Category: Edinburgh Biomes
Over the summer of 2024, the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh welcomed the return of one of the plant world’s most spectacular plants: the giant Victoria water lilies, specifically…
Explore more Botanic Stories covering the Ferns and Fossils Glasshouse decant below. Stories from the Biomes: Fern House decant begins – Botanics Stories Stories from the Biomes: The…
As part of my apprenticeship at the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh, I have been working for a 13-week period with each of the different horticultural teams, learning as…
The sharing of plants between botanic gardens has long been an essential tool in the cultivation and display of the world’s rare and threatened flora. The plants generously…
A new Postcards from the Biomes following the move of the last fern to leave the Ferns and Fossils Glasshouse at The Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh.
You can read more about the journey of the tree ferns in the BBC article below. BBC News – Giant plants make epic journey from Edinburgh to Port…
Read Marc Gilbert’s full article on air layer propagation here. Discover more from our other articles and journals here.
In 2022, the Horticulture team fixed their attention on the Ferns and Fossils Glasshouse, home to an impressive species diversity from an ancient group of plants. Read about the successes and challenges of moving this collection, from one of the team who carried out the work.
It all started with one houseplant. That one plant, a Crassula ovata (money plant), led me to having one of the healthiest obsessions human beings can possibly have;…
A lot can happen in a year, especially where the Biomes Project is concerned. Looking back at 2022, it is impossible to include everything that has been achieved, but here is a selection of highlights of the work undertaken by the Horticulture team and colleagues.
Tucked away behind the glasshouses of the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh is a terrace that contains an exceptional collection of Chilean plants collected by RBGE staff and Chilean…
While the Edinburgh Biomes Project involves the more noticeable decanting of both Victorian Palm Houses and the Front Range Glasshouses, there are several research collections going through an equally significant change behind the scenes.
Every day for the last thirty years, rain or shine, Senior Horticulturist Bruce Robertson has climbed up on to the roof of the Temperate Palm House to change the Campbell-Stokes recorder’s sunshine card. As the restoration on the Victorian Palm Houses begins, the recorder’s solid crystal ball is stored away for safe keeping.
From the beginning of the Biomes project the outdoor horticulture team have been hard at work preparing and moving plants to facilitate the work on the Glasshouses. New…
Since the start of the Edinburgh Biomes project there has been an almost constant movement of plants within and between the various glasshouses, and part of this involves changing the glasshouses themselves to create the best conditions for each collection.
So far, the iconic Temperate Palm House and the Tropical Palm House have been emptied of plants and are ready for refurbishment work to begin. The plants that…
In an age where 40% of the world’s plants are faced with extinction, the recording of data is more important now than ever. Documenting, describing, and researching the properties of plants enhances their chances of survival; how can we protect what we don’t know we have?
During summer 2021 the first phase of the Biomes Project began and the Glasshouse staff were tasked with the mammoth undertaking of removing all plants from the Palm…