To make a moon garden:

First, you start with a moon tree.

Richard T. Bowers Historic Tree Grove at MOSI, Tampa
The Historic Tree Grove at MOSI offers a unique timeline of America's history as it was viewed by silent witnesses, trees. Our 17 trees planted in the grove in 1996 are all seedlings of trees that witnessed amazing historic events or were associated with famous historical people. Imagine the sycamore that grew from seeds that went to the moon, a pine that watched a battle of the American Civil War, the sweet gum that saw the flight of the first airplane. What wonders those trees witnessed and those same trees still live long after the events of history have passed. We can still lay our hands on their bark, sit beneath their boughs and take a few minutes out to learn and converse about great deeds and fantastic people which shaped our world.

One of my favorites tree in the grove is the Moon Sycamore and here is the story of a remarkable tree, a special astronaut and a companion planting of beautiful moonlight loving plants.

Stuart Roosa and the Moon Trees
From January 31 to February 9th of 1971, Stuart A. Roosa was the pilot of the Apollo 14 mission to the Moon. While Alan Shepard and Edgar Mitchell descended to the Lunar surface, Roosa remained in a solo orbit around the moon for 33 hours. Each of the astronauts on the mission was allowed a personal preference pack. Alan Shepard took golf balls which he smacked about the lunar surface with a geology tool as a driver. Stuart Roosa, the former smoke jumper, took a package of tree seeds: namely Redwood, loblolly pine, sycamore, Douglas fir and sweetgum.

The tree seeds were picked by the US Forest Service genetics institutes and were selected by Stan Krugman, director of Forest Service genetics research in 1971. Stuart Roosa told NASA "I picked redwoods because they were well known, and the others because they would grow well in many parts of the United States". The seeds were germinated by the Forest Service with an excellent success rate and the moon trees were planted all around the country at girl scout camps, public libraries, universities and even at the White House.

Stuart Roosa remained an astronaut until his retirement from the Air Force as a Colonel in 1976. When he passed away in 1996, Roosa was buried in section 7A of the Arlington National Cemetery and a second generation Moon Sycamore was planted just up the hill from his grave in 2005.

Our Moon Sycamore, like the one planted at Arlington, is a second generation tree now known as a half-moon tree.

A garden to love the moonlight:

There are many ways in which a person can plant a moon garden. We designed a garden filled with plants with white, silver, and blue flowers and foliage that will best reflect moonlight and seem to almost glow at night. The moon garden was planted beneath the Moon Sycamore at MOSI on Earth Day, April 22nd 2009.

The plants that were chosen for this planting are:

• African Iris (Dietes vegeta) for its lovely white iris blooms.


• White trailing lantana (Lantana montevidensis) for its trailing arms laden with bunches of white blossoms.


• Plumbago (Plumbago auriculata) for its beautiful blue blooms.


• Dichondra "silver falls" (Dichondra) for its trailing silver foliage


• White Alyssum (Alyssum maritium) for its honey fragrant white flowers that look like clumps of snow when in bloom.


• White Angelonia (Angelonia angustifolia) for its white flowers that are reminiscent of tiny snapdragons.


• Calocephalus (Calocephalus brownii) for its stark bone white foliage that looks like coral structures.


• Dusty Miller (Senecio cineraria) for its dusty silver white leaves.


• White Petunia (petunia hybrida) for its showy white trumpet-shaped blooms

By day, this garden is shaded and receives only dappled sunlight, thus plants had to be chosen that would love the well drained soil, hot Florida conditions, and the mostly shaded light conditions. 12 volunteers and several MOSI staff members helped to plant this lovely garden on Earth Day thanks to our Project Orange Thumb Grant from Fiskars. We couldn't be happier!

Thanks again to Fiskars Project Orange Thumb for making our nine thematic gardens happen so we could provide a more garden-centric interpretation of these very amazing trees in the Historic Tree Grove at MOSI!