VNLA Newsletter Spring 2018

ance or susceptibility. HRI is using the re-established Box- wood Blight Fund to help establish a standardized testing protocol. Previous research has shown potential variability among results. For example, a variety may show high toler- ance in one site but moderate tolerance at another site. Ulti- mately, HRI hopes to endorse a labeling system indicating a variety's tolerance level to guide better choices by nursery growers, retail customers, and landscape managers. To make a charitable contribution in support of the Boxwood Fund, please contact HRI at 614 -487-1117. Make checks paya- ble to HRI at 2130 Stella Court, Columbus, OH 43215 and in- clude memo line: Boxwood Blight. News - WPS Training Materials New Training Materials in English and Spanish Under the newly-revised Worker Protection Standard (WPS), training materials must be EPA-approved when officially training workers, handlers, and trainers . Look for an EPA approval number that looks like this: "Approval # EPA WPS TTT W/H 00026". Training must be delivered in a manner that can be under- stood, in a location relatively free from distractions.

Research - HRI Launches New Boxwood Variety Evaluation Initiative Both the Virginia Nursery & Landscape Associa- tion and the West Virginia Nursery & Land- scape Association have committed $10,000 to- ward this work. HRI has recently relaunched its Emerging Issues: Boxwood Blight Fund and will use this fund to coordinate develop- ment efforts for a standardized evaluation of boxwood vari- eties' tolerance of or susceptibility to boxwood blight. In 2012, in response to confirmations of boxwood blight in the United States, HRI established the Emerging Issues: Boxwood Blight Fund and dedicated over $16,000 towards research on mitigation efforts Since then, HRI has leveraged these funds to gain an additional $2.7 million through mul- tiple funding sources, including the USDA -ARS Floricul- ture and Nursery Research Initiative and USDA- APHIS Farm Bill. HRI continues to directly fund boxwood blight research, including two projects funded in 2018. In addition to needed mitigation research, the industry needs to better understand which boxwood varieties exhibit toler-

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VNLA Newsletter NLA Newsletter

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