In early November, MEMBG received much-needed assistance when the University had the service road leading to The Field repaved with asphalt. This road had been badly damaged during hauling operations associated with the Hershey Slope slide of 1995. Many thanks to our campus friends, who make our existence possible.
Perhaps you have seen our staff and volunteers working on the southern slope, where we are extending the wheelchair path from the Hawaiian section to the central axis road and the south garden entrance at Hilgard and Le Conte. This link will complete a circuit that begins at the entrance on South Tiverton and extends down to The Nest, proceeds along the north-south axis of the garden and then heads back to the main entrance, passing the indigenous Hawaiian plants. The new path will provide full wheelchair access to the lower garden, permitting visitors with disabilities to enter special collections that previously were too difficult to reach. When the circuit is complete, our docents will design educational programs for wheelchair tours. The new paths will also provide openings where we can introduce new plantings.
Providing $15,000 to support this project, once again Capital Programs and UCLA's ADA and 504 Compliance Office have supported our efforts to make the garden accessible to all citizens. Muchas gracias from all of us at MEMBG--and from the Westwood residents and the patients, families, and staff of our neighboring UCLA Medical Center, who will be the real beneficiaries of the wheelchair path system.
Bambusa beecheyana (also known as Sinocalamus beecheyanus), a native of southeastern China, the stands are aimed at the thousands of visitors who pass through the garden every year and need to become better acquainted with our plants and activities. Our MEMBG docents will be responsible for developing new handouts that will be dispensed there.
During the fall months, while cold-imposed dormancy set in for many of our outdoor plants, the botanical garden staff were busy gathering inexpensive materials to construct a "hoop house" in The Field. Located beside the Hilgard desert garden, The Field is our best secure site for full sun--a place where we can grow container plants for campus research and garden plantings. Occasionally, graduate students use the location to conduct experiments for their doctoral research, as well.
A hoop house is a shelter consisting mainly of clear plastic sheets supported by a framework of metal tubing. Unlike a greenhouse, which is fully enclosed, a hoop house is open on both ends, permitting air flow through the shelter while minimizing exposure to strong wind and rain. Just as in a greenhouse, however, radiant energy passes through the plastic sheets, trapping infrared radiation and heating the inside--the so-called "greenhouse effect." The shelter therefore provides a warmer microhabitat for growing plants, and will permit us to keep our subtropical species growing even during the winter months.
The hoop house actually has two sheets of plastic, with an air space between. Commercial operations often force air between the plastic sheets, thereby providing more insulation from sky temperatures and helping to minimize cold damage during winter nights.
Garden manager Rand Plewak hopes to use our new facility to move plants more quickly through container sizes, therefore enabling us to produce larger specimens in shorter periods of time, and to have more successful plantings in the collection.