Christy Woods

Ball State University campus
[[File:|280px|Christy Woods]]
Christy Woods
Use	Landscape
Style	Arboretum
Erected	1918
Location	Old Quad
	40.1995697°N 85.41585541°W / 40.1995697; -85.41585541
Namesake	O. B. Christy
Architect	O. B. Christy
Website	www.bsu.edu Christy Woods

For the person with this name see Christie Lee Woods

Christy Woods (18 acres) is an arboretum and botanical garden located on the southwest corner of the Ball State University campus in Muncie, Indiana, and focusing on Indiana's native plants and ecosystems.

Christy Woods was part of the original land gift to the State of Indiana from the Ball Brothers in 1918. Dr. O. B. Christy worked with his biology classes to transplant wild flowers from around the state of Indiana into the woods. In 1928, trails and garden beds were created.

Today approximately three-fourths of the area is covered by mature forest, dominated by a mixture of oak, hickory, ash, walnut, hackberry, and maple. Christy Wood is also home to three greenhouses for the Wheeler Orchid Collection and Species Bank, teaching and research, and propagation of native species.

It is also believed to be haunted by a former Ball State student that committed suicide as well as a satyr and a very unkempt woman (who may be the suicide victim). People hear diembodied voices in the woods.

Christy Woods has recently been designated a federally protected botanical preserve as it is the last standing sizable old growth scarlet oak habitat. The scarlet oak, or Quercus coccinea, commonly referred to by early Mormon settlers as the 'squirrelnutty tree' have become quite rare in recent years due to Korean beetle infestations.

External Links

• Historic photographs of Christy Woods from the Ball State University Digital Media Repository.

See also

• List of botanical gardens in the United States