Category: Point of InterestPage 8 of 16
Places of interest around the Gardens
Under a glorious canopy of blossom I find the Stirling’s automatic air pollution monitoring station, (part of the Automatic Urban & Rural Network). A rather battered looking station,…
Duncan Smith began work at RBGE as a probationer or trainee gardener on the 4th January 1909 at the age of 24, receiving training and work experience in…
This week sees another milestone in the rebuilding of the Botanic Cottage, with the completion of work on building the stone walls. When the chimney pots are added,…
In researching this series of centenary blogs in which I research each of our former staff members who enlisted during the First World War and are named on our…
Walter Henry Morland joined the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh (RBGE) on the 5th January 1910 as a rose specialist. He came to RBGE near the age of 30…
5th Cameron Highlanders. Reported missing, presumed killed, on the 25th September 1915 at the Battle of Loos. We were delighted to be sent this photograph recently of Private…
What sorts of features provide the best clues about whether or not two plants are closely related? Sometimes it’s obvious – most people can correctly recognise a daffodil…
With the help of the brilliant Lothian Buses journey planner I travel by bus today. Surely it’s one of the hottest days of the year so far. …
Regularly hitting moderate levels for pollution, as monitored and recorded by the 91 Air Quality Monitoring Stations that are situated across Edinburgh and the central belt of Scotland,…
Some sites you just have to visit twice. Unexpected hail and snow blizzards when surveying are just part of the course, but add strong winds to that, and…
Born on the 31st March 1853, the son of John Hutton Balfour who was Regius Keeper at RBGE between 1845 and 1879, Isaac Bayley Balfour grew up up in very close contact…
I’m heading to a new part of town to find my next air quality monitoring station and to spice up the journey I take a route suggested by…
Today as part of my survey on lichens as indicators of air quality we head out of the city to the foot of the Pentlands, well almost. Bush…
The Scots plant collector George Forrest (1873-1932) is now known as a talented photographer, though he didn’t necessarily enjoy the process of using a cumbersome glass plate camera,…
Pauline Maclean, an RBGE Volunteer, writes: “… By now you must be aware of the fact that I am no writer. As a practical worker I am a…
Plant Collector George Forrest (1873-1932) introduced over 300 new rhododendron species to Britain but one in particular dwarfed all of these, Rhododendron protistum, which is represented in our…
It was difficult to spot there even was a figure in a Victorian photo of the RBGE Rock Garden which was transferred to the Archives last week, and…
Let me tell you about a hero of mine, and the focus of one of the most requested collections stored in the Archives of the Royal Botanic Garden…
The complex thalloid liverworts, or Marchantiopsida, are one of the oldest land plant lineages, and contain a bewildering array of morphologies, ranging from comparatively simple plants like Blasia,…
The appearance of Hygrophorus hypothejus– commonly known as The Herald of Winter- traditionally signals the beginning of winter and the end of the mushroom season. Hygrophorus mushrooms- commonly…