Vermont Experimental Cold Hardy Cactus Garden is a small botanical garden, less than , specialized in cactus and
succulent
In botany, succulent plants, also known as succulents, are plants with parts that are thickened, fleshy, and engorged, usually to retain water in arid climates or soil conditions. The word ''succulent'' comes from the Latin word ''sucus'', meani ...
It is located in a private residence in a bioclimatic zone (
USDA zones
A hardiness zone is a geographic area defined as having a certain average annual minimum temperature, a factor relevant to the survival of many plants. In some systems other statistics are included in the calculations. The original and most wide ...
4 and 5) in far north in New England.
''Vermont Experimental Cold Hardy Cactus Garden'', Halladay Road, Middlebury,
Addison County
Addison County is a County (United States), county located in the U.S. state of Vermont. As of the 2020 United States Census, 2020 census, the population was 37,363. Its shire town (county seat) is the town of Middlebury (town), Vermont, Middle ...
, Vermont 05753 United States.
It is open to the public after a phone call to arrange the visit.
History
The botanical garden arose from a happy idea of the couple formed by Louis and Marilyn Varricchio, who also make acclimatization attempts of cold resistant plantsJenn Sli 24 Cold Hardy Cacti and Succulents that Can Withstand Frost LeadCamp, Inc. in this bioclimatic zone.
Collections
Her collections include several
opuntia
''Opuntia'', commonly called prickly pear or pear cactus, is a genus of flowering plants in the cactus family Cactaceae. Prickly pears are also known as ''tuna'' (fruit), ''sabra'', ''nopal'' (paddle, plural ''nopales'') from the Nahuatl word f ...
s, agaves, yuccas, and sedums and some raised cultivation beds with plantations on a miniature hill.
The garden also performs resistance tests of the Giant Sequoia ('' Sequoiadendron giganteum '' aka Sequoia gigantea) in Bioclimatic Zones 4-5. Several resistance test seedlings were planted in the year 2000.