Virginia Rose Garden

The Vir­ginia Rose Gar­den was installed in the spring of 2009 by stu­dents in an Envi­ron­men­tal Sci­ence class. The site posed sev­er­al chal­lenges, includ­ing heavy runoff from the quad and salt spray in the win­ter, and thus the stu­dents chose plants tol­er­ant of a wide range of soil mois­ture and salin­i­ty con­di­tions. The site’s nat­u­ral­is­tic design requires lit­tle main­te­nance; nitro­gen-fix­ing plants (e.g. sweet fern and blue false indi­go) pro­vide much need­ed nutri­ents; and flow­ers, food, and cov­er pro­vide wildlife habitat.

The fol­low­ing plants are in the Vir­ginia Rose Garden:

Shrubs

  • Vir­ginia Rose (Rosa vir­gini­ana)
  • Arrow­wood (Viber­num den­ta­tum)
  • Sweet fern (Comp­to­nia pere­grine)
  • Sum­mer­sweet (Clethra alni­fo­lia)

Wild­flow­ers