WILLAMETTE CHAPTERWILLAMETTE CHAPTERWILLAMETTE CHAPTER AMERICAN RHODODENDROAMERICAN RHODODENDROAMERICAN RHODODENDRON SOCIETYN SOCIETYN SOCIETY

http:members. http://www.arswillamette.org/ ARS Home Page: http://www.rhododendron.org

Meeting February 14, 2018 7:00 pm in the Carrier room (State Street entrance) of the

First Methodist Church on the corner of Church and State Streets, Salem

Speakers: Kathy & Wally Reed New Zealand Conference and Gardens

ALL VISITORS WELCOME

NEWSLETTER Willamette Chapter American Rhododendron Society

Volume 13 Issue 115 February 14, 2018

CALENDAR OF EVENTS

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February 14, 2018 Wally & Kathy R. New Zealand

March 14, 2018 Roger & Kathy L. Ireland

April 11, 2018 Bobbie Dolp Lord and Shryver Garden and Legacy

May 9, 2018 Pot Luck & Plant Sale

Minutes—Willamette Chapter ARS January 10, 2018

Following our usual get-together for the New Year at the Ram Pub, we gathered for our meeting, usual time and usual place. Usually there's coffee and tea and goodies to be devoured before, during and after the meeting. But by the time our Prez-4-Life, Wally Reed, could whack the microphone to call us all to order (he's lost the gavel), the coffee and tea fixings were there. But to our dismay no other refresh-ments were there to refresh us. Oh well...on we went. The goodies would show up eventually. Wally reminded us all that a year ago, almost to this very date, we had to cancel our meeting because to was too icy outside to be safe driving...or walking or anything else. Thankfully, so far this winter, we've had just the rain and semi-cold. Like late Oregon Willamette Valley weather. The truss show is coming up in April and there will be more information on it when we get a bit closer to the date. It will be held at Riverfront Park with the Friends of Bush House, a combination that's been very successful the last few years. Hillside Garden has received yet another financial award from the Compton Family Foundation. They've donated $10,000 to Bush Pasture Park, with $5,000 designated for Hillside. We are all sincerely thankful for their continued support. Wally asked if anyone of us knew where a rhodie named “Hendricks Park” to let him know. The one that was originally at the park has died and the Eugene ARS Chapter would like to replace it. No

one at the meeting knew of one, but maybe if the word gets out, someone somewhere will locate it. Anne Gross let us know that Steve Hootman, Direc-tor of the RSBG, will be speaking at both the Eugene Chapter ARS as well as the Siuslaw Chapter ARS. He'll be speaking in February. If you're interested in attending either (or both) meetings, the location and phone contact number for both Chapters is at the end of the newsletter. And our very own Wally Reed will be delivering a presentation to the Portland Chapter ARS meeting in Portland. (Your secretary neglected to write down what he'd be talking about, but I suspect it will be about Hillside Garden since he's been uno numero in that garden's development.) Steve Krasik is helping him with the technical stuff (i.e. computer stuff). So assume Steve will be with Wally every step of the way. April's meeting will be our “Annual Business Meet-ing”, which is when new officers and board mem-bers are voted in. Two of our appointed Chairs, Anne Gross (Nominations Chair) and Carol Lundin (Medals Chair) will carry out their duties. I'm as-suming Wally asked them before the meeting if they were still willing to be the Chairs.... Now we were almost to the highlight of the evening which was Dick and Karen Cavender's visit to the gardens of South Africa as well as their safari into the wilds. The perfect time to load up on more goodies and drinks, but the “assigned” portion of the refreshment table was short of refreshments other than the coffee and tea. No cookies or cake

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or other goodie were to be found. Glares were starting to go around the room. No one seemed to know who had not carried out the most important reason for the meeting...well, maybe the most im-portant next to the speaker. This usual passive bunch was starting to get un-passive. Keith White, Program Chair, sallied up to the podium to introduce our very own Dick Cavender, the eve-ning's speaker and the Gardens of South Africa. He really needed any introduction as he's been a mem-ber of ARS for eons and his R. occidentale is known by all rhodie growers. He's also a railroad buff (that makes three of them I know of in our Chapter). Hold on...stop the clock. Wally interrupted Dick be-fore he could get started. We were hoping that this signaled the arrival of the goodies. No, no such luck. It was, instead, the passing of the clipboard to sign up for the Portland Home and Garden Show. (Personally, I'd thought it was strange that a clip board for something hadn't yet made the rounds.) The show is in February, and Dick needs help with setting up, taking down, and manning the booth. Set-up date is Weds. Feb. 21 and take down is Mon-day, Feb 26. Your reward for helping in any way or manner and, yep, free admission to the show and free mulch at the Show's take-down. The clip board started it's rounds and no one any-where having any further business to interrupt Dick again, he started us off in the Cape of Good Hope area, that NOT being the Southern-most “tip” of the continent. It's actually Cape Point, very near Good Hope, and that's where he started. Their trip was 21 very full days and took them all over South Af-rica. He and Karen visited a good number of botanical gardens: Kirstenbosch BG, Karoo Desert National BG, Gootkop Natural Heritage area, and Sisulu BG plus two large rose gardens. Roses are very “big” in South Africa, growing between 400 to 500 varieties. Some of the major flowers Dick showed were the Protea, Heather & Cycads that were prominent but sadly none are hardy enough for our climate. Kirstenbosch also some wood cycad which are now so rare that those remaining have microchips to de-

ter their being stolen for the black-market. There were also a number of evergreen azaleas. Karoo and Gootcrop featured mainly succulents of every conceivable size, shape, description, color and size. Most of them were varieties of euphorbia, go-pher plant and “living stones”. They were displayed singly so you could see that in just a small space, the variety was amazing. Dick freely admitted that he would have loved to have brought some back for their garden, but, like the earlier named flowers, they would not survive in our weather. The Cavenders saw many more usual (to us) plants around where they stayed or walked, like a fig tree with semi-barren branches and the figs hanging from them in balls of fruit and leaves. Also the bot-tle trees, skinny and 40 feet tall and beds of Clivia about 100 yards long. There was the water bottle tree (not the same as the above) which is hard to describe. It's about 3 feet high with a huge (for its height) trunk and tiny throne-covered twiggy branches extending upward from the top of the trunk. Another site led them to what would be called an ancient forest, one of the few left in South Africa. There's very little old growth left in Africa due to the multitude of wild fires, a result of the prolonged drought, which have burned trees to the ground,. These areas are now being renewed with plantings of pine and eucalyptus. The Cavenders toured all over South Africa, hitting the major cities along the way. In Pretoria, the streets were lined with the most beautiful shade of blue flowers, the Jacaranda, which was in bloom, since it was spring when they were there. Pretoria is a “man-made forest” of trees, shrubs and flowers, as originally there was nothing there. They didn't see just flora and fauna. They also went to the Elephant Camp (and perhaps one other sa-fari) where they “roughed it” sleeping in a luxury room with a huge bed and all the plumbing you'd find in the Waldorf-Astoria. And they did see ele-phants, and kudu and rhinos, oh my. Add to that, giraffe, lions, crocodiles, zebra, tortoise, wart hogs and Cape buffalo. Add to that, a visit to the “jack-

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WORKDAY COMING UP The Smith Garden work day is March 24, 2018. Start around 8- 9 or when ever you can manage and work as long as you want. Bring gloves and your favorite hand tools. There are chores for all skill lev-els. Lunch will be served. We would really appreciate all the help we can get. I will be doing my sun dance but this will be a rain or shine event so come prepared. It is also a good opportunity to visit the garden. If anyone would like more informa-tion, give me a call at 503-625-6331. Directions can be found at www.rhodies.org.

Thanks, Dick Cavender

ass penguin at the mouth of the Storm River, and the weaver birds. The latter is a small, bright yellow bird that builds a nest for his mate out of leaves and mud shaped into a ball. If the love of his life doesn't like his creation, she'll tear it all apart. (To which some smarty male voice, sounding a lot like Paul Doellinger, muttered: “So what else is new?) At an ostrich farm, they stood on ostrich eggs which are so tough-shelled a man can put his full weight on one and it won't crack. Dick also got up close and sort of personal with a young ostrich who seemed to be clinging to him and several other peo-ple...or was it the other way around. In either case, his facial expression wasn't one of sheer joy! AND, they also visited the Congo Caves, which were just what it sounds like it would be: beautiful deep caves with the marvelous “carvings” that caves al-ways seem to have. Just think, all of this in just 21 days. Needless to say, the photos were wonderful. I won't go into the political stuff, except to say that each house in the cities has a 7 foot fence around it and tourists are totally discouraged from going ANY-WHERE outside after five p.m. In any case, it sounded like the trip of a lifetime. Finally, Keith and Mary Ellen White admitted THEY were supposed to provide the “goodie” part of the refreshments and they BOTH forgot. However, Keith promised: “WE WILL MAKE IT UP TO YOU WITH A POOL PARTY THIS SUMMER (2018)” We will all hold you to it. There being nothing to raffle or auction off, we ad-journed and finished off the coffee and tea.

Respectfully submitted, Mary Crofts – Secretary - WCARS

Spring Home and Garden Show February 21-26, 2018

Portland Expo Center, Marine Drive Portland The Society will have a booth and garden at the Spring Home and Garden Show. We need people to set up the garden, staff the booth, and take down the garden. Garden setup will be Wednesday, 2-21-2018 and take down on Monday, 2-26-2018. Bring your truck or trailer on Monday and take home a free load of mulch. We will need several willing workers to stack the wall, move bark and install plants. Booth shifts will be 3 or 4 hours and I hope to have 2 people in the booth per shift. This will al-low you to take turns looking at the show during your shift. Dick will have a sign up sheet at the January & February meetings. Our staff will receive free admission. Just go to the 'will call' desk and get your hand stamped. General admission to the show is $10.00 so this will be a bargain. On site parking is $8. Sorry I can't do anything about that. However, MAX does run out to the Expo Center. This is a great opportunity to meet new people, hand out information and sign up new members. No experience necessary! Hours are 11 - 8 PM Thurs - Sat and 11 AM - 6 PM Sunday. For the best selection of time and day, call Dick Cavender at 503-625-6331 or email him at red@redsrhodies.com.

PREMEETING DINNER February 14, 2018 pre-chapter Meeting dinner will be at the Ram Pub again beginning about 5:00 PM. The Ram Pub and Brewery is located at 515 12th St. SE, Salem, OR 97301, 503-363-1904, at the inter-section of 12th St. SE and Bellevue St. SE in Salem, OR. The menu is at: http://www.theram.com/menu-location/or-salem/. It is fully handicap accessible. Parking is behind the building off Bellevue St which is One Way East and off 12th St, which is One Way South, next to the Pringle Creek.

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Buds, Shoots and Leaves: Rhododendron De-flowered

A hand and arm provide scale; R. macabeanum really has huge leaves!

Many Rhododendron serve year-round as stunning broad-leaved evergreens. They can have glossy, textured or pubescent (downy) foliage in a wide range of greens, with lovely shapes and interesting branching and bark.

‘Noyo Dream’ has rich green glossy leaves, contrasting beautifully with the graceful, weeping

Dacrydium cupressinum. Say Rhodendron to most people, and they will envision shrubs dripping with large, showy blossoms. Indeed, the name comes from two ancient Greek words meaning ‘rose’ and ‘tree’. We toured the Mendocino Botanical Gar-dens and the nearby private Gardens at Harmony Woods last week, but we focused on ‘dendron‘, rather than ‘rhodo‘!

Large leaved Rhododendron macabeanum graces the stone bridge at Harmony Woods.

November is not the time of year when Rhododendron are thought to take center stage as garden divas, or are even believed to shine as notable members of the cho-rus. However, by selecting plants with attributes other than simply the showy trusses, one can have the exuber-ant floral display in spring, AND have gorgeous foliage, bark and structure all year round. The Rhododendron macabeanum, pictured above, has enormous leaves of bright, deep green, which are plenty decorative during the months that the plant is not in bloom.

R. ‘The Honorable Jean Marie de Montague’ has chartreuse buds, which are echoed in the

surrounding plantings. Rhododendron provide form and interest to the garden even when most of the other plants have gone dormant for the season. Like Magnolias, they set their buds the year before they flower, so they carry them through the fall, winter and early spring. Both their leaf and flower buds are structural, and are often contrasting colors of chartreuse, rusty brown or maroon.

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R. yakushimanum x ’Sir Charles Lemon’ is a beautiful shrub with rusty accents.

Many Rhododendron share another feature that requires closer observation, but provides fabulous year-round drama: contrasting leaf undersides. R. yakushimanum x ‘Sir Charles Lemon’, pictured above, while an attractive shrub from any angle, displays its hidden assets only when viewed from below:

The weak autumn sunlight warms up the cinnamon-colored undersides of the leaves of R. yakushimanum x

‘Sir Charles Lemon’ R. neriiflorum var. neriiflorum ‘Rosevallon’ is really coy. It’s an unassuming plant (which doesn’t even have a particularly showy flower) with narrow, deep green ellipti-cal leaves. Hidden beneath those leaves, however, are deep claret undersides, which match the tightly furled flower buds. This is a seldom seen plant–if you encoun-ter it, be sure to turn the leaves over!

Look at the way the buds and the leaf undersides are color-coordinated!

Other cultivars have extremely decorative leaves, with a range of colors and patterns far beyond what most of us associate with Rhododendron. This stunner, pictured be-low, which we saw at The Gardens at Harmony Woods, is

not available commercially, and it has been nicknamed ‘The Hybrid’ because it is a result of so many crosses be-tween both species and hybrids. There are others of similar hue, however.

This Rhodie reads ‘blue’ in the landscape, especially when contrasted with its deep green ruff of Cryptomeria j.

‘Ryukyu Gyoku’. Up close we can see that the blue cast comes from a fuzzy white coating:

Rhododendron ‘The Hybrid’ with its sugary coating. R. pacysanthum is another Rhododendron with silvery blue leaves.

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Rhododendron pachysanthum has silvery leaves that are decorative enough to be flower clusters.

There are even variegated cultivars, such as ‘President Roosevelt’, which provides plenty of interest in the au-tumn and winter garden. This beauty is part of the col-lection at the Mendocino Botanical Gardens.

Rhododendron ‘President Roosevelt’ at the Mendocino Botanical Gardens

Many Rhododendron also have deeply textured leaves, some of which are puckered, which is botanically de-scribed as ‘bullate’.

Rhododendron brachysiphon has shiny, bright green crinkly leaves

Then there is Rhododendron edgeworthii, which has not only texture, but cinnamon-flocked stems and leaf under-sides. The Gardens at Harmony Woods has a lovely specimen that we were able to examine in detail:

Rhododendron edgeworthii is worthy of close inspection

There are even Rhododendron that make their statement by the shape of their leaves. R. orbiculare subsp. orbiculare (that should make it doubly clear to all that the leaves are round!) has crisp green lily-pad leaves with chartreuse buds and veins. It is one of the most charming plants we encountered, and needs no flowers to assert its individuality or its garden-worthiness.

The leaves of R. orbiculare subsp. orbiculare look like lily pads

And did we mention the bark? Rhododendron are often big shrubs (remember that ‘dendron’ means ‘tree’) and when the larger varieties or cultivars get some age on them, some display gorgeous, peeling bark, often cinna-mon-colored. This Rhododendron ciliicalyx x formosum is one of the best:

This Rhodie, at the Mendocino Botanical Gardens, gives paperbark maple a run for its money

Or take a look at Rhododendron ciliicalyx, one of the ge-netic parents of the plant pictured above, planted amongst the ferns at The Gardens at Harmony Woods:

Rhododendron ciliicalyx If you must have fall color in your garden, don’t rule out Rhododendron for that, either. Some, such as the Exbury hybrids (commonly called azaleas) are deciduous and provide as much autumn color as maples and ginkgo. This one at the Mendocino Botanical Gardens caught our eye and drew us from afar:

Rhododendron ‘Exbury Hybrid’ at the Mendocino Botanical Gardens

This little R. ‘Washington State Centennial’ at Harmony Woods was in full fall glory when we visited:

Hard to believe that this is a Rhododendron! And if you think that the leaves only get a chance to show their glory in fall and winter, take a look at R. ‘John Paul Evans’ which, in a burst of confused enthusiasm, flushed new growth on one branch just in time for our visit to Harmony Woods:

R. ‘John Paul Evans’ has violet new foliage and large, textured leaves

This nuttallii form was a 2013 American Rhododendron Society pick of the year, and supposedly has huge, fra-grant blossoms. We fell in love with the crinkly violet leaves!

Wally and Kathy Reed in New Zealand The Reeds and the Malby’s traveled to New Zealand in October 2017 for the 73rd Annual Conference of the New Zealand Rhododendron Association October 27th to 30th in Feilding, NZ The Reeds traveled about NZ before and after the Confer-ence. The February 14th WCARS Chapter Meeting talk will be some of the Reed’s NZ adventures with and be-yond rhodys. The Malby’s adventures will be revealed in the fall of 2018 The Reeds NZ adventure started in Auckland, then they did the Hamilton Gardens, fumaroles in Rotorua, the Feilding Conference, Wellington and then on to the South Island with Christchurch and Woodbury rhodies. Our WCARS New Zealand members, Joy and Bernie O’Keefe have a beautiful nursery in Woodbury. Joy has just been elected President of the New Zealand Rhododendron As-sociation. It was a great honor and great fun to visit the O’Keefes in Woodbury and tour rhody gardens with them. All the North and South Island gardens we visited were beautiful, so the Reeds will share the rhodys of their second spring in 2017 in New Zealand.

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ONLINE SHOPPING AND THE ARS STORE

A REMINDER TO HELP FUND THE ARS Anytime you shop online for just about anything, please consider first going through the American Rhododendron Society Online Store. The ARS Online Store is reached by

the link: http://arsstore.org/ On this site you will find a very wide range of merchants who have agreed to give the American Rhododendron Society a referral fee of 4% to 25% on each sale "referred" by ARSStore.org. Just use a link from the ARS Online Store site to go to a merchant’s site and buy something like you normally would. You get the same low price and help the ARS. Wally Reed - President

MONTHLY EVENTS EUGENE CHAPTER

The Springs at Greer Gardens, 1282 Goodpasture Island Rd. Eugene. Second Thurs. Oct. to May at 7:30

SIUSLAW CHAPTER First Presbyterian Church 3996 Highway 101,

Florence, OR Third Tuesday of the month at 7 pm.

PORTLAND CHAPTER All Saints Episcopal Church

4033 SE Woodstock Ave, Portland, OR Third Thursday, and the program begins at 7 pm.

SALEM HARDY PLANT SOCIETY First Tuesday of the month 7:00pm

Salem Heights Community Hall 3505 Liberty Road S.

OREGON TRAIL IRIS SOCIETY Center 50+

2615 Portland Rd. NE Third Tuesday of the month 7:00 pm - 9:00 pm

TUALATIN VALLEY CHAPTER First Tuesday of the month at 7 pm Washington County

Fire District 2 31370 NW Commercial Street North Plains, OR 97133

DISTRICT 4 CHAPTER WEB SITES Arswillamette.org

eugene-chapter-ars.org rhodies.org (Portland)

siuslawars.org sworegonars.org

tuatitinvalleyars.org All other web sites can be found on

rhododendron.org Under chapters under web sites

All ARS Bulletins are now available on line at:

http://scholar.lib.vt.edu/ejournals/JARS/

REFRESHMENTS Karen and Dick Cavender

Willamette Chapter Officers President: Wally Reed.........…...503-588-3666 V-President: Programs Chair: Keith White ……….…..503-363-2815 Secretary: Mary Crofts….… .…...503-838-4122 Treasurer: Dana Malby ……….... 503-393-6463 Librarian: Dick Lundin .......…...503-585-8439 Newsletter: Editor: Dick Lundin .......……503-585-8439 Print. & Mail: Dick Lundin .......…...503-585-8439 Board Members: Tom Bailey ........…...503-364-7741 Bill Vagt ………………..503-581-8654 Greeter Susan Doellinger…...503-838-4884 Past President: Chuck Dehn.......…...503-362-9217 Web Site

Bob Bovee Predominant Flower Color: Yellow

Flower/Truss Description: Flower openly funnel- shaped, wavy lobes, 3” across, light yellow-greenish with light red in throat that ages to greenish. Ball-

shaped trusses with 10-12 flowers. Fragrant: No

Bloom Time: Early midseason Foliage Description/Plant Habit: Leaves narrowly

obovate to elliptic, acute to apiculate apex, cuneate base, 51/2” long, glossy, dark green, retained 3

years. Red petioles. Rounded, well-branched plant. Height: 2 feet in 10 years

Cold Hardiness Temp: 0°F (-18°C) Parentage: (seed Plant x Pollen Parent)

Degronianum ssp yakushimanum ‘Koichiro Wada’ x wardii

Elepidote (E) or Lepidote (L): E Hybridizer: Bovee