Wüstenhaus Schönbrunn
Built in 1904 Sundial house, run as a desert home since 2004, is the youngest of the four plant houses in the Schönbrunn Palace in Vienna. Their present topic is to be understood as a counterpart to the 2002 in the neighboring Tiergarten opened Rainforest House.
History
The little conspicuous sundial house is located opposite the Palm House, right on the way from Hietzinger gateway to the Tiergarten. It owes its name to the sundial, which is located south of the building in the garden area.
The diplomat, explorer and founder of the Vienna Horticultural Society Karl Alexander Anselm Freiherr von Hügel had suggested this building to replace an older, the demands of the plants are not sufficient greenhouse. It should first take the plants collected from these Hollanders extensive collection, which the imperial court had acquired in 1848, and around, South and North America native plants was later extended from South Africa who need similar conditions.
It was built in 1904 to designs by the imperial Court architect Alphons Custodis.
While a bomb attack almost completely destroyed the glazing of the neighboring Palm House on February 21, 1945 a majority of the disks of the sundial house has been preserved, probably because the Palm House between the bombed area and the house is, and because the glazing of the sundial house (unlike the Palm House ) was the propagation of the pressure waves approximately parallel. Several plants from the palm house could be moved to safety, therefore, here, as far as space permitted this. Also during the refurbishment of the Palm House, 1986-1990, the sundial house again served as temporary quarters.
In April 1990 the first Austrian butterfly house was built within the walls, which one but in 1998 moved to the Palm House in the castle garden.
After heavy rust damage had shown to the steel elements, the house was closed in 1998 and renovated from 2000 to 2003. Then designed the Austrian Federal Gardens, the successor to the imperial Hofgärten manage the house since 1918, in a joint project with the Tiergarten Schönbrunn in this building, the Desert House. The Federal Gardens show succulents, beige prepared by the Tiergarten and supervised small animals such as gerbils, reptiles and birds living exhibition.
- Two copies (one male and one female ) of the discovered by the Austrian Friedrich Welwitsch 1859 Welwitschia, a rare and endangered desert plant from Namibia, which is up to 2,000 years old. However, the two Schönbrunn specimens are from the Botanical Garden of the JW Frankfurt Goethe University and are only about 40 years old.
- Even the rose -like aspect cactus leaves is presented.
Fockea capensis (F. crispa ).
Diamond Dove ( Geopelia cuneata )
Cacti against a background painting
Architecture
The 95 meters long, 14.5 meters wide and 15 meters high building is glazed on the roof and south side completely, while the north side consists of a brick wall. The 1,300 square meter total area is divided lengthwise into three sections; subsequent to the middle part two wings are used as landscaped entrance facing east, west side, as a cold house.