The National Botanic Garden of Latvia ( lv, Nacionālais botāniskais dārzs) is a
botanical garden in
Salaspils, Latvia. It is one of the largest botanical gardens in the
Baltic states
The Baltic states, et, Balti riigid or the Baltic countries is a geopolitical term, which currently is used to group three countries: Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania. All three countries are members of NATO, the European Union, the Eurozone, ...
.
History
The present institution was founded in 1956, but traces its history back to 1836, when
Сhristian Wilhelm Schoch founded a commercial plant nursery, which later moved to Salaspils. Before
World War II, it was the largest plant nursery in the Baltic states. In 1944 it was turned into a state-owned experimental garden and in 1956 became the botanical garden of the
Latvian Academy of Sciences
The Latvian Academy of Sciences ( lv, Latvijas Zinātņu akadēmija) is the official Academy of Sciences, science academy of Latvia and is an association of the country's foremost scientists. The academy was founded as the ''Latvian SSR Academy o ...
. Since the re-establishment of Latvian independence in 1992, it has served as the National Botanic Garden of Latvia.
Description
The National Botanic Garden of Latvia have the following main tasks: "investigations in botany and ornamental gardening, plant collections, introduction of plants, researches in genetics and breeding and information and popularisation of the investigations' results."
[ It is the largest botanical garden in the Baltic states, and covers an area of almost .][
927/5000
]
Collections
National Botanic Garden of Latvia has some 18,000 species of live plants and 15,000 taxa of plants in cultivation, which are exhibited in different collections of which the following stand out:
* Rhododendron
''Rhododendron'' (; from Ancient Greek ''rhódon'' "rose" and ''déndron'' "tree") is a very large genus of about 1,024 species of woody plants in the heath family (Ericaceae). They can be either evergreen or deciduous. Most species are nati ...
with 227 subspecies, hybrids and cultivar is
* Crataegus
''Crataegus'' (), commonly called hawthorn, quickthorn, thornapple, Voss, E. G. 1985. ''Michigan Flora: A guide to the identification and occurrence of the native and naturalized seed-plants of the state. Part II: Dicots (Saururaceae–Cornacea ...
with 224 taxa,
* Cotoneaster with 120 taxa,
* Salix with 176 taxa,
* Populus
''Populus'' is a genus of 25–30 species of deciduous flowering plants in the family Salicaceae, native to most of the Northern Hemisphere. English names variously applied to different species include poplar (), aspen, and cottonwood.
The we ...
with 138 taxa,
* Arboretum
An arboretum (plural: arboreta) in a general sense is a botanical collection composed exclusively of trees of a variety of species. Originally mostly created as a section in a larger garden or park for specimens of mostly non-local species, man ...
of 60 hectares, which exhibits 5000 taxa of trees and shrub
A shrub (often also called a bush) is a small-to-medium-sized perennial woody plant. Unlike herbaceous plants, shrubs have persistent woody stems above the ground. Shrubs can be either deciduous or evergreen. They are distinguished from trees ...
s.
* Pinetum with 771 species and varieties of conifer
Conifers are a group of conifer cone, cone-bearing Spermatophyte, seed plants, a subset of gymnosperms. Scientifically, they make up the phylum, division Pinophyta (), also known as Coniferophyta () or Coniferae. The division contains a single ...
s,
* Rosarium about 100 wild species and about 1,020 cultivars of roses,
* Tulipa with about 900 taxa,
It also has within it an extension of 5 ha of preserved natural wild vegetation.
See also
* Kalsnava Arboretum
References
{{Authority control
Botanical gardens in Latvia
Parks in Latvia