The Morton Arb

Trees & Gardens

Use our Interactive Collections Map and our Plant Collections Map to identify where plants are located on our grounds.

Explore our Plant Database

Integrated data of The Morton Arboretum's living collections, herbarium, interactive collections map, and photographs. Search database

How Plants are Named
The words in the scientific name of a plant all mean something. Learn how plants get such interesting names. Click here

How To Read a Plant Label at the Arboretum

Container gardens & Spring bedding at The Morton Arboretum

Spring Creations
Download a list of plants that can be found in our Container Gardens and Display Beds.

Gardens

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Container Gardens: Eye-Popping Color and Texture for Any Space

Container Gardens at The Morton ArboretumIn numerous locations at the Arboretum, you'll find colorful, creative, and sometimes whimsical container gardens. These popular, seasonal displays inspire many visitors to add color and texture to their own home gardens and landscapes. Such alternate forms of traditional gardening are especially attractive to those who lack a garden yet have a condo or apartment balcony. Many of these containers incorporate a diverse plant palette, including aquatics, annuals, perennials, ornamental grasses, tropicals, flowering bulbs, trees, and shrubs.

While all containers are planted with summer displays, many are rotated with spring and fall plantings. And when winter arrives, a limited number of containers receive winter greens, stems, and/or holiday lights.

Where can you find such containers at the Arboretum? They are displayed in the Children's Garden, Arbor Court, May T. Watts Reading Garden, Four Seasons Garden, Fragrance Garden, at the Administration Building entrance, in the Herb Garden, and at the Thornhill Education Center.

Spring Creative Creations

The Spring Display Containers & Display Beds are here! All containers and planting beds have a location—the containers also have a number.  By matching the location (and number) with the attached lists, you will be able to identify all of the plants. 

There are four types of plants that are typically used in a container design. Our containers may incorporate all four types or only a few.

  1. Background Plants: These plants are usually the tallest, placed in the back of the container for height.
  2. Center Plants: These plants are also quite tall, used as an anchor plant in the center of the container, when no Background Plants are used.
  3. Mid-Height Plants: These intermediate sized plants are typically used in front of the Background Plant or they can surround the Center Plants in a container. In smaller containers, they can be used by themselves or with Trailing Plants incorporated into the design.
  4. Trailer Plants: These plants cascade over the edge of the container, resulting in a trailing effect. These plants are often used in combination with any or all of the plant types mentioned above.

 

The Spring Display Beds incorporate bulbs, annuals, perennials, and tropicals.

Container Gardens
Display Beds