saving the fraser fir, a popular christmas tree, with missouri botanical’s travis hall

Travis Hall is supervisor of the Horticulture Division at Missouri Botanical Garden in St. Louis, where a project is under way to save Abies fraseri. He helped me understand what’s up with the decline of wild populations of this iconic holiday tree, and the Garden’s efforts to help save this species and others. (Fraser fir detail photo, above, by Harold Smith via Wikimedia Commons.)

Read along as you listen to the December 27, 2021 edition of my public-radio show and podcast using the player below. You can subscribe to all future editions on Apple Podcasts (iTunes) or Spotify or Stitcher (and browse my archive of podcasts here).

Margaret Roach: Thanks for making time during the holidays to talk with us, Travis. And before we dig into Christmas trees specifically, I said in the introduction that you’re a supervisor in the horticultural division at Missouri Botanical. But I know that’s a somewhat different kind of role than it might be at some other public gardens. You’ve described the work of your team there to me as “conservation horticulture.” So can you kind of explain your focus and how it’s different from thinking about just displays and ornamentality and so forth.

Travis Hall: Absolutely. That is a good place to start. At botanical gardens, we’re uniquely positioned to tackle the rapid biodiversity loss that’s happening in the plant kingdom globally. So we have the capacity to think about our work and the