Gardens in Coastal British Columbia

In early August I took a garden tour with the Minnesota Landscape Arboretum to the cities of Vancouver and Victoria in southwestern British Columbia. Garden tours focus on plants; here are miscellaneous highlights.

a bed of coleus and marigolds

Early August is the peak of the growing season in British Columbia so the flowers were amazing. (Caveat: if you water. The actual climate has a warm to hot, very dry summer, so unwatered areas were brown, all dried out.)

Butchert Gardens includes an old quarry, so you can stand on the rim and see colorful vistas. 

Butchert Gardens view

They combined annuals in dramatic patterns. Some I liked 

yellow begonias and unidentified white flowers

and some I did not

pink begonias, white maybe dusty miller (Senecio cineria),
unidentified blue flowers

At Queen Elizabeth Park, there were light touches I loved: 

Why not grow plants on the trash bins?

trash bin, VanDusen Botanical Garden

I thought this a very pretty arrangement. I have several old pans that might be suitable to imitate it.

rock garden in a pan, Horticulture Centre of the Pacific

The Horticulture Centre of the Pacific had a Wsánec' Ethnobotany Trail. Here is pepkiyos, snowberry, Symphoricarpos albus. The fruits were mostly gone, though you can see a cluster in the second photo. The HCP's literature did not list uses, but other tribes of the Pacific Northwest used it as a treatment for burns. The brochure did say it has cultural and spiritual uses. 

pepkiyos, snowberry

Looking up into a big tree. The trees of BC were enormous by Colorado standards! Some trees only 100 years old were this massive. 

Below is the base of the Eagle Tree at the University of British Columbia Botanical Garden, a Douglas fir, Pseudotsuga menziesii. It is the one of the oldest in the gardens. When the area was clear-cut, it was left because of the obvious damage (lumps and scars in my photo below). Furthermore it leans strongly, which creates undesirable compression wood. Its flaws saved it. It is estimated to be 400-500 years old.

Eagle Tree, UBC Botanical Garden

Fantastic displays of annuals to huge natives, the gardens in Vancouver and Victoria were entrancing.

Comments and corrections welcome.

References 

The Butchert Gardens Flower and Plant Guide

Native American Ethnobotany database link

Wsánec' Ethnobotany Trail. The Gardens at HCP and Pepáken Háutw Foundation.

You will have noticed that you don't have to live in Minnesota to travel with the Minnesota Landscape Arboretum.

Kathy Keeler

A Wandering Botanist

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