Fuchsia Rescue!

A change in scenery, the team met at Arboretum Headquarters instead of MME for our Sunday meeting. In addition to continuing the critiques and presentations of all the teams’ designs, the team did some plant rescue! The Arboretum has an ongoing construction project that requires sections of the waterway to be closed for construction. Part of the process of construction means the entire surrounding landscape has to be removed before anything new is built. Therefore, many precious Arboretum plants would be destroyed in the process of construction. Since our mentors at the Arboretum requested some help salvaging a bunch of the California fuchsia, near headquarters, we decided to hold our meeting there.

The team quickly dug up the fuchsia, where we bundled it up and transported it to the Arboretum Teaching Nursery. They have great facilities there to quickly divide and re-pot the fuchsia. We were able to split the mother plant into nine flats of potential transplants! Although it’s a shame that many other plants at the construction site will not be able to be divided like so, at least Project Invigorate was able to save so much of the California fuchsia, Epilobium canum, a species that we often incorporate into our plantings.

For our next meeting, we will delve deep into each design, giving our final comments and suggestions before we begin to order materials and plants for the first site.