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Displaying plants and practicing the high art of horticulture to provide a beautiful and hospitable setting for the delight and inspiration of the public…
Brooklyn Botanic Garden is a world-class horticultural resource with 52 acres of beautiful gardens and plant collections that delight and inspire nearly 725,000 visitors annually from near and far. BBG's lush grounds feature 11,000 plant species and cultivars and provide refreshing relief to the surrounding urban landscape. New audiences are continually drawn to the Garden by seasonal events that combine entertainment with education and interpretation.
Horticulture
A trio of horticultural debuts brought particular excitement—and thousands of visitors—to Brooklyn Botanic Garden this year.
In July 2006, BBG had a surprise arrival: A specimen of Amorphophallus titanum, known as the titan arum or corpse flower, produced a flower bud for the first time in its ten years in the Steinhardt Conservatory collection. In previous summers, staff gardeners were greeted with a huge stalk and leaf that would reach toward the roof of the production greenhouses; now they were finally rewarded for their care and patience by the appearance of this "budding" ingenue. BBG immediately shared the discovery with its visitors.
The titan arum is the world's largest compound flower, and it rarely blooms in cultivation. These horticultural Halley's comets cause a stir whenever they appear—with much of the fascination perhaps owing to the intense odor that the flower produces in order to attract pollinators in its native Sumatra. The BBG specimen, which Conservatory staff nicknamed "Baby" because they had been nursing it for a decade, became the first representative of the species to bloom in New York City since 1939.
In a matter of days, as the flower bud reached past the five-foot mark, visitors flocked to BBG in anticipation of the bloom—and the resulting stench. When the moment arrived, the enormous flower did not disappoint, and nearly 50,000 people came to watch the bud unfurl. Meanwhile, bloggers and media outlets from New York to Australia featured the story. With luck, BBG may see a flower again in a few years.
Crowds flocked to see the blooming titan arum and to watch BBG horticulturists pollinate it.
The second surprise came courtesy of the spate of mild, springlike weather that arose in December 2006 following upon a frigid November. These unusual climatic conditions tricked a number of BBG's plants into believing that spring had arrived, leading to unexpected blossoms of all kinds throughout the gardens and collections. One cherry, a Japanese variety called Prunus 'Fudan-Zakura', which normally blooms sporadically in both spring and fall, burst into full and sudden bloom—landing itself, in color—in the pages of the New York Times and on the network news. From mid-December through much of January, flowers including winter jasmine (Jasminum nudiflorum), witch hazel (Hamamelis spp.), apricot (Prunus mume), and dogwood (Cornus spp.) appeared and drew thousands of visitors to the Garden at a time usually reserved for the appreciation of conifers and holly.
The third celebrated arrival at BBG was a specimen of Wollemia nobilis, the Wollemi Pine, one of the rarest and oldest plants in the world, recently introduced to cultivation after being thought extinct for aeons. A small population of this species, a contemporary of the dinosaurs that was previously known only through fossils, was discovered growing in Australia in 1994. BBG became the first garden in the northeastern United States to introduce a specimen to the public.
Over the course of the year, several new plants were introduced throughout the gardens and collections, with significant acquisitions of rhododendrons in the Fragrance Garden, magnolias in the Plant Family Collection, and trees and shrubs in the Native Flora Garden. Planting in the Osborne Garden and around the Eastern Parkway entrance also continued. The hedges that frame the seasonal borders along the Lily Pool Terrace were renovated, and plantings in the Shakespeare and Fragrance Gardens were enhanced. In the Herb Garden, Horticulture staff restored paths and introduced drip irrigation. Staff also boosted the azalea plantings in the Japanese Hill-and-Pond Garden, added thousands of bluebells to Bluebell Wood, and continued an extensive program of rejuvenation pruning in the Cranford Rose Garden and throughout the collections.
The Garden welcomed a number of important visitors throughout the year. Sharifa Zein Alsharaf bint Nasser, the assistant for development, women, youth, and education for the Royal Hashemite Court of Jordan and a member of the Jordanian royal family, visited the Garden in March to meet with staff and to draw inspiration for a system of national gardens being developed in Jordan. She was accompanied by a Jordanian representative, Ibtesam Yunis, and Brenda Dean, international visitor program coordinator for the U.S. Forest Service.
In December, renowned landscape architect and professor Darrell Morrison came to BBG to lead a full-day design workshop for the entire Horticulture staff. BBG also welcomed acclaimed author and horticulturist William Cullina in February and New Zealand author and garden designer Neil Ross in April. Horticulturist Shigeto Tsukie of the Hyogo Prefectural Conservatory's Miracle Museum of Plants in Japan shared his insights with the staff in June.
BBG continued to extend its influence outside the Garden, as Horticulture staff contributed designs or advice to external projects. In the spring, Horticulture and GreenBridge staff worked with the Maimonides Cancer Center to design a therapeutic garden for patient and staff enjoyment. Horticulture staff also consulted on plans for the DUMBO improvement district and advised on tree specifications for New York City's ambitious PlaNYC 2030 street-tree planting program.
Garden staff designed, constructed, and installed a garden display to present at the U.S. Botanic Garden's (USBG) special exhibition "Celebrating America's Public Gardens." Featuring displays from 12 leading public gardens across the country, the summer-long USBG exhibition celebrated the work, diversity, and importance of public gardens across America. A host of BBG staff members helped create the Garden's entry: a brownstone façade and stoop featuring antique architectural elements and filled with plants that represent the diversity of BBG's collections. BBG was the only public garden east of the Mississippi and north of Washington, D.C., selected for the exhibition, which ran from May through October 2007.
The Garden created a brownstone façade for a display at the U.S. Botanic Garden in D.C.