Celebrating snowdrops Meet the relatives Getting ready for the John

Botanics
the
Issue 35 | winter 2008
Celebrating snowdrops
Festival and conference at RBGE
Meet the relatives
A world of ginger research at the Garden
Getting ready for the
John Hope Gateway
Preparing the opening exhibitions
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Contents Foreword
Cover: Snowdrops are a seasonal
highlight at Dawyck Botanic Garden.
RBGE's Gardens at Dawyck,
Edinburgh and Logan will all be taking part in the 2009 Scottish Snowdrop Festival.
Photo: Robert Unwin.
In this issue ...
4 Meet the relatives
RBGE is a world-renowned centre for the
study of the big, beautiful and bizarre
family of gingers
9 A day in the life ...
Of Mairi Gillies, the John Hope Gateway
Curator of Exhibitions
10 A celebration of snowdrops
A February focus on these harbingers
of spring, with festivities and a special
conference at RBGE
12 May all your Christmases
be green!
Seasonal fun for all the family
A taste of science at the Garden
Try your hand at botanical research
techniques with RBGE’s one-day workshops
13 Winter exhibitions
Close, photographs of Scottish gardens;
Two Voices III/Horticulture Behind the Scenes;
Dreams on Wheels – Danish cycling culture for urban sustainability;
Not His Now: Inscriptions, Bookplates and
Annotations in Some RBGE Library Books
14 A dazzlingly diverse world through the microscope
Jack Oliver explores aquatic plantlife
Eden founder addresses
RBGE Patrons
Tim Smit provided an inspirational speech
at RBGE's annual Patrons' Dinner
15 From old bothy to new facility
A new building for horticultural therapy
Greenfingers
Growing gingers in Scottish gardens
T
his issue of The Botanics magazine
highlights two very different
kinds of Monocots: snowdrops
and gingers. Monocots (short for
Monocotyledons) are one of the major
groups of flowering plants, characterised
by having a single seed leaf – or
cotyledon – that emerges when the
seed germinates. Some of the largest
families of flowering plants are Monocots,
including the grasses, sedges, orchids,
lilies and the gingers. So snowdrops
and gingers have much in common
despite one being highly familiar as
the quintessential early spring flowers
of every garden and the other the very
image of exotic tropical rainforest flora.
I first became aware of ginger through
the ginger beer 'plant' on the kitchen
windowsill of my childhood home. It fizzed contentedly when fed with root
ginger and sugar and I am convinced
that, to this day, I have never tasted the
equal of our home-made supply! I didn’t know much about gingers until
I began to work and travel as a botanist
in the tropics. In Malawi, where there
are many species of Costus, I began to
appreciate just how difficult it is to make
good herbarium specimens of gingers
because of their very delicate flowers.
Over the years my respect for ginger
experts has grown – these are some of
the most difficult plants to preserve. It’s not just the delicacy of the flowers, the leaves are often enormous and take
up several pages in a plant press.
One thing that is clear is that there are still many new species out there
waiting to be discovered, described and named. There is an urgency to
this work because of the threats to
their natural habitats in the tropics and
because so many members of the ginger
The Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh is a Charity registered
in Scotland (No SC007983) and is supported by the Rural
and Environment Research and Analysis Directorate.
Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh
20A Inverleith Row, Edinburgh EH3 5LR
Tel 0131 552 7171
Fax 0131 248 2901
Web www.rbge.org.uk
Opinions expressed within The Botanics are those of the
contributors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh.
All information correct at time of going to press.
Enquiries regarding circulation of The Botanics should be addressed to Hamish Adamson.
Above: Professor Stephen Blackmore (left) consults
with architect Roddy Langmuir of Edward Cullinan
Architects at a recent site visit to the John Hope
Gateway, due to open at the West Gate of the
Edinburgh Garden in 2009.
family are useful as condiments, herbs, dyes and medicinal plants.
As always, our research and
conservation work on gingers is a
collaborative effort with partners in other
countries, including the Smithsonian
Institution in the United States, as well as institutions in the tropical countries
that are home to wild gingers.
Gingers also rather nicely illustrate the way in which we coordinate with
the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew –
sometimes working together and
sometimes dividing the task between us. Monocots are a major focus at Kew
but by mutual agreement the gingers are one group they do not study, so that
our work complements their efforts on
the other groups. We have long been
famous for our work on Rhododendrons, now the story is out for another RBGE speciality.
Professor Stephen Blackmore
Regius Keeper
Editor Contributing Editor Production Editor Designer Printed by Hamish Adamson
Email: h.adamson@rbge.org.uk
Anna Levin
Email: a.levin@rbge.org.uk
Catherine Mouat
Email: c.mouat@rbge.org.uk
Caroline Muir
Email: c.muir@rbge.org.uk
CCB, Glasgow
T H E B OTA N I C S w i n t e r 2 0 0 8 | 3
News
Photo: Courtesy of Brenda White
Tribute to Professor Five stars Douglas Mackay
for Dawyck
awyck Botanic Garden has
Henderson (1927- 2007)
P
ermanent tribute is being paid
to one of Scotland’s eminent
botanists with the installation of
a bronze cast heron beside the Dutch
Bridge at Dawyck Botanic Garden.
The statue is in memory of Professor
Douglas Mackay Henderson CBE, FRSE, VMH,
who was the twelfth Regius Keeper of RBGE,
from 1970 to 1987. He died in 2007 after a
distinguished career which earned him the
title Her Majesty’s Botanist in Scotland.
The unveiling ceremony in September
2008 was attended by over 100 family,
friends and former colleagues, including
three successors as Regius Keeper
(pictured above, left to right): Professor
David Ingram; the current Regius Keeper
Professor Stephen Blackmore and
Professor John McNeill.
D
received VisitScotland’s coveted
five star status, making it the first garden in Scotland to achieve this
world-class recognition. The Garden, near Peebles, has reaped the benefits since the opening of its £1.6m visitor centre in May. Sandi Hellowell, VisitScotland's Regional
Director, said: “It is credit to all involved.
The five-star award really emphasises
the time and effort that has gone into making the attraction world-
class standard.”
Regius Keeper Professor Stephen
Blackmore added: “We cannot fail to be delighted. We have long believed the Garden itself was of world-class
standard, but the upgraded facilities have allowed us to hugely improve our visitor offering”.
Global index of plant and animal collections
I
n December 2007, RBGE embarked on a
new project to help develop an internetbased index of the worlds’ biological
collections of plants and animals. This
Biological Collections Index (BCI) is being
created in partnership with the Global
Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF) and
Biodiversity Information Standards (TWDG).
It is estimated that there are
approximately 15,000 collections
of biological artefacts in the world,
including living specimens, illustrations,
fossils, seeds and other materials. These collections are widely distributed
around the academic and governmental
institutions of all nations. It is intended
that the index will provide a single
point of access for researchers and
governmental agencies seeking
biodiversity materials. The first working version of the index
was announced by RBGE’s Roger Hyam in October at the TDWG 2008 conference
in Australia. It is available for use at www.BiodiversityCollectionsIndex.org/.
With many other projects showing an interest in integrating with it, the index looks set to become a key feature of the global infrastructure of biodiversity information.
Apple Day at the Garden
T
he first Apple Day Celebration to
be held in the Garden drew over
1,000 visitors to a two-day event
in October. In partnership with the
Glasgow-based organisation The Children’s
Orchard, the event showcased more than
a hundred varieties of apple which grow
in Scotland, including Edinburgh’s own
James Grieve variety. Visitors could bring
in their own apples to be pressed, or enjoy
the pickings from RBGE’s own apple trees.
Tasty treats were baked from RBGE’s apples
by Edinburgh’s Manna House Bakery.
It’s hoped that Apple Day will grow on this
success with more celebrations next year.
A world-first grant
for botanical
accountancy
A
lasdair Macnab, Director of Corporate
Services at RBGE, has secured a
prestigious first in the world of
accountancy by gaining professional
funding for research into strategic
management of botanic gardens globally.
Alasdair Macnab underwent a rigorous
selection process from the Chartered
Institute of Management Accountants
(CIMA). It is the first time such backing
has been granted to a botanic garden.
Alasdair Macnab said his ambition
was that this research would bring fresh
insight into how botanic gardens, as
not-for-profit organisations, could work
efficiently as research institutes and
how they might benefit from global
coordination of certain activities.
4 | T H E B OTA N I C S w i n t e r 2 0 0 8
A renaissance of research into gingers has made
RBGE a world-renowned
centre for the study of this
extraordinarily diverse family,
as Anna Levin discovers.
Main: A flower of the common ginger
Zingiber officinale, with its more familiar
rhizome – the root-like underground stem –
and the end product: a gingerbread house.
Photos by Jana Leong-Škorničková.
Meet the
relatives
M
ost of us only know one ginger,
Zingiber officinale, and our
encounters are limited to its
spicy, root-like stem, crystallised and
dipped in chocolate or ground into cakes
and biscuits. We may have met some
family members without realising they
were related: cardamom and turmeric,
used in Indian cookery, and ornamentals
such as red ginger and Siamese tulip,
which are increasingly popular in
flower shops. But these are just a few
representatives of a vast, diverse and often
flamboyant family, with more than 1,500
species found mostly in tropical forests.
For an introduction to this family
closer to home, step into the steamy
forest atmosphere of the Wet Tropics
House, part of the Windows on the
World tour of Edinburgh’s Glasshouses.
Here the most famous ginger Zingiber
officinale looks quite shrubby and
inconspicuous among so many of
its showier relatives. An enormous
Etlingera from Sumatra takes centre
stage, with startling flowers, thick
towering stems and massive leaves
reaching the roof. Close by is a red wine
ginger Zingiber vinosum from Borneo,
which has tiny, pale yellow flowers near
the ground and takes its name from the
claret-coloured underside of its leaves.
Near the entrance to this house is
Globba winitii, known as dancing ladies
for its long dangling trails of yellow
flowers suspended from purple bracts.
T H E B OTA N I C S w i n t e r 2 0 0 8 | 5
Left: The lush ginger jungle in RBGE’s Wet Tropics House.
Below: RBGE’s Mark Newman collecting Zingiber collinsii
in Vietnam. Photo by Jana Leong-Škorničková.
What links these varied family members
are two distinctive traits: a small flap of
tissue called a ligule where the leaf joins
the stem, and the pattern of the leaves
arranged in two opposite ranks. Most
leaves also contain ethereal oils, which
give a distinctive
aroma. These
traits make
gingers easily
recognisable,
yet within
these traits the
family displays
extraordinary variety. Stems may be
small and slender or tall and towering.
Some leaves are huge and shining green,
some intricately-patterned spears and
others small shapes of dark, rich, velvet.
And, the flowers range from big, bright
and bold to downright bizarre, or tiny
and delicate with an orchid-like beauty.
The gingers on public display are just a
small selection of RBGE’s Living Collection –
most of which is kept behind the scenes
in the Research Houses. These are used by
RBGE staff and visiting scientists, together
with an extensive collection of preserved
specimens in the Garden’s Herbarium.
Inside the Research House is a lush jungle
of gingers of all shapes and sizes, some
bearing surreallooking fruits,
others with
miniature flowers
like tiny butterflies
among the foliage.
The plants here
tell the story of
ginger research at RBGE. The oldest ones
date back to the 1960s when Bill Burtt, one
of the Garden’s leading taxonomists, was
exploring Sarawak on the island of Borneo.
He was primarily looking for gesners but
found gingers along the way. His Research
Assistant Rosemary Smith wrote that “he
had been intrigued by their appearance
in the rainforest, particularly those species
which produced their spectacular flowers
at ground level, borne separately from the
Gingers are the most
conspicuous undergrowth
in the rainforest and are
both beautiful and useful.
leaves.” Back in Edinburgh, the task began
of identifying and naming the unknown
species. “The ensuing plunge into the
taxonomic history of the family found
me floundering, while Bill tackled the
nomenclatural tangles with relish,” wrote
Rosemary. Nevertheless, she took on the
bulk of this work and published extensively
on gingers through the 1970s and 1980s.
Today RBGE is one of the most
important centres in the world for the study
of gingers. The Research House is now
crowded with an influx of new arrivals – the results of a resurgence of interest in
gingers led by botanist Mark Newman.
“Gingers are the most conspicuous
undergrowth in the rainforest, and are
both beautiful and useful,” says Mark.
“Only three species are commonly used in
this country, but people in the hill tribes of
India and Asia use more than 300 species,
for cooking, medicine and religious ritual.”
Yet, scientifically, there is still a lack of basic information about many species
of ginger. It is difficult to assess their
conservation status, for example, because not enough research has yet
been undertaken.
“Gingers are difficult to collect and
study,” Mark explains. “It is difficult to
make good herbarium specimens: some
species are huge, the inflorescence (flower
head) is often slimy and the flowers are
asymmetrical and so hard to press – so a
beautiful, delicate specimen can become
a brown squash on a herbarium sheet.”
Much of the work today still focuses
on identifying and naming species.
“Historical confusion means that the
6 | T H E B OTA N I C S w i n t e r 2 0 0 8
taxonomy – classifying species – is
difficult with gingers,” says Mark. “There
may be 3,800 names for 1,500 species, yet
one name for ten different species, so it
is difficult to sort out the correct name.
The study of chromosomes is among the
tools used – each genus has its own basic
number of chromosomes, so counting
them can help aid identification.”
Mark is working on a database of
ginger species to enable scientists around
the world to share information effectively.
His own research currently focuses on
a revision of the genus Globba, found
throughout Cambodia, Laos, Thailand and
Vietnam. This means finding out how
many species there are, how to identify
them, where they are distributed and
whether they are threatened. Addressing
these questions involves regular fieldwork
in the rainforests of South-East Asia, where new species are being discovered.
“Many forests are seasonal and the
gingers come up in the rainy season, then
disappear in the dry season,” says Mark.
“They survive the dry season, and even
forest fires, by storing moisture and energy
in the rhizome – that’s the bit you see in the
supermarket. Yet until the advent of tarmac
roads it was difficult to travel in South-East
Asia during the rainy season. There is now
a broad network of such roads in Thailand,
but not in Laos and Vietnam, so previously
unknown species will be lurking there.”
While many of the world’s ginger species
are found in Asia, there are also some
African plants in the Edinburgh Glasshouses.
These are Aframomum, the largest of the
four ginger genera found throughout
tropical Africa. They were collected by
David Harris, now RBGE Herbarium Curator,
who was drawn into studying gingers when
he realised how little was known about
them. In the 1980s David was working as
a botanical assistant with a gorilla research
project in the Central African Republic.
His task was to identify the plants that the
gorillas were feeding on, including gingers
which form an important part of their diet.
He took plant specimens back to Kew
Top, left to right: Torch ginger Etlingera elatior, photo by Jana Leong-Škorničková; Candy stripe
turmeric Curcuma rhabdota, and Aframomum
angustifolium, photos by Alex Wilson.
Below: RBGE’s Mark Newman pressing specimens of Alpinia in southern Vietnam with trainees from Ho Chi Minh City. Photo by Jana Leong-Škorničková.
to identify, but of the first 16 species he
collected, he could only name four.
“This flagged up the lack of information,”
David says. “It was frustrating that I couldn’t
provide the primatologists with the names
of species.”
David took up the challenge and
embarked on a complete revision of
Aframomum across Africa. This painstaking
task involved borrowing all available
specimens from herbariums around the
world and steadily working through them,
sorting them into species and plotting
their locations across the African continent.
Together with Research Assistant Alex Wortley, David has worked through
about 4,000 specimens in this way. They have already made great progress,
with over 70 species identified so far.
“It is very satisfying to be giving
information back and finally to be able to
answer those questions, 20 years on,” he says.
Many of the gingers in RBGE’s
collection, including the vast Etlingera in
the Wet Tropics House, were brought to
RBGE by the Danish botanist and prolific
collector Axel Dalberg Poulsen. Having
studied gingers in the Amazon, Africa,
Asia and the Pacific, Axel recently arrived
in Edinburgh for an 18-month project
to revise the Etlingera genus on the
Indonesian island of Sulawesi, a region in
which RBGE has made several collecting
trips in the past. The project combines
in-depth research using RBGE’s Living
Collection, Herbarium and Library, with
expeditions to the mountains of Sulawesi.
“Nobody has worked on gingers there
for 100 years, and so a lot of information
T H E B OTA N I C S w i n t e r 2 0 0 8 | 7
is lost, out of date or inaccurate,” Axel explains. “It’s exciting to find new species but equally gratifying to put pieces of the jigsaw together. That’s the detective work of a botanist – it involves many languages,
looking at the evidence, reading
expedition reports and going back to collect in those locations.”
Back in the Research House, Axel
surveys rows of young Etlingera with
pride. “I call them my toddlers,” he says,
and describes the excitement of collecting
seeds in the field and sending them to the Garden, then returning to RBGE
himself to find young plants growing.
“I’ve only seen these as enormous
plants, and so I didn’t know what the babies looked like before now – I’m learning, seeing new details like the red tinge to the first leaves.”
Important new discoveries happen
here in the Research House as well as out in the field. Often botanists don’t
know what they are collecting: they find an unknown species, collect seed or rhizome to send home, and must then wait – sometimes a few years –
for the plant to grow and flower before
it can be identified. This all depends
on the knowledge and skill of RBGE's
horticultural staff, some of whom have
been an integral part of expeditions to
Sulawesi in recent years, enabling them to
glean valuable knowledge of conditions
in the gingers’ natural habitat.
“I remember coming across a new Etlingera species, growing in Top: Axel Dalberg Poulsen tends
to his ‘toddlers’ at RBGE – as yet
unidentified Etlingera species from Sulawesi.
Main: Gingers on sale at a night
spice market in northern India.
Photo by Jana Leong-Škorničková.
a big dell up in the mountains of northern Sulawesi,” says Horticulturist
Steve Scott. “I scrambled down and
took a bit of the rhizome. We never saw this plant again.”
It is now flourishing back in
Edinburgh. Nicknamed ‘rhubarb and
custard’ because of its red and custardyellow flower, the species still hasn’t
been named scientifically.
“It’s great to bring back a plant and
find that it is new to science,” says Steve.
“We find new species on every trip.”
Horticulturist Helen Yeats is currently
responsible for the maintenance of the
ginger collection, adjusting her daily
routine through the seasons as the light and temperature change.
“It’s a challenge!” she says. “In their
natural habitat some of these
gingers would experience warm
days with quite intense sun,
cold nights and regular light
levels near the equator. We can’t
replicate that – we can have 16 hours of light in the summer and not enough
in the winter. Another challenge is the
size – some gingers can reach 8 m tall
and with so many new specimens
arriving we are short of space.”
“The wide variety makes them
interesting. If I have a favourite it would
be the genus Curcuma (turmeric),
especially the candy stripe Curcuma
rhabdota, it’s so gaudy like a surreal
1970s album cover!”
She leads the way through the thicket
of gingers in the Research House to
find one of the last flowers before the
deciduous Curcuma die back for the
winter. It’s bold and bright among a fan of green foliage. Just like the
research activities based
on them, the gingers
themselves are
flourishing
8 | T H E B OTA N I C S w i n t e r 2 0 0 8
Jana Leong-Škorničková
In February 2008, a Memorandum of Understanding was signed between RBGE and Singapore Botanic
Gardens to facilitate a closer working
relationship between the two Gardens. Jana Leong-Škorničková, a Senior
Researcher at Singapore Botanic Gardens
who works in collaboration with RBGE staff
on the Zingiberaceae Resource Centre,
explains her lifelong love of gingers.
I fell in love with gingers as a ten-year-old.
We visited the botanic gardens in Prague
on a school trip and I remember the wild flora in the glasshouses. By then I already knew I wanted to be a tropical
botanist but that was not on the agenda
in communist Czechoslovakia. When
you live in a country where you are not
free you dream. I used to read books
about people travelling in faraway forests. Everyone has childhood dreams
and mine was to discover new species
of plants or animals.
The revolution happened before
I went to university so at least we
could travel. But when I said I wanted to study gingers,
they just laughed at me.
Above: Staff of RBGE and Singapore Botanic
Gardens at the Ginger Garden after signing the Memorandum of Understanding between
the two gardens.
Below: Jana Leong-Škorničková searching for
gingers in Sarawak.
Right: Curcuma rubrobracteata the first new species Jana discovered, fulfilling a
childhood dream.
After 40 years of communism we had
completely lost our link to tropical botany –
very few teachers were old enough to
remember the pre-communism era. But I managed to get a scholarship to
study gingers in India as a part of my PhD.
In India I finally achieved my
childhood dream when I found a new
Curcuma in Mizoram. I was so thrilled,
completely on a high! I’m more used to it now – on most expeditions you find at least one new species, but there is a
slow process of verification to discover if it has already been described or not.
In 2001 I met a Singaporean, who
became my husband five years later. I knew Singapore Botanic Gardens had
a long history in studying gingers, and
I was very excited to hear that a Ginger
Garden was being created there. I started
volunteering there from my very first visit,
later I got a part-time job and then a full-time job, in between my PhD.
The major issue in plant taxonomy is to
give the correct name to the correct plant.
(It’s like people – if you make a mistake
in the names you can execute the wrong
person!) Taxonomy is definitely still queen
of sciences. We can’t do any conservation
effort or biodiversity studies unless we
know what we have in the remaining
forests. The forests are being cleared very
quickly so we need to act fast.
But it’s difficult: to trace retrospectively
the history of a name is no joke, because
there are 200 years in between and
plenty of people have expressed their
opinions and diverted the story a little bit
here and a little bit there. It takes time
to untangle, sometimes your only clue is
handwriting on an old herbarium sheet.
Some people love to boast about their
kids in front of everyone, and I’m just like
that with gingers. Gingers are amazing
and they are beautiful, which helps – you have to be in love with your subject.
T H E B OTA N I C S w i n t e r 2 0 0 8 | 9
A day
in the life…
Fay Young finds RBGE’s Mairi Gillies busy preparing
exhibitions for the opening of the John Hope Gateway in 2009.
A
round 8.45 am Mairi Gillies checks emails in her office at the
top of Inverleith House. After that it can be hard to track her down. Between trips up and downstairs
“fielding more email” she could be busy
in the laundry (that windowless space
next to Inverleith House) casting moulds
of plant specimens, in the Exhibition Hall
checking the current exhibition, or out in the borders hunting for fungi.
Every day brings a different creative
challenge for the young artist turned
horticulturist, who is now Curator of
Exhibitions for the John Hope Gateway,
working against the clock to coordinate
and complete the exhibitions which will open with the building next year.
“There are basically three parts to
my job,” says Mairi. The daunting detail shows in a blaze of pink,
green and yellow Post-it® notes stuck
to the wall above her desk. That’s
pink for temporary exhibitions, yellow
for ongoing events in the Exhibition
Hall and green for semi-permanent
exhibitions. “I’m a very visual person,”
she says laughing. “This is how I get my head round things.”
With the show safely installed in the
Exhibition Hall (Close by Allan Pollok-Morris
runs until 11 January), Mairi is now
concentrating on the green Post-it®.
At the time of this interview she is
roughly half-way through collecting
and preserving specimens for the semipermanent display in the new building.
When the weather is good she is likely to start the day in the Garden competing
with squirrels for prize specimens. “It’s an
extreme environment out there,” she says,
“I’ve had squirrels stealing from my bag.”
From algae to orchids, the taxonomic
family tree of plants will be set out in 96 bell jars of different
shapes
and sizes,
which is why her desk is surrounded by
samples of ferns, fungi and seaweeds
along with plastic moulds, glycerine and sugary crystals of silica gel.
None of this seems daunting to an artist
whose work has always been inspired by
nature. “I work very closely with science
and horticulture, but I do have a fair bit of
artistic licence,” says Mairi who came to
the Garden in 2003 as a volunteer when
she was at Edinburgh Art College and
returned with a degree in sculpture a
year later to take the HND in Horticulture
with Plantsmanship. She successfully
applied for her present job after 18 months
as a member of the horticulture staff
working on Vireya rhododendrons.
There are other days when
Mairi meets artists and craftsmen
commissioned to work with wood from
the Garden’s wych elm for next year’s
first temporary exhibition. Then there’s
the prospect of relocating Images of
the Garden, the annual exhibition of
work by students and tutors of the
adult education programme, which has
been such a popular feature in the
Exhibition Hall. “We’ll be moving
from a very adaptable white
cube to a space with lots of
glass and a curved wall; it’s going to be interesting.”
And there simply isn’t
room here to mention all
the imaginative plans for
new collaborative projects
with schools, community groups
and other research organisations to
communicate the cultural and natural
heritage of Scotland. Right now there
are plants to collect and preserve.
Once the fungi season is over it will be time for mistletoe.
1 0 | T H E B OTA N I C S w i n t e r 2 0 0 8
A celebration of
snowdrops
Photos: Snowdrops flourish below Dawyck's
towering trees (main and facing page, top) and Logan's exotic Chusan palms (facing page, below).
With a special conference
and a festival full of arts
and crafts activities, RBGE is making the
most of its snowdrop
collections this year.
T H E B OTA N I C S w i n t e r 2 0 0 8 | 1 1
T
iny yet tough, snowdrops pierce
the hard winter ground with
their spear-shaped leaves before
revealing the exquisite beauty of their
shining white bells. Spreading in clumps
and clusters through woodlands and
gardens, they reflect the early sunlight
bringing the hope of new life and the
promise of spring.
No wonder snowdrops are among the
best-loved of Britain’s flowers and have
been collected, cultivated and celebrated
for hundreds of years, resulting in endless
varieties today. Once known as the
Candlemas bells, snowdrops were viewed
as an emblem of purity and were often
planted in monasteries and churchyards.
RBGE will be taking part in Scotland’s
2009 Snowdrop Festival, in which
gardens throughout Scotland open early
in the year to encourage visitors to get
out and admire the drifts of snowdrops
in the clear winter light. Now in its third
year, the Snowdrop Festival is run by
VisitScotland and showcases the best
snowdrop gardens, woodlands and
estates across the country.
The festival was the inspiration of Lady Catherine Erskine of Cambo Estate,
home to Scotland’s National Collection of Snowdrops.
“At the height of the season the
snowdrops at Cambo are breathtaking,” she
says. “There are carpets of snowdrops as far as the eye can see, clinging to the sides of the burn, tumbling down the slopes.
“The simple beauty and tenacity of
snowdrops is very endearing. However
foul the weather, up they come and remain
looking white and beautiful for several
weeks. Flowering in the darkest days of
winter, the sight of them is uplifting.”
The idea of a snowdrop festival came
about when Lady Erskine was asked by a
group of Dutch visitors to arrange a tour of
Scottish snowdrop woods and realised that
there was no easy way to find out about
visiting snowdrop gardens and woods.
“In Scotland we have the best snowdrop
woods in Britain,” she says. “There is great
potential to encourage visitors from near
and far to get out and about at snowdrop
time. Part of my mission with snowdrops
is to encourage more garden visitors to
Scotland and to
raise the profile
of gardens as a
good day out. The
interesting thing
about snowdrop
visitors is that they
are not your ‘normal’
garden visitors – very often they are
families wanting an outing at a dull time
of the year and quite a number have
never visited a garden before. If we can
capture their interest then it has to be good.”
Three of RBGE’s Gardens will be
taking part in this year’s festival. Dawyck
is renowned for its stunning drifts of
snowdrops, which cover the banks of
the Scrape Burn and spread far up the
hillside. Logan is opening on Sundays
throughout the festival to allow visitors
to enjoy the carpet of snowdrops
among a wide variety of early flowering
rhododendrons, camellias and other
exotic plants in this subtropical garden.
A specialist collection of snowdrops is
scattered throughout the Edinburgh
Garden, especially in the Rock Garden
and woodland areas.
Snowdrop-themed events will take
place at the Edinburgh Garden, including
guided walks, family science and craft
activities. A special collection of historic
photographs and botanical illustrations
from RBGE archives will be on display in
the Library Foyer.
February
will also see a
gathering of
‘galanthophiles’ –
snowdrop
enthusiasts – at the Edinburgh
Garden, with a Snowdrop Conference,
held in association with the Cambo
Estate. This will feature a programme of
talks on specialist snowdrops and their
collectors, as well as guided tours of the
collections in the Edinburgh Garden.
“I hope by organising the Snowdrop
Conference we will put Scotland on the
‘snowdrop map’ and attract visitors from
England and Europe,” says Lady Erskine.
For more information on the Scottish Snowdrop Festival, see www.rbge.org.uk/snowdrops
For information on the Snowdrop
Conference, contact Rachel Brown at RBGE. Tel: 0131 248 2844 or email: rachel.brown@rbge.org.uk
‘Flowering in the
darkest days of winter,
the sight of them is uplifting’.
1 2 | T H E B OTA N I C S w i n t e r 2 0 0 8
A taste of
science at the
Garden
R
Illustration: Sarah Batey
May all your
Christmases be green!
J
oin us at the Botanics for RBGE’s fourth Green Christmas celebrations
which take place during the first
three weekends in December from
10.30 am to 3.00 pm. The Edinburgh
Garden’s Exhibition Hall will be a hub
of activity for all ages with the main
attraction being the opportunity to visit Green Santa in his magical grotto, and get a lovely present to take home.
There is also the chance to try out
a range of creative crafts in the lead
up to Christmas, with activities such as
creating your own Christmas wreaths
using recycled and natural materials
with the Art-tastic team; making your
own winter-inspired story book with the
Garden Rangers; or learning some of
the techniques used to create botanical
illustrations with Sunday Science. You can find out more about the plants
that are around us at Christmas-time –
in the Garden, in the wild, and in
traditional Christmas cooking. You may even be lucky enough to hear some of our carol singers!
Let the Talking Trees storytellers feed your imagination with tales of far away and long ago, deepest winter and Christmas-time.
The Festive Feast exhibition in the
Library Foyer will offer visitors the
opportunity to view a selection of
books and images from the Library and
Archives, all with a festive connection.
All this must be reason enough to come
in from the cold and warm your hands and
heart with seasonal fun at the Botanics!
For full listings of events, tickets or
pricing, please refer to our What’s On
guide, visit www.rbge.org.uk or call 0131 248 2968.
BGE’s new one-day Science Taster
Workshops launched at the
Edinburgh Garden in September
and are proving very popular.
The workshops allow an insight into
some of the techniques used in botanical
research, and some of the different ways
in which RBGE’s work contributes to the
global conservation of plants.
There are five one-day workshops to
choose from. These include ‘3 Collections
in 1’, an explanation of how RBGE’s
three collections – the Living Collection,
the Library and the Herbarium – are
maintained and how they link together,
and ‘Phylogenetics for Beginners’, which will
explore the evolutionary history of plants.
Emily Wood, the Short Course Co-ordinator, explains: “The aims of the
workshops are to provide an opportunity
for people to discover some of the
scientific techniques behind the plant
research at RBGE.
“Some workshops focus on techniques
which course participants can use in their
own research, such as the skills practised
in ‘Plants Under the Microscope’, while
others offer a deeper understanding
of essential botanical themes, such as
plant classification and evolution in
‘Getting to Grips with Plant Names’ and ‘Phylogenetics for Beginners’.”
To see a full list of the one-day
workshops available, and to download a booking form,
visit www.rbge.org.uk/education or contact the Education Office on 0131 248 2937.
Below: Inside the scanning electron microscope suite
at the Edinburgh Garden which attendees visit during
the ‘Plants Under the Microscope’ Workshop.
T H E B OTA N I C S w i n t e r 2 0 0 8 | 1 3
Dreams
on Wheels –
Danish cycling
culture for urban
sustainability
Above: Corrour Lodge Gardens, by Fort William.
Photograph by Allan Pollok-Morris.
Close
R
BGE’s autumn exhibition by Scottish
photographer Allan Pollok-Morris
has generated a huge amount
of interest among visitors, including
fellow photographers, artists and garden
enthusiasts. Allan has a real eye for the
quirkier aspects of Scottish gardens, and
the exhibition draws out the unique nature
of home-grown horticulture that thrives on
good plantsmanship, rain and eccentricity.
All the photographs in the exhibition
are included in a new hardback book
Close: A journey in Scotland, a celebration
of some of our famous and not-so-famous
gardens and garden-art, from Charles
Jencks’ Garden of Cosmic Speculation
to Alec Finlay’s Letterboxes. Fascinating,
intriguing and compelling, the journey
is one that armchair gardeners will find
inspiring and immensely satisfying.
Close is at RBGE’s Exhibition Hall, at
Edinburgh Garden, until 11 January,
admission free.
Two Voices III
P
art of a series of six exhibitions
describing RBGE’s Gardens through
colour photographs by blind
artist Rosita McKenzie, accompanied by
tactile interpretations by Camilla Adams
and audio commentaries. This exhibition
is the third in the series and focuses on
horticulture at the Edinburgh Garden.
Two Voices III/Horticulture Behind the
Scenes runs at Inverleith House until
8 February 2009. Tuesday to Sunday,
10 am to 3.30 pm, admission free.
Above: The Nursery at the Edinburgh Garden.
Photograph by Rosita McKenzie.
Not His Now
I
n January, RBGE’s Library opens the covers
on a selection of books from its collections
to find out a little bit about who owned
them before and the unique ways in which
some owners marked their ownership.
Not His Now: Inscriptions, Bookplates
and Annotations in Some RBGE Library
Books runs from 6 to 30 January in the
Library Foyer at the Edinburgh Garden,
admission free.
W
hen it comes to making
Scottish cities more enjoyable
and safer places for cycling
we can learn a lot from the experience
of the Danes. The exhibition Dreams on
Wheels looks at cycling and cycle-ways
in Copenhagen, which has been rated
the most cycle-friendly city in Europe.
RBGE is in the centre of a network of carfree cycle routes in the city, and we are
delighted to host this touring exhibition
from the Danish Cultural Institute.
As well as offering an insight into
city planning for a more sustainable
and pollution-free environment, the
exhibition includes a real bonus for
cycling enthusiasts – a collection of
unique bicycles from some of Denmark’s
top design teams.
Those of us who are of the opinion
that the bicycle represents the pinnacle
of human invention and are interested
in innovative, functional and beautiful
Danish design, are getting very excited
about this exhibition, which has
previously toured Australia and will arrive in Edinburgh in the spring.
Dreams on Wheels is at RBGE’s Exhibition Hall, Edinburgh Garden, 24 January to 21 March, admission free.
1 4 | T H E B OTA N I C S w i n t e r 2 0 0 8
“A dazzlingly diverse
world through
the microscope”
Retired doctor and RBGE Member
Jack Oliver has explored new depths in the world of aquatic plantlife, as he tells Anna Levin.
T
hrough his medical career, Jack Oliver had focused on children
damaged by their parents and
carers, mainly with brain and visual
injuries following maltreatment and
neglect. On retirement, he was looking
for an activity which offered a complete
break from this “depressing topic”
and “emotionally-charged scientific
endeavour” and so returned to botany, in which he had excelled as a teenager.
He pursued his new focus with zeal,
joining the Botanical Society of the British Isles and co-founding a Botanical
Society in Wiltshire. He also started a
small arboretum and, inspired by a lecture
on the RBGE-based International Conifer
Conservation Project, joined as a Friend of
the Garden and is growing small numbers
of ten threatened conifer species.
For his own research, he took up the
challenge of studying water plants, noting
that little had been recorded of the plants
on and under Wiltshire’s rivers, ponds
and canals. Exploring the “dazzlingly
diverse world through the microscope”,
he became interested in the minute algae
which he saw surrounding the plants’
roots. Mostly these were free-floating
or were growing attached to the roots.
Some roots, however, were sufficiently
transparent to see inside them and Jack Oliver was intrigued to see “green
blobs” actually inside the root tissue itself.
“This was all new to me and not
described in any of my botany textbooks,”
he says. “Eventually, some of the microphotos of root tissues were sufficiently
distinctive to reveal that algae had infiltrated
and invaded the living roots of four duckweeds and six other water plant species.”
He sent his pictures to algae specialist
Hans Sluiman at RBGE, who suggested that these were original observations.
A summary of Jack Oliver’s findings has
been published in The Phycologist, the
newsletter of the British Phycological Society
which aims to promote the study of algae.
A champion of botanical research, Jack Oliver feels more resources should be directed to biological investigation. “The variety of botanical and zoological
life – especially at microscopic level, with all
the concomitant complex biochemistry –
is astounding,” he explains. “A handful of
soil or cupful of pondwater probably has
more diversity than could be found in the
rest of our solar system outside our green
world. However, billions have been spent
on space exploration and physics such as
CERN atom smashers, hundreds of times
more than is spent studying our own
Earth’s unique and complex biology.”
For more information about becoming
a Member, contact the Membership
Office on 0131 248 2868 or visit www.rbge.org.uk/support-us
Above: Jack Oliver (top) and two microscope photos
showing algae deep inside the roots of duckweed
specimens. A special feature of this algal species are
bristle-like structures, which are thought to be involved
in the uptake of nutrients from the surrounding water.
Photos by Jack Oliver.
Eden founder addresses
RBGE Patrons
T
im Smit (pictured, left, centre)
provided an inspirational speech at
RBGE's Patrons' Dinner in October.
Renowned for his work on the restoration
of 'The Lost Gardens of Heligan', he also
co-founded the Eden Project in Cornwall.
Sponsored by Life PD Homes and catered
by Prestige Scotland, the event included a
champagne reception and a dinner in the
Caledonian Hall in the Edinburgh Garden.
T H E B O T A N I C S WINTER 2 0 0 8 | 1 5
Greenfingers
We are more familiar with the ginger family in our food and drink, but members of the Zingiberaceae can also make attractive garden plants –
even in Scotland, as RBGE Garden Supervisor Pete Brownless explains.
T
Above: The newly refurbished bothy is opened by
Lady Margaret Elliot (far right) as RBGE’s Regius Keeper
Professor Stephen Blackmore and Viv Sutherland of Life PD Homes look on.
From old
bothy to
new facility
T
he old bothy at the RBGE’s
Nursery has been transformed
into a spacious and comfortable
facility for participants of the ongoing
Horticultural Therapy programme, thanks to sponsorship from Life PD
Homes, one the companies developing
property adjacent to the Garden and
sponsor of Patrons’ events for two years.
Upgraded to include a meeting room,
changing facilities, lockers, kitchen and
disabled toilet, the bothy was officially
opened by Lady Margaret Elliot during
a reception for Patrons and Horticultural
Therapy volunteers on Monday, 29 September. Also present was Duncan
Sutherland, Director of Life PD Homes and
a descendant of RBGE’s first Regius Keeper
James Sutherland (RK: 1699 - 1715).
During the evening, Regius Keeper
Professor Stephen Blackmore presented
certificates to volunteers for achievements
including long service, completion of the
Discovery level of the John Muir Award
and the Certificate in Practical Horticulture. The volunteers gave demonstrations of
various aspects of their work, including
apiary care, phenology, bird- and bat-box
construction, cuttings and tool cleaning.
Finally, the Garden’s Patrons were each
given a herb, grown by the volunteers, as a memento.
he crystallised ginger
which we often enjoy
at Christmas is just one
of the treasures produced
by members of the ginger
family, Zingiberaceae. A recipe for Indian food,
for example, would not
be complete without the
spiciness of cardamom
(Elettaria sp.) and
turmeric (Curcuma sp.).
The family is distributed
throughout tropical
Africa, tropical and
temperate Asia and
the Americas, so you
probably would not
expect to be able to
grow any gingers in
your Scottish garden.
Some gingers,
however, are
surprisingly hardy.
For the woodland
garden, the genus
Roscoea provides
attractive
herbaceous
plants with a cult
status to rival
trilliums. Roscoea enjoy our
wet summers and are happy in light
shade. Roscoea purpurea is perhaps
the easiest to grow; it reaches about
35 cm tall and produces a succession
of flowers in early summer. It can be
divided in the autumn after leaves have died down.
For a warm sunny site, try Hedychium
gardnerianum. Its flamboyant yellow
flowers are borne on top of spikes
of luxuriant tropical foliage reaching
120 cm tall in late summer. Plant the
rhizomes deep, adding as much wellrotted compost and organic matter as possible.
Illustration: Roscoea purpurea, Curtis’s Botanical Magazine, Plate 463, Vol. 78, year 1852.
Cautleya spicata makes
a spectacular plant in a large pot of
summer bedding, with flamboyant
yellow-orange flowers held in bright
red bracts. It comes from the Himalayas
and has broad green canna-like leaves
growing 45 cm tall. Edge the pot with
the tubers of the architectural-leaved
love plant Oxalis triangularis. Keep the
pot frost free over winter.
Throughout the winter you can
enjoy the warmth of Edinburgh’s
tropical Glasshouses to hunt for spicy
gingers. At other times of the year
explore the gingers in the Woodland
Garden area in Edinburgh and at Logan Botanic Garden.
1 6 | T H E B OTA N I C S w i n t e r 2 0 0 8
Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh
Open daily (except 25 December and 1 January)
Inverleith Row, Edinburgh, EH3 5LR
Tel: 0131 552 7171 Email: info@rbge.org.uk
Admission to the Garden is free; charge applies to the Glasshouses.
•
Benmore Botanic Garden
The Botanics Shop
now brought
direct to your door!
Shopping at the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh
has now been made even easier with
the launch of our new on-line shopping service.
Visit www.rbgeshop.org.uk
to buy books, bulbs, gifts and more,
with discounts for RBGE Members.
Sales support the work of the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh.
The Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh is a registered charity (Scottish Charity Number SC007983)
and is sponsored by the Rural and Environment Research and Analysis Directorate.
Open daily 1 March to 31 October
Dunoon, Argyll, PA23 8QU
Tel: 01369 706261 Email: benmore@rbge.org.uk
Admission charge applies.
•
Logan Botanic Garden
Open Sundays only in February
Open daily 1 March to 31 October
Port Logan, Dumfries and Galloway, DG9 9ND
Tel: 01776 860231 Email: logan@rbge.org.uk
Admission charge applies.
•
Dawyck Botanic Garden
Open daily 1 February to 30 November
Stobo, Scottish Borders, EH45 9JU
Tel: 01721 760254 Email: dawyck@rbge.org.uk
Admission charge applies.
•
For further information about the Gardens visit
www.rbge.org.uk
For a What’s On guide, contact Catherine Mouat
Tel: 0131 248 2991 Email: c.mouat@rbge.org.uk
•
Photo: © iStockphoto.com/Stefan Klein