Armitage retires from UGA Trial Gardens

Thirty years ago, the Canadian-born Allan Armitage came to the University of Georgia faculty from Michigan, and ever since then he’s been running the UGA Trial Gardens, which he founded with another famous UGA horticulture professor, Michael Dirr.

The upcoming open houses at the Trial Gardens, in resplendent bloom now as summer approaches, will be Armitage’s last shows as director. And while he’s retiring from UGA, he’s not retiring from horticulture or from teaching, he says.

Plant breeders from all over the world send new varieties of flowering and ornamental plants to the trial garden to see how they’ll do in the South’s hot summers and sometimes chilly winters. On June 19, plant breeders and other professionals will be in Athens to see what’s blooming, and the garden’s big public show is scheduled for July 13.

Though Armitage won’t be working at UGA or the Trial Gardens anymore, he plans on staying busy.

The author of 13 books and many more articles, he will keep on writing; Armitage will also continue to consult with a handful of companies, and he’s got his own travel company, taking gardeners to the great gardens of the world.

He’s also planning to start a gardening school with a colleague in England at a 15th-century manor house.

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