March 14, 1997




Crocus plants bloom as Landscape Services groundskeeper David Jacobs prunes perennials Tuesday in the gardens on the south side of Andrews Hall. (Photo by Richard Wright).


Putting New Plants on Trial

University Garden Benefits From Worldwide Diversity


By Diane Wilson
Landscape Services

One of the most exciting facets of work in a botanical garden or arboretum is the opportunity to put to the test new and unusual plants.

The Collections Policy of the university's Botanical Garden and Arboretum states that we might grow any plant that lives in Zones 2-6. That's a lot of plants, and only a percentage will fit the design and cultural requirements of the university's campuses. So the BGA staff devotes a portion of its time, nursery space and record-keeping skills to evaluating the performance of trial plants.

Botanical Garden and Arboretum staff who work with the trial programs include, left to right, Michele Beyer, Sandy Wacker, Jeff Culbertson and Kevin Christiansen. Seated in front is Emily Levine.

These plants are both woody and herbaceous, native and introduced species as well as new hybrids. Our staff works with the horticulture department and the Nebraska Statewide Arboretum to evaluate the performance of plants of interest. The China Plant Program is administered by Bill Gustafson, professor and extension horticulturist with the Southeast Research and Extension Center.

In fall 1995 the BGA received about 80 species of woody plants that had been grown from seed sent to Bill from a colleague at China's Beijing University. Some species have never before been grown in the United States.

The seed had been collected from sites in China and Tibet that would likely produce cold tolerant and hardy plants. Kevin Christiansen and Emily Levine of the nursery crew care for these plants and track their performance for Gustafson.

So far, the information required is pretty basic: Are these plants tough enough to make it through the harsh Nebraska winters? About half of them made it through the hard winter of 1996, and Christiansen and Levine say that if they can make it through our current cold season, these species are real survivors.

Although the China plants are still seedlings, some have already exhibited some promising characteristics. Some species of elm show an attractive purplish fall color and so far show no signs of elm leaf beetle damage. Christiansen's and Levine's observations of these plants are noted by plant production manager Sandy Wacker and entered into the plant inventory database that follow a plant throughout its life at Nebraska.

BGA also cooperates with the Nebraska Statewide Arboretum through two plant evaluation programs. The Plant Consortium Program began several years ago to test new or unusual species around Nebraska and track performance in different regions of the state. About 90 different plants are being grown.

There is also a NC7 program coordinated at UNL by the Nebraska Statewide Arboretum. Its objective is to test and evaluate cold-tolerant woody and herbaceous plants at sites around the Midwest. Some of those plants have proved their hardiness and usefulness and have been included in the campus landscape - fall baby's-breath and black chokeberry.

BGA has its own plant evaluation program, too. Several hundred varieties of woody plants on campus, both native and introduced, are being observed by staff for hardiness and adaptability to southeast Nebraska landscapes.

In addition to the evaluation programs, BGA staff are always on the lookout for new and unusual additions to the gardens. Several staff members participate in acquiring and maintaining the new additions. East Campus landscape supervisor Jeff Culbertson and plant production crew members Wacker, Christiansen, Levine and Michele Beyer all are involved with acquiring and monitoring new additions to campus.

Where are new plants found? Professional journals and magazines carry articles on new selections, and commercial nurseries feature new offerings every year. Sometimes seeds are collected during visits to gardens and parks in other cities. What kinds of plants are they looking for? Often it's for a plant which exhibits a particular design feature, like an early blooming ornamental grass that will tolerate part shade.

The new perennials are usually grown in the nursery for a year or two before introduction to the campus. During that trial period they may be exposed to a variety of conditions as well as different management practices. These trials can yield important information that determines if and where a selection will be placed in the campus gardens. Woody trials are often observed in the nursery for several years until they're of size to go out on campus.

Despite the extra effort required to maintain trial plants and track performance data over long periods of time, the staff agreed that it was rewarding work. Their enthusiasm was evident when each of them mentioned some of their favorites.

Christiansen is excited about several elms from the China program, as well as a plant called Securinega suffruticosa, which exhibits an unusual weeping form. He also mentioned Panicum virgatum 'Heavy Metal', a new selection of switchgrass which has an upright habit, bluish fall color, and doesn't set seed. Levine mentioned two Chinese shrubs which bloom in the fall. Indigofera pseudotinctoria has a beautiful blue flower, and she said that "Heptacodium micinioides smells like springtime when it blooms."

Wacker is anticipating the arrival of Corydalis flexuosa 'China Blue', a shade-loving perennial with true blue flowers and a long bloom time. Another current favorite is Lythrum 'Purple Dwarf'. Beyer mentioned two new perennials. Hemerocallis Happy Returns' is a daylily with clear yellow flowers that blooms repeatedly through the season, and a new variety of hellebore (Helleborus niger) with early blooms and new colors.

Culbertson mentioned two woody plants that he finds promising: the Swedish aspen, Populus tremula 'Erecta', is fast growing, pest free and used as a street tree in western North America. Nemopanthus mucronatus, or mountain holly, is a deciduous shrub native to New England known for its superior berry display.

Look for the best of these plants to be displayed in the garden in years to come!



Pound Middle School students Amy Benson, left, and Jenn Hopkins conduct a rainbow electrophoresis experiment Friday in their science class, which uses materials provided by the Biotech Footlocker. Looking on are students Brittney Clinton, right, and Heather Hulett, back. (Photo by Richard Wright).

University 'Footlockers' a Portable Storehouse of Scientific Discovery


By Karen Underwood
News and Information

The two 33-gallon green plastic tubs are stacked in a corner of George Veomett's lab next to a check-out sheet on which Veomett tracks the containers' comings and goings, and the number of students who have used their contents.

The "footlockers," as Veomett has dubbed them, contain equipment that area high school science teachers, who participated in a training workshop last August, may borrow to teach their students about DNA. During a series of experiments, students become detectives of a sort - extracting DNA from bananas or trying to place suspects at the scene of a "crime."

The idea for the footlocker was developed by Veomett, an associate professor of biology, and Pat Friedrichsen, a lecturer in curriculum and instruction and high school science teacher on leave from Lincoln High School.

Friedrichsen was a teaching assistant for Veomett while pursuing her master's degree, which she earned in 1987. Frustrated by the lack of training for Nebraska educators to teach genetics, she approached Veomett last year with a workshop proposal for such lessons. Inspired by the idea, he began developing equipment that high school teachers could borrow to teach a unit on DNA.

"George had done workshops with area teachers in the past," Friedrichsen said. "We wanted this to be teacher-driven - resulting in going to the teachers, asking what are your needs and how can we help you accomplish your goals."

She and Veomett took their ideas to Jane Obbink, a science teacher at Lincoln Southeast High School, and asked her to lead the workshop. Obbink, one of Veomett's former students, attended the Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation's Summer Institute on Biotechnology in Princeton, N.J., in 1993. There, she learned how to conduct DNA and genetics experiments suitable for high school science labs. She later returned to the institute as a faculty member.

"I heard George was thinking of putting on a DNA workshop and putting together a footlocker," Obbink said. "We've started seeing DNA in the news, and in 1994, the DNA evidence in the O.J. Simpson trial was in the news a lot. If you've been teaching for 10 years or more, you didn't work a lot with DNA while you were in school. In December of 1995, we started thinking of how to provide information and equipment to teachers that would enable them to teach DNA."

The equipment needed to conduct DNA tests and experiments are everyday items in research labs. But for high school science teachers, who will teach a unit on DNA for a week or two, buying the equipment and supplies isn't cost efficient.

"If you were to buy the items in the footlocker, it would cost more than $5,000," Veomett said. "A school or teacher might be able to buy some of the equipment, but to use in their classes, they'd need more. What we're doing is providing materials for an entire class to participate."

Veomett received funding for the footlocker from the Center for Biotechnology and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. The Nebraska Math and Science Initiative sponsored the August workshop for 19 teachers from the southeast region. Teachers were encouraged to borrow the footlocker from Veomett to teach the experiments to their students.

The group planned the workshop with the teachers' needs and comfort levels in mind. It was taught in a high school lab to show how easy it is to conduct the experiments in that setting with borrowed equipment. Teachers were encouraged to come with others from their school, so that they could help each other with the experiments during the school year.

The group believes the project is successful. So far, nine of the 19 teachers who attended the workshop have borrowed the footlocker, and 640 students have used its contents. The footlocker isn't widely advertised among teachers, because Veomett wants to evaluate the project to ensure it's meeting teachers' needs. Students are enthusiastic about what they can learn from the footlocker.

"They think it's really high tech," Obbink said. "They feel like scientists. They think that's the neatest thing."

Judy Martindale, a science teacher at Lincoln Northeast High School, agreed. She participated in the workshop and later borrowed the footlocker to teach a lab to her life science class.

"When we extracted DNA, one student wanted to carry it around with him all day," she said. "It was something (the students) hadn't seen before, and the only other way they would have learned about it was to read about it in a text book."

In addition to being fun, the experiments provide teachers with the opportunity to encourage their students to pursue post-secondary study and career paths they might not otherwise consider.

"When we talk about DNA fingerprinting, we talk about university faculty who use this technique," Obbink said. "It's used in a wide variety of research like proteins, gene expression and embryology. It's also used in industry research and crime labs."

Veomett, Friedrichsen and Obbink plan to reunite the teachers who participated in the workshop in April to evaluate the project. They also foresee ways it can be expanded in the future.

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