MaryAnne Spinner, Chicago Master Gardener

Heading west for vacation this year? Here are more recommendations of gardens to visit, some very elegant and grandiose, others rather funky; some world-famous, others relatively obscure.

?>Brentwood Bay, British Columbia

Perhaps the most famous garden in Canada, The Butchart Gardens (www.butchartgardens.com) cover fifty acres in what was once a limestone quarry, located twenty-one miles north of the B.C. capital city of Victoria. The garden is on the estate of Robert Butchart, a pioneering and prosperous manufacturer of Portland cement, and is still owned by the Butchart family. Robert purchased the land in 1904 and located both his factory and his home on the property. After the quarry became depleted, his wife Jenny spent the next forty years turning this eyesore into a horticultural showplace. She arranged for tons of topsoil to be hauled onto the estate by horse cart from neighboring farms to create the Sunken Garden on the floor of the quarry, and had quarry rock relocated to form bases for raised flower beds. The Butcharts planted rows of cherry trees shipped in from Japan, and flooded part of the quarry to create a lake edged with weeping willows. Jenny herself dangled over the sides of the quarry, suspended by rope in a bosun's chair, tucking ivy into the nooks and crannies of the quarry walls. The Butcharts loved to travel, and it is said that they never returned from a trip without new specimens to plant. This passion for travel is reflected in the Japanese Garden with its Torii gate, teahouse, and Zen-style sand garden, as well as the Italian Garden, converted from a tennis court and built in the shape of a Florentine cross, and centered on ponds of water lilies. The house itself boasted an indoor salt-water swimming pool, a billiards parlor, and a bowling alley. The Butcharts installed a rare self-playing Aeolian pipe organ, which is still in use on Saturday nights in the summer to accompany a gala fireworks display, and guests can take afternoon tea in The Dining Room of the house. Each year over 1,000,000 bedding plants in some 700 varieties are used throughout the Gardens to ensure uninterrupted bloom from Spring–with 50,000 tulip bulbs–through Autumn–with its stunning fall color. I visited in late October and found much still in full bloom, especially the lovely Rose Garden, which was clearly a function of the excellent Pacific Northwest climate. At Christmas time, the Gardens are decorated with tens of thousands of lights, evergreen swags and wreaths, holly, ivy, and winter berries, and visitors can twirl around a large skating rink.

Calgary

Calgary, the largest city in the province of Alberta, Canada, is perhaps best known for its annual Stampede or for hosting the 1988 Winter Olympics. But it also has two very interesting gardens, which is rather remarkable considering the fact that Calgary is situated in chilly USDA Zone 3a/b. The first of these, the Dorothy Harvie Gardens and Conservatory http://www.calgaryzoo.org/horticulture/index.htm , is actually located in the middle of the Calgary Zoo! The Harvie is celebrating its 20^th anniversary this summer, and is maintained by the University of Alberta Master Gardeners, who are available on-site daily from June through September to answer questions. The gardens are open all year long and feature some 40,000 annuals, including an All-American Selection garden, and a test site for the Alberta Perennial Trials, which evaluate new perennials in light of the province's challenging climate. When I visited one summer, I was bemused and puzzled by a large bed of strikingly eerie yet unfamiliar-looking plants. On closer inspection, I realized that these were large lettuces and kales that had been deliberately allowed to bolt as part of a trial, to showcase their unusual flowers. In the center of the garden is the Conservatory, which houses a Palm Garden displaying palm trees and tropical plants, as well as Butterfly, Arid, and Rainforest gardens. And certainly one of the most entertaining aspects of this garden is the fact that is located wholly within a zoo (or more formally, a zoological garden!). In addition to conventional exhibits of African, Asian, and Australian animals, the Calgary Zoo has a marvelous collection of indigenous species, including grizzly bears, eagles, moose, wood bison, and wolves.

Given that the average January low temperature in Calgary is 5 degrees Fahrenheit, it should come as no surprise that the city has built one of the world's largest indoor parks, Devonian Gardens (www.calgary.ca/parks/devonian ). Opened in 1977, the Devonian occupies three floors of the Toronto Dominion Square, a large shopping mall in the heart of downtown. In garden terms, it spans 2.5 acres of full-size trees and tropical flowers, with one mile of interior walkways, all grown under high-intensity metal halide lights. Although the concept of Banana Republic and banana trees co-existing might sound rather surreal at first, the Devonian is actually quite charming and peaceful. It houses 20,000 plants–14,000 imported from Florida, 6,000 natives–and a number of ponds requiring 85,000 gallons of recirculating water. Despite construction costs of $9 million, entrance to the garden is free, and so it is a favorite destination of both downtown workers and tourists...especially in the winter. It is part of Calgary's "+15 Skywalk" system, which links most major office complexes, hotels, attractions and public buildings downtown with climate controlled bridges. The Devonian features a Sun Garden with native plantings, a Sculpture Court, a woodland Quiet Garden in a secluded corner, Water Gardens (home to 45 Red Ear Slider turtles), and a Reflecting Pond. The latter feature, surrounded by plantings, statues, and fountains, is open during the summer months and is the only outdoor area in the complex.

Los Angeles Area

Winter weather is not an issue at the gardens of the Getty Center in Los Angeles (http://www.getty.edu/visit/see_do/gardens.html ). The Getty is a multi-faceted museum offering world-class art, striking architecture, and inspiring gardens with stunning views from an isolated hilltop location in the swanky Brentwood neighborhood. Visitors park at the base of the hill and then take a winding tram ride up to the property. The Getty opened to the public in 1997, featuring J. Paul Getty's personal collection of Western art from the Middle Ages to the present, from Rembrandt's Abduction of Europa to van Gogh's Irises. The museum buildings' architect was Richard Meier, but the gardens themselves were designed by installation artist Robert Irwin. His 134,000 square-foot Central Garden at the Getty features a natural ravine planted with grasses, and a tree-lined walkway which traverses a stream descending to a pavilion rimmed with bougainvillea arbors. The stream then cascades over a stone waterfall and ends in a pool with a floating maze of azaleas, surrounded by specialty gardens. The landscape contains over 500 varieties of plants, and is constantly evolving; Irwin's philosophy, "always changing, never twice the same" is carved into the plaza floor. Besides the Central Garden, the Getty's grounds feature courtyard fountains, shaded nooks, and–if you are lucky enough to be there on a smog-free day–spectacular views of Los Angeles, the Santa Monica Mountains, and the Pacific Ocean. My favorite feature is the Cactus Garden, planted with hundreds of barrel cacti in symmetrical rows (much like an army of Li'l Abner's Shmoos). The Cactus Garden is perched on a stone enclosure on the southern edge of the property, with heady views of West Los Angeles below, and recalls for me the medieval French fortress city of Carcassonne.

The Huntington Botanical Garden (www.huntington.org) in San Marino, twelve miles northeast of Los Angeles, is part of a huge estate that includes an art museum and library. Founded by railroad baron Henry Huntington in 1919, the gardens span 120 acres, divided into various themed areas. The Rose Garden features 1,200 cultivars, including an important collection of Old Garden Roses developed before 1901, and is arranged chronologically. The Shakespeare Garden contains plants mentioned in Shakespeare's works such as columbines, poppies, and rosemary, all identified by signage quoting the relevant play or sonnet. The formal Herb Garden groups plants into beds according to their use–like culinary, medicinal, perfume and cosmetic–while the ten-acre Desert Garden is not only comprehensive, but is also a valuable research and educational tool; it contains 5,000 species, half the plants in the world considered to be succulent. Huntington's Japanese Garden, begun in 1911, is one of the oldest in the United States, reflecting Americans' curiosity about all things Asian at that time. It was a wedding gift designed to appease his sophisticated easterner wife, who was dubious about moving out to the Wild West. The Australian Garden was originally started as a test plot of 1,000 eucalyptus trees planted by the USDA, and now contains numerous other plants from the Southern Hemisphere. There is a lovely Camellia Garden, housing a collection of 60 species and over 1,400 cultivars, and exemplary Subtropical, Jungle, and Palm Gardens. Although some of the Huntington's gardens are approaching 100 years of age, the plantings are not static and have been revised and renovated over the years. A new Chinese Garden, to be called the Garden of Flowing Fragrance, is currently under construction, using Chinese artisans and imported rocks and carved stones. At twelve acres, it will be one of the largest classical Chinese gardens outside of its native land. Visitors to the Huntington should plan to spend the entire day on the property–in addition to the gardens, the art museum and library are world-class institutions in their own right. The museum focuses on 18th century British and French art, and on American art ranging from the early 18th to the early 20th century. Other objects of the same period include French paintings; French and British sculpture, tapestries, furniture, porcelain, and silver; and British drawings and watercolors. Arguably the museum's most famous works of art are Gainsborough's 'Blue Boy' and Lawrence's 'Pinkie'. The Huntington's research library is one of the most celebrated and most extensively used scholarly American collections outside of the Library of Congress. Among its treasures are the Ellesmere manuscript of Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, a Gutenberg Bible on vellum, the double-elephant folio edition of Audubon's Birds of America, early editions of Shakespeare's works, and original letters of Washington, Jefferson, Franklin, and Lincoln.

Palm Springs, California

This resort town is home to film and sports celebrities, glitzy desert estates, and a zillion golf courses. So of course its botanic garden is classically elegant and formal, right? Well no, the Moorten Botanical Garden and Cactarium–billed as the "World's First Cactarium" (http://www.palmsprings.com/moorten/index.html ) –is about as funky and offbeat as gardens get. Founded in 1939 by Patricia and Chester "Cactus Slim" Moorten, pioneer residents of Palm Springs, the rustic garden is a one-acre plot featuring 3,000 examples of desert cacti and succulents. The plants are grouped together by geographic region: Arizona, Baja California, California, Colorado, the Mojave Desert, the Sonora Desert, South Africa, South America, and Texas. The Moorten is both highly entertaining and educational. Charming hand-written wooden signs identify plantings with information like "African Thorn-Tree, Giraffes Eat It", or impart homespun philosophies such as "Take your time like a turtle, and you'll see more". The cacti are placed in fantastical stage settings like a conceptual Treasure Island shipwreck, or are planted among old pioneer wagons, "Real Dinosaur Footprints" cast in concrete, and religious statuary. The Moorten's retail center sells a wide variety of house-propagated cacti, and the center of the garden is dominated by a caged dove-cote: doves for sale, $20 a pair. The theatricality of the garden is whimsically appropriate, in that Slim Moorten was an original Keystone Cop from the silent film era, and later acted as a double for Howard Hughes. Slim and Patricia designed and installed landscapes for fellow Palm Springs resident Frank Sinatra, and were friends with Walt Disney, serving as consultants for Disney's design of Frontierland at his new amusement park, Disneyland. The Moortens were avid world travelers, and collected many of the plants on exhibit during their travels throughout the Americas. Their amiable son Clark is now the proprietor of the Moorten, and he is usually on hand working the cash register (admission $2.50), ready to answer questions about both cacti and his family history. The garden features some truly other-worldly plants, including a two-story Pachypodium, numerous caudiciform (fat-bottomed) species of cactus, and an arborescent "candelabra" Euphorbia. Even the names of the plant varieties are curious: Aztecia, Gymnocalyciums, Ferocactus, Thorned Caesalpinia, Bursera, and Bombax. Perhaps the most bizarre plants in the collection are two rare Welwitschia mirabilis from Namibia. Each of these plants consists entirely of exactly two leaves, plus one stem base, and roots. Its two permanent leathery ribbon-like leaves are unique in the plant kingdom; they are the original leaves from when the plant was a seedling, and they just continue to grow forever and are never shed, sort of like Howard Hughes' fingernails. The plant is believed to be a relic from the Jurassic Age, and lives for several hundred years, while specimens in the wild have been dated as being over 2,000 years old.

Santa Barbara

The Santa Barbara Botanic Garden (http://www.sbbg.org) is sited on a picturesque location in Mission Canyon below the Santa Ynez Mountains, overlooking the Pacific Ocean. Founded in 1926 by a local philanthropist and originally called the Blaksley Botanic Garden in her honor, the SBBG features 40 acres crisscrossed by 5.5 miles of hillside hiking trails. The garden is a repository of over 1,000 different native California plants, and because of this has been accredited by the American Association of Museums as a living museum. Its notable collections–many of which are of endangered species–include Salvia, Matilija Poppy (Romneya), and Agaves, with exceptional groupings of beautiful blue-flowering Ceanothus (also known as California Lilac), and Manzanitas (Arctostaphylos). The SBBG has separate Canyon, Chaparral, Arroyo, and Desert areas, and an Island Section containing plants from a series of 16 islands off the coast of southern California and Baja California, Mexico. These islands are home to numerous rare plants, many of which are seriously threatened by human activity. Other highlights of the SBBG are a Japanese teahouse, a meadow of California wildflowers and grasses, a home demonstration garden planted with water-conserving species, a Redwood Forest, and the landmarked Mission Dam, which was constructed by Chumash Indians in 1806.

Perhaps my favorite garden anywhere is Lotusland (www.lotusland.org), a 37-acre estate and botanic garden situated in the foothills of Montecito just east of Santa Barbara. It was the home of beautiful but eccentric Polish opera singer Madame Ganna Walska from 1941 until her death in 1984, after which Lotusland was opened to the public. Madame–as she was known–worked her way through six husbands including Harold McCormick of the International Harvester McCormicks, and became quite wealthy as a result. She bought the property at the suggestion of her last husband, Theos Bernard, who was a Hatha Yoga enthusiast. He persuaded her to purchase the estate as a retreat for Tibetan monks, and originally named it "Tibetland." The Tibetan monks never arrived, however, and after Madame divorced Theos she changed the name of her estate to "Lotusland", in honor of the sacred Indian lotus growing in one of the ponds on the property. Although she used several landscape designers to help achieve her vision, Madame herself designed much of the property, usually demanding the biggest and best specimens of plants, no matter the cost. As a result, Lotusland has spectacular collections of cacti and succulents, amassed both for their beauty and for their educational value; according to her will, Madame intended to develop the gardens "into the most outstanding center of horticultural significance and of educational use". The instructive part of the experience begins as one comes up the driveway leading to the house, which is planted on one side with a stand of cacti–which are new world plants–while the other side is planted in euphorbias from the old world. Madame also clearly appreciated whimsy; the Aloe Garden, for example, contains a shallow kidney-shaped pool, decorated with two large cascading fountains of giant clam shells and a border of abalone shells, while the Bromeliad Garden is ringed with a border of giant ponytail palms (Beaucarnea recurvata). The Topiary Garden features a "zoo" of twenty-six large animals, and a working floral clock 25 feet in diameter planted with succulents and senecio. Madame's sense of high drama and theatricality were served by the estate's Theatre Garden, designed to resemble an outdoor theatre on the grounds of her chateau in France. She held frequent concerts in this setting to entertain her guests, and special events are still held out there on the terraced seating, framed by hedges of boxwood and punctuated with comical sculpted stone gnomes. One of Madame's crowning achievements–financed in the 1970's by selling off some of her jewelry–is the Cycad Garden. Cycads are a group of unusual cone-bearing plants which were common during the time of the dinosaurs. However, most species are endangered and some are now extinct in the wild. Lotusland's cycad collection is considered the most complete collection of cycads in any public garden in the United States, with over 400 mature specimens of cycads, including ten of the eleven living genera and more than half of known species represented. Lotusland's Water Garden is built around the estate's original swimming pool, which Madame converted into a pond. On display there are numerous water lilies and other bog plants such as taro (Colocasia esculenta), Papyrus, and–of course–several species of Indian lotus (Nelumbo nucifera), all abuzz with dragonflies. There are a number of other dramatic water features on the estate, including a pool area in the Fern Garden with an adjacent sandy "beach", bordered by more giant clam shells and a stone wall planted with succulents; a wall fountain with a figure of a hippocampus (a mythological horse-sea monster combination) in the Fruit Orchard; and in the Parterre, a fountain of Neptune and Spanish fountains inlaid with Moorish stonework reminiscent of the Alhambra in Grenada, Spain. The deceptively simply named Cactus Garden, Lotusland's newest feature, was completed just a few years ago. This garden contains over 500 columnar cacti from famed California collector Merritt Dunlap. The Dunlap collection was begun in 1929, and 40 percent of it was grown from seed. It took Lotusland's staff six months to move the collection in and place it among 300 tons of basalt boulders, creating a stunning naturalistic setting. Thirty-one of Dunlap's largest specimens had to be dug up with a backhoe and boxed, their individual branches framed to protect them during their long trip to Lotusland by flatbed truck. Among the remarkable specimens in this collection are species of Opuntia native to the Galapagos Islands, several blue Armatocereus, and a complete collection of the genus Weberbauerocereus, which sounds more like a dinosaur than a plant, but is actually a group of columnar cacti from Peru named after Andean researcher August Weberbauer. It should be noted that if you plan to visit Lotusland, arrangements must be made in advance with the staff, and should be made as far in advance as possible. As the estate is located in a private enclave of very wealthy residents (think Oprah), there are strict regulations as to traffic and parking. Hours are limited, and most visits are by docent-guided tour only, although there are also several open days each year when visitors can wander freely if they purchase a membership. The two-hour guided tours are first-rate, however, as the garden is staffed by over 200 volunteers who are exceedingly knowledgeable both about the elements of the estate and its entertaining history. On two separate visits, my guides were a retired professor of geology whose hobby was paleontology, and a University of California Extension Master Gardener.

Do you have a gardening question? Email the Extension's Electronic Plant Clinic at rwolford@uiuc.edu, and our Master Gardeners will be glad to assist you.