- A botanical garden or botanic garden is a garden dedicated to the collection, cultivation and display of a wide range of plants labeled with their botanical names.
- A botanical garden is a controlled and staffed institution for the maintenance of a living collection of plants under scientific management for purposes of education and research, together with such libraries, herbaria, laboratories, and museums as are essential to its particular undertakings.
- Each botanical garden naturally develops its own special fields of interests depending on its personnel, location, extent, available funds, and the terms of its charter.
- It may include greenhouses, test grounds, a herbarium, an arboretum, and other departments.
- It maintains a scientific as well as a plant-growing staff, and publication is one of its major modes of expression.
- A botanical garden is a collection of living plants which are used for Pure and applied study of plants.
- Plants in botanical garden not only used for beautification but used for Horticulture, Plant breeding etc.
- Botanical gardens are useful in studies of Introduction and Acclimatization of plants, Control and eradication of weeds, use of plants for Pollution control etc.
- Botanical gardens are also known as Outdoor laboratories for studies of botany and plants because they are used for research and investigation work.
- Although the Botanical Gardens were slow to develop, however from the early period of the history man started cultivation of plants in garden for easy availability of plants for his needs such as food, medicine etc.
- Many ornamental and floral plants were cultivated for easy availability near to temples in India, Egypt and China.
- First Botanical Garden of world was established approximately 2350 years ago (350 BC) by Great Greece scientist Aristotle though in India, Botanical Gardens were established 550 years before Aristotle by famous doctor Jivak Komar Britiya as per the historical evidences.
- Modem concept of Botanical garden came in existence 150 years back and credit to make this Botanical garden useful goes to Henery Shaw who established Missouri Botanical Garden in Saint Louis, USA (1859).
1. Royal Indian Botanical Garden, Shibpur, Kolkata, BG :
- This is not only famous Botanical Garden of India but also one of the famous in Asia.
- The gardens were founded in 1787 by Colonel Robert Kyd, an army officer of the British East India Company
- It was renamed in 2009 as Acharya Jagadish Chandra Bose Indian Botanic Garden to honor Indian plant physiologist and physicist Sir Jagadish Chandra Bose. It is operated by the Botanical Survey of India.
- The garden exhibit a wide variety of rare plants and a total collection of over 12,000 indigenous and exotic specimens of trees, shrubs, Palms, Grasses, Orchids spread over 109 hectares.
- The main attraction of this garden is a 200 years old Big Banyan tree which has a height of 100 feet and its branches covers an area of 15000 m².
- It has amazing collection of Palms, Cactus and Succulent plant.
2. National Botanic, Garden, Lucknow, NBG :
- This garden was founded by Nawabs of Oudh in between 1789 to 1814 as a Princely Garden to get Sentonim medicine from a plant Artemisia maritima.
- It has good collection of Palms, Ferns, Orchids, Cactii, Citrus plants and many verities of Rose plant.
- Now it is famous as National Botanical Research Institute, Lucknow.
3. Lloyd Botanical Garden, Darjeeling :
- Lloyd’s Botanical Garden, or Darjeeling Botanical Garden, is a botanical garden in Darjeeling in the Indian state of West Bengal.
- William Lloyd donated 40 acres (160,000 m²) land for garden to Government of India in 1878.
- The Darjeeling Botanical Garden preserves several species of Evergreen and Deciduous plant species such as Tree Ferns (Cythaea), Callitris with blue leaves, Living fossil plant Ginko biloba and Metasequoia etc.
- The Cacti and Succulent collection of 150 species is displayed in the Conservatory.
- The collection of native Orchids from the Singalila Ridge in present-day Singalila National Park is rare and notable.
4. Botanical Garden, Saharanpur :
- This garden covers 40 acre area of land.
- It was founded in 1799 by Zabita Khan.
- This garden is famous for great plant taxonomist J.F. Duthie and his famous book “The Flora of Upper Gangetic Plains and adjacent Shivalik Hills” This book authentic text for description, identification of North Indian floral plants.
- It has a good collection of useful plants for humans such as Potato. Tobacco, Guava, Apple. Papaya, Chilli etc.
5. LalBagh Garden, Bangalore :
- LalBagh Garden name was given by King Hayder Ah.
- It covers approximately 240 acre land.
- Here useful plants for humans were established from Australia. Africa and North and South America.
- It is also famous as “Bonsai garden LalBagh” because it has approximately 1000 bonsai plants.
- It is the place of regular research and one of the famous botanical garden in the world.
