Victimized by a tough winter, the MIT Endicott House horticulture team lost most of its bulbs and perennials and had to improvise ground cover for the team's entry in the annual New England Spring Garden Show.
Nonetheless, the exhibit in Hall B of the Bayside Exposition Center won a bronze medal and was popular with the spectators during the show's first weekend. The show runs daily from 10 a.m. to 9:30 p.m. through Sunday, March 23.
"We'll just have to work harder next year," said Steve Wiswell, horticulturist at Endicott House, a Dedham estate that MIT runs as a conference center. The team won two awards and a silver medal last year and six awards and a gold medal in 2001.
This year's Endicott House exhibit includes more than 300 specimens of 25 varieties of plants and flowers in a 14-by-40-foot plot. The exhibit is divided into two sections by a Chinese moon gate, with plants on one side from North America and specimens from the rest of the world on the other.
The North American section features a Bristlecone Pine from the Rocky Mountains, one of the oldest existing plants on Earth, and May Apple and Bear Berry trees.
A Korean Spice Bush, whose sweet fragrance permeates the surrounding area, along with a Dawn Redwood and Pink Discovery Azaleas, with origins in the orient, brighten up the international area.
Besides Wiswell, Andy Turcotte, head of Endicott House grounds department, Tom Willard of grounds, and Dave Loud of conference services worked on the exhibit.
A version of this article appeared in MIT Tech Talk on March 19, 2003.
