The St Andrews Botanic Garden is an 18-acre

botanical garden A botanical garden or botanic gardenThe terms ''botanic'' and ''botanical'' and ''garden'' or ''gardens'' are used more-or-less interchangeably, although the word ''botanic'' is generally reserved for the earlier, more traditional gardens, an ...

in the university town of

St Andrews St Andrews ( la, S. Andrea(s); sco, Saunt Aundraes; gd, Cill Rìmhinn) is a town on the east coast of Fife in Scotland, southeast of Dundee and northeast of Edinburgh. St Andrews had a recorded population of 16,800 , making it Fife's fou ...

Fife Fife (, ; gd, Fìobha, ; sco, Fife) is a council area, historic county, registration county and lieutenancy area of Scotland. It is situated between the Firth of Tay and the Firth of Forth, with inland boundaries with Perth and Kinross (i ...

Scotland Scotland (, ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a border with England to the southeast and is otherwise surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to the ...

. It is located on the banks of the wooded Kinness Burn in the Canongate area, on the southern edge of the town. The gardens are supported by the

University of St Andrews (Aien aristeuein) , motto_lang = grc , mottoeng = Ever to ExcelorEver to be the Best , established = , type = Public research university Ancient university , endowment ...

and

Fife Council Fife Council is the local authority for the Fife area of Scotland and is the third largest Scottish council, with 75 elected council members. Councillors are generally elected every five years. At the 2012 election there were 78 councillors ele ...

, and by admission charges. The garden is included on the

Inventory of Gardens and Designed Landscapes in Scotland The ''Inventory of Gardens and Designed Landscapes in Scotland'' is a listing of gardens and designed landscapes of national artistic and/or historical significance, in Scotland. The Inventory was originally compiled in 1987, although it is a conti ...

Collections

It contains more than 8000 species of native and exotic plants. These are laid out in zones of woodland, meadow, shrubbery, herbaceous bedding, sand dunes, a large rockery and a series of ponds. There are also vegetable and herb gardens, and two large greenhouses. There are borders that specialise in Chinese and Chilean flora, containing both woody and herbaceous specimens.to recreate the full environment of those parts of the world. There are significant collections of

Cotoneaster ''Cotoneaster'' is a genus of flowering plants in the rose family, Rosaceae, native to the Palaearctic region (temperate Asia, Europe, north Africa), with a strong concentration of diversity in the genus in the mountains of southwestern China an ...

Berberis ''Berberis'' (), commonly known as barberry, is a large genus of deciduous and evergreen shrubs from tall, found throughout Temperateness, temperate and subtropical regions of the world (apart from Australia). Species diversity is greatest in S ...

and

Sorbus ''Sorbus'' is a genus of over 100 species of trees and shrubs in the rose family, Rosaceae. Species of ''Sorbus'' (''s.l.'') are commonly known as whitebeam, rowan ( mountain-ash) and service tree. The exact number of species is disputed depend ...

. The gardens also house an

algal Algae (; singular alga ) is an informal term for a large and diverse group of photosynthetic eukaryotic organisms. It is a polyphyletic grouping that includes species from multiple distinct clades. Included organisms range from unicellular mic ...

herbarium A herbarium (plural: herbaria) is a collection of preserved plant specimens and associated data used for scientific study. The specimens may be whole plants or plant parts; these will usually be in dried form mounted on a sheet of paper (called ...

based on the collection of seaweed specimens gathered originally by the phycologist

Margaret Gatty Margaret Gatty ( Scott; 3 June 1809 – 4 October 1873) was an English children's author and writer on marine biology. In some writings she argues against Charles Darwin's ''Origin of Species''. She became a popular writer of tales for young pe ...

(1809-1873) and enlarged since her death.

History

The gardens were founded by the University of St Andrews in 1889 on a different site within the grounds of St Mary's College. The principal founder was the botanist Dr John Hardie Wilson. The early site consisted of 78 similar beds laid out according to the

Bentham and Hooker A taxonomic system, the Bentham & Hooker system for seed plants, was published in Bentham and Hooker's ''Genera plantarum ad exemplaria imprimis in herbariis kewensibus servata definita'' in three volumes between 1862 and 1883. George Bentham (18 ...

system of plant classification. The valuable town centre site grew in size from , and in the early 1960s the present site, which was then agricultural land, was bought to allow for future development. The new site was laid out to a design meant to mitigate the Scottish climate with a dense barrier of pine trees along the western edge, and many shrubs and understory trees around the site to give additional shelter.

Gallery

File:St Andrews Botanic Garden map.jpg, alt=, Plan of St Andrews Botanic Garden. File:St . Andrews Botanic Garden - geograph.org.uk - 991562.jpg, alt= Greenhouse interior, Greenhouse interior File:St. Andrews Botanical Garden 2 - geograph.org.uk - 305257.jpg, alt= Rockery and pond, Rockery and pond File:Fading Flower (3293338820).jpg, alt=Flower at the Botanic Gardens, St. Andrews, Scotland, Flower in the genus

Muscari ''Muscari'' is a genus of perennial bulbous plants native to Eurasia that produce spikes of dense, most commonly blue, urn-shaped flowers resembling bunches of grapes in the spring. The common name for the genus is grape hyacinth (a name which is ...

File:St Andrew - geograph.org.uk - 423817.jpg, alt=Statue of St Andrew, A copy of the statue of St Andrew by Francois Duquesnoy which stands in St Peters. Executed in

Dalmeny Sandstone Dalmeny ( gd, Dùn Mheinidh, IPA: �t̪uːnˈvenɪʝ is a village and civil parish in Scotland. It is located on the south side of the Firth of Forth, southeast of South Queensferry and west of Edinburgh city centre. It lies within the tradi ...

it is believed to have been made by the Musselburgh born sculptor

Alexander Handyside Ritchie Alexander Handyside Ritchie (16 April 1804 – 24 April 1870) was a Scottish sculptor born in Musselburgh in 1804, the son of James Ritchie, a local brickmaker and ornamental plasterer, and his wife Euphemia. The father in turn was the son of a ...

(1804–1870). It was rescued and moved to the Botanical gardens in the winter of 1964/65.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Saint Andrews Botanic Garden St Andrews Botanical gardens in Scotland Inventory of Gardens and Designed Landscapes