Remember that we saw the evolution of parking as it moved from up around the tower to down the hill in front of the Head House.

Now might be a good time to look at parking according to the Master Plan. In that plan there was to be a temporary parking lot by the temporary visitor’s center. This temporary visitor’s center is about where the Head House is, so the parking lot we are talking about here is about where the temporary parking lot would have been.

Anyway, this project was designed to make this spot more attractive. Following is a quote from the site files.

“Catalpa trees and boxwood shrubs were planted as a ‘green’ parking lot. Larry Kurtz with AHTS, Waterloo was the Landscape Architect. Waterloo City Forrester, Todd Derifield, planted the 14 catalpa trees.” (it would seem from the computer disk, that these were planted last year.) Driving into the parking lot, you will notice that it has been renovated and expanded. The parking area in the center of the parking lot will have 100 hardy boxwood shrubs to serve as bumper guards for cars. “The following photo shows the ultimate result of this project, it was taken three years after the project was completed.

College Pathway

This year we created a pathway for easy access from the college to CVABG on foot. A quote from the site files.

“Constructed a 220 feet long walkway to Hawkeye Community College from the parking lot and Head House. Also installed brick walkway in parking lot.”

Arrival Gardens

Here is another quote from the site files concerning activities for this year:

“As a long-time supporter of the Arboretum, Craig Ritland, Ritland Landscape Architecture, donated his professional services to design the Arrival Gardens. A variety of shrubs, evergreens and deciduous trees create a sense of mystery as visitors walk along the entrance path to the gardens and Arboretum. Craig envisions a layered effect to showcase multiple colors, shapes, sizes and textures which will be combined for aesthetic appeal.  Varied in texture and form, the Arrival Gardens stand as a welcome to visitors. The planting showcases trees and shrubs suitable for visitors’ home landscape.”         

“The shrub garden will be an extensive collection displaying both native and exotic shrubs. The native species could be located with the Sesquicentennial Forest and its native trees as its backdrop. Visitors will be able to see labeled plants grouped by species and new cultivars of the species selected for improved characteristics such as fall color, good fruit display and disease resistance. Viburnums, dogwoods, hazelnuts, chokeberries and elderberries, to name a few, will be planted along the south side of the perennial garden creating a beautiful backdrop for the floor display. On the north side of the perennial garden will be the exotic shrub display showing the best varieties of the lilacs, cotoneaster, forsythia, hydrangea, and spirea, old and new.”

To tie this new garden to the new direction for visitor traffic a brick walkway was created in conjunction with the new garden and it leads from the Head House to a gravel path to the kiosk installed last year and then turns to go through the Arrival Garden and up to tower hill. This has become the point of entry to the gardens from the newly renovated parking lot. 

Fall Harvest Festival

Let’ take a look at the event for this year

Tim’s Garden

If you recall the first garden planted was the Wattle Garden, it was on tower hill adjacent to the tower and just East of the entrance. It was used as one of the garden spots to display annuals. Looking at the site files I find this entry for this garden spot in the space in the file for history:

“Circle drive installed in 2005”

I believe this is when the Wattle Garden became a different garden, entrusted to the care of long time volunteer Tim Spengler. The reason I think it was in this time frame is because in those same site files is this entry for Tim’s Garden:

“The existing access drive to the radio tower from Orange Road is positioned at the safest location for visibility of approaching traffic on Orange Road. This driveway will need to be upgraded to provide the two-way access to the garden site for both visitors and to begin garden construction. In the future this will remain as a service access road. A temporary identity for the gardens will need to be developed at this location with planting and signage.”

Notice especially the bold type in that quote. It would seem that the Wattle Garden was one of those gardens that took on a “temporary” identity. That identity has changed again this year, and is now known as Tim’s Garden

This is obviously a photo taken in the fall but this gives you an orientation, remember back and you discover that this is the same spot as the Wattle Garden. You can even see those original fence posts on the left side by a tree where those Clematis were planted nine years ago.

So, let’s take a stroll around the grounds and see how the new gardens are developing and how the older ones are maturing:

From Director’s Notes: Planted 80 trees for windbreak, shade, and improve general collection

Not sure what these were.

Again, I close out this report with the fact that our people are always hard at work, there are hundreds of hours being put in by many wonderful folks.

Nancy Friedman working in the new Arrival Garden

Kelly Conrad

John Miller, long-time volunteer

It takes all of our wonderful volunteers

The Community Gardens have been a feature since the beginning and starting in 2005 we have some records of the people that planted one or more.

Carol Ackerman                     Howard and Roberta Craven

Jan Eardahl                           Rita Garertson

Diane and Jack Golden           Ann Herzog

Janet Ludolph                        Liz Rath

David Roberts                        Kevin and Susan Shreiber

Mary Severts                         Tim Spengler

Dorothy Wright

You can clearly see the site taking on a more definite outline with delineated path-ways and service road that now runs behind the children’s garden.