2025 was another eventful year at Secrest, both in terms of improving the diversity and sustainability of the gardens and enhancing the experience of our visitors. New, interesting, or otherwise notable plants continue to infiltrate all corners of the collection. The outstanding Secrest staff and I planted a total of 143 trees, 155 shrubs and vines, and 345 herbaceous perennial and groundcover plants in 2025. These new acquisitions represent 346 unique species and cultivated varieties (i.e., taxa) from 134 different genera.
The addition of 19 new flowering crabapple varieties brings the total number of Malus taxa represented at Secrest to 172. Perhaps the most notable of these are four different clones of Malus spontanea, Hall’s Crabapple, acquired as scion wood from the Morton Arboretum in Lisle, Illinois, and grafted by Paul Snyder. This rare, endemic Japanese species has performed admirably for decades at Morton in terms of disease resistance and other ornamental traits. In fact, a small specimen planted in the fledgling “Tree Walk” immediately east of the Landscape Plant Evaluation Garden featured handsome orange fall foliage in late October—a trait rarely seen in most cultivated crabapples due to early leaf drop from fungal infections like rust and apple scab. Our young M. spontanea is descended from Morton accession 116-45-1 which is a semi-dwarf tree featuring abundant white flowers and a dense, rounded crown of relatively petite foliage. It will certainly be a subject of enjoyment and evaluation in the coming years.
Another group of plants that continues to increase in number at Secrest are the intersectional or “Itoh” hybrid peonies. These crosses between the woody, shrub-like tree peonies and the more familiar herbaceous peonies combine the best of both groups by offering large, showy flowers, disease (powdery mildew) resistance, and a compact, non-floppy growth habit. Since the first two varieties (‘Kopper Kettle’ and ‘Bartzella’) were planted at Secrest in 2011, they have become visitor and staff favorites. Over the last few years, advancements in tissue culture propagation have made these highly sought-after plants more widely available—and substantially cheaper. With the addition of 8 new introductions from the Garden Candy® series from breeder Don Smith and Plants Nouveau, Secrest now holds over 30 different varieties of these beautiful perennials. Be on the lookout for even more of these fascinating plants at future Plant Discovery Day sales.
Perhaps the best place to see an eclectic mix of new plants is a completely new garden area just south of the Witch-hazel Walk. Dedicated to the memory of Charles Ofori and Ebenezer
Laing, a new circular walkway with benches and various trees, shrubs, and perennials was carved from an existing bed of mature winterberry hollies and tall junipers. The center planting bed created by the new walkway is affectionately known as the “donut hole” and is home to a pink-flowering hybrid dogwood known as Rosy Teacups® (‘KN144-2’). Another in a line of floriferous, disease-resistant dogwoods from Rutgers University, Rosy Teacups® is a complex cross between kousa dogwood (Cornus kousa) and C. nutallii, the West Coast cousin of our eastern flowering dogwood (C. florida). Nearby, another improvement on a long-adored garden favorite is Syringa vulgaris New Age™ White (‘G13103’). This novel white-flowering lilac boasts fragrant white flowers and excellent resistance to powdery mildew, which tends to render older lilac varieties downright hideous by midsummer. It was a generous gift from the International Lilac Society when members visited Secrest in May.
Finally, 2025 was a year of additional signage in and around the gardens. The long-overdue installation of basic wayfinding signage was the final phase of a grant awarded to Friends of Secrest by the Wayne County Community Foundation in 2023. Thanks to a series of 15 directional aids strategically placed along main routes of the arboretum, we hope to encounter far fewer visitors hopelessly disoriented by the garden’s meandering pathways. Second, two new interpretive panels highlighting common butterflies encountered in the arboretum were recently installed in Gayle’s Butterfly and Hummingbird Garden. We are grateful to several supporters and collaborators for making these informative features possible, namely Friends of Secrest Arboretum, retired OSU entomologist Dr. Roger Downer, and the late Dr. Skip Nault. Thanks to everyone else who helped make 2025 a great year at Secrest Arboretum!
–Jason Veil, Curator veil.11@osu.edu
