This Nursery Management October 2020 cover story announces Plant Development Services Inc. (PDSI) and Tree Town USA’s partnership to introduce Better Boxwood, a series of blight-resistant selections.
“Others in the industry have joined the quest for blight-resistance breeding. Plant Development Services Inc. (PDSI) and Tree Town USA recently formed a partnership to introduce Better Boxwood, a series of blight-resistant selections. The Better Boxwood series is the result of more than 20 years of breeding and trials in Europe, led by Belgium grower Didier Hermans in cooperation with the Flemish Institute for Agricultural and Fisheries Research.
The newly formed partnership, Boxwood Solutions Inc., will begin taking liner orders in September 2021 for spring 2022 delivery to grower partners across the United States.
“Our expertise in licensing and marketing, coupled with Tree Town’s production engine and nationwide reach, will allow Better Boxwood to make an immediate impact in the marketplace,” says Kip McConnell, business development director at PDSI.
Boxwood is important to the North American landscape and these breeding efforts allow landscape professionals and growers to rely once again on this valued crop.
“This is a game changer,” McConnell says. “These plants came from intensive research and trialing in Europe. Through a genome project they found every kind of boxwood in the world. They started from square one and worked up to controlled crosses. Selections from those crosses were inoculated with blight and trialed.”
The Better Boxwood series will include four types — a dwarf, a spreading dwarf, a standard hedge type and a taller, faster-growing hedge type.”
Read more of the Nursery Management article.