural Happenings
Description
An account of the resource
<em>Horticultural Happenings</em> newsletter is produced by the Colonial Williamsburg Department of Landscape Services to communicate items of interest about the plants, trees, and gardens under its care in addition to articles about the department’s latest achievements, activities, and outreach to visitors, donors, and fellow employees. It began in May 2019 and continues to the present. It was intended to be a monthly publication although there have been some gaps in its production.
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Colonial Williamsburg Foundation. Department of Landscape Services
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Colonial Williamsburg Foundation
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2019-
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Horticultural Happenings, April 2023
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Colonial Williamsburg Foundation. Department of Landscape Services
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Colonial Williamsburg Foundation
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2023-04