Gothenburg Botanical Garden

Striking a blow for pollination

S et on 430 acres of land in the heart of the city, the Gothenburg Botanical Garden boasts a range of extraordinary collections and rare species while bursting with natural exploration and beauty. This year, with the new exhibition What is pollination?, the garden joins in with the global rallying cry for biodiversity and to save the bees.

Without pollinating insects, there is no biodiversity – but it is easy to feel powerless in the face of the current global environmental crisis. What can you do? This and much more, the Gothenburg Botanical Garden is aiming to answer with its new exhibition this season. “There are many, often simple ways in which we can all help save the bees and biodiversity,” says Agneta Green, head of marketing and communications. “Everything from not mowing the entire lawn in your garden but letting a meadow grow, to choosing to grow plants that bees and bumblebees like.”

Boasting 16,000 plant species and hybrids and one of the world’s greatest collections of bulbs and tubers, the Gothenburg Botanical Garden is somewhat of a pollinators’ paradise, and among the first things you see as you enter the garden is its series of beehives, honey from which is for sale in the shop. In addition to exploring these, as well as the rock garden with its waterfall, the herb garden, the Japanese valley and the more than 1,500 tropical orchids, visitors young and old will this season get the chance to take part in competitions, exhibitions and talks about all things biodiversity.

Local schools as well as artists and photographers have been roped in to take part in this rallying cry for increased awareness and collective action. If there was ever a place that could make a convincing case, it would surely be this world-class horticulture haven in the heart of Gothenburg.

Photo: Eva S. Andersson

botaniska.se/en