Botanische Gärten der Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn

With its botanical gardens, Rheinische Friedrich- Wilhelms-Universität Bonn maintains one of the oldest documented and most traditional botanical garden in Germany. Under the motto Explore, Get Explaining Experience about 11,000 plant species are there cultivated on about 12 ha. The accommodation is spread over three sites, the historical castle gardens around the castle Clemensruh in Bonn -Poppelsdorf comprises the largest and most well known part. Furthermore, there is the public garden for the special crops collection, as well as the non-public Melbgarten on the Venusberg.

Core task of the gardens as a university institution, research and teaching. For this UNGs and the test material is made ​​available on a large scale Anschau. However, the Botanical Gardens are also recreation room of the Bonner citizens as well as banquet and meeting the university. With an average of 140,000 visitors a year, the gardens are the biggest showcase of the University for the population.

History

The roots of the Botanical Gardens date back to the 16th century. At the site of today's garden was in the Middle Ages a moated castle, since about 1340, a possession of the Elector of Cologne.

Around the year 1650 is detected at the castle, a Renaissance garden with orangery. Over 200 years since there was here a pleasure garden of the Elector of Cologne. Often, the garden was destroyed in wartime, but was rebuilt again and again in the same place in just the current style of garden design.

Around 1720 the garden was transformed into a Baroque garden, which is preserved in its basic structure until today. Until 1746 the rococo palace Clemensruhe was built by Elector Clemens August of Bavaria. In his time two beech trees were planted. These survived over 250 years and were referred to as Clemens -August- Book. Since the 1970s, her health was monitored critical; January 18, 2007 fell by Hurricane Kyrill to one of the trees and the other was due to its isolated position now like safety's sake.

Under the rule of Prussia were in 1818, the castle and the adjacent park property of the University of Bonn. In the same year the park under the first director Christian Gottfried Daniel Nees von Esenbeck was converted into a botanical garden.

Under the later garden director Eduard Strasburger was one of the greatest botanical gardens Prussia Bonn (after Berlin). The botanical garden was completely destroyed in World War II. It was not until 1979-1984 the reconstruction was finally completed with new greenhouses.

The Botanical Gardens today

The Botanical Gardens are located today at three locations:

• The original botanical garden at Castle Poppelsdorf
• The useful plants garden at Katzenburgweg (coordinates: 50 ° 43 '30 " N, 7 ° 5' 18" O50.7257.0883333333333 )
• The Melbgarten on Nachtigallenweg ( not public)

The Botanical Gardens show today, to approximately 12 hectares with eleven technically highly modern equipped greenhouses around 11,000 different plant species that are collected and managed since 1990 in an electronic database.

Current director of the botanical garden is Maximilian Weigend. Curator since 1988 is Dr. Wolfram Lobin.

At the Botanical Gardens Bonn currently run mainly research projects on phylogeny and evolution of flowering plants, biodiversity, ecology and bionics. Since 1996, research and development projects are carried out dealing with the contents of the Convention on Biological Diversity. These projects arose among other things, the International Plant Exchange Network ( IPEN ), which has enjoyed worldwide success as an implementation tool for access and benefit sharing. Many important results of the R & D projects were published by the German Federal Agency for Nature Conservation. 2007/2008 the implementation of the Global Strategy for Plant Conservation is ( GSPC) studied and promoted in Germany.

The garden leads several special collections, such as since 1818 an arboretum, further Araucaria, Araceae from the Mediterranean region, a Cape Verde - Protection Collection, endangered plants of the Rhein- Sieg district, maintenance culture of the Toro Miro, as well as the most extensive German collection carnivores. Because of its cultural, historical and current importance of the botanical gardens were included in the road of garden design between the Rhine and Maas 2004. Together with the Poppelsdorfer castle, Poppelsdorfer Allee and a guard post of the Botanical Garden as a historic listed building.

Significant botanist and gardener at the Botanical Garden Bonn

Many eminent scientists researched plants in Poppelsdorf. Also important gardeners and landscapers worked or learned here. Below is a selection:

• Maximilian Friedrich Weyhe (1775-1846) garden designers, trained by his father, the fancy gardener Joseph Clemens Weyhe ( the Elder 1749-1813 ) (see Joseph Clemens Weyhe the Younger 1807-1871 ) and his uncle, Peter Joseph Lenne Elder.
• Christian Gottfried Daniel Nees von Esenbeck (1776-1858), first Garden Director (1818-1829), President of the Imperial Academy " Leopoldina ".
• Theodor Friedrich Ludwig Nees von Esenbeck (1787-1837), pharmacologist and botanist, garden inspector since 1819, from 1833 to 1837 co-director of the garden
• Peter Joseph (the younger ) ( 1789-1866 ), son of the Elector's court gardener Peter Joseph Le New ( Lenne the Elder. ), Born in Bonn and trained in Poppelsdorf.
• Eduard August von Regel (1815-1892), trained in Poppelsdorf the gardener, later director of the Botanical Garden Saint Petersburg
• Johannes von Hanstein (1822-1880), garden director 1867 to 1880.
• Beissner Ludwig (1843-1927), dendrologist, 1887-1913 Garden inspector in Bonn
• Eduard Strasburger (1844-1912), botanist
• Wilhelm Pfeffer (1845-1920), plant physiologist, Curator of the Botanic Garden 1874-1877
• Carl Friedrich Julius Bouché (1846-1922), 1871-1888 Garden Inspector
• Andreas Franz Wilhelm Schimper (1856-1901), plant geographer, 1883-1899 Curator in Bonn
• Wilhelm Barthlott ( born June 22, 1946) Garden Director 1985-2011