“The Best of the Leach hybrids and Moving Forward with his Work”.

Steve Krebs is our fall 2014 Steele lecturer. He is director of  the David C Leach Research Station at the Holden Arboretum in Kirtland Ohio.  The Leach Research Station is a satellite facility maintained for horticultural research on a 30-acre property, 40 minutes east of Holden’s main campus. The land was a gift to Holden from Dr. David Leach, who developed it as a rhododendron breeding and evaluation garden. Leach, who died in 1998, was an eminent American horticulturist who became a world authority on the genus Rhododendron, and is renowned for his development and introduction of hardy (zone 5) hybrid rhododendrons for the gardening public.  His numerous cultivars include “Janet Blair’,  ‘Bali’, ‘Bikini’, Capistrano, ‘Anna Hall’, ‘Hindustan’, “Madrid’, ‘Santa Fe’, among others.  The Leach Station is staffed and equipped to support extensive and diverse display gardens, in addition to large breeding populations and research plots.  ( http://www.holdenarb.org/home/)