Replanting

During the Restoration Project, the Horticulture team have added a large number of new plants that we weren’t growing in the Garden before. We wanted to improve our collection by representing new plant families, groups and regional plants in our displays. 

The team has added 94 new plants to the glasshouses that will become part of our collection. As you can imagine, it was hard to find the space to fit them all in! One of these new plants is the Aloe polyphylla, also known as spiral aloe. This aloe only grows in the Maloti Mountains in the country of Lesotho. It grows in gaps on slopes and between rocks and is highly desirable for its unique spiral pattern. 

The Cool Fernery was the first glasshouse to be completed as part of the project. Last year, it was replanted and landscaped. In spring of 2023, a full year later, the new plants have really bedded in and are taking off. Ferns need high humidity, so we mist inside a special case in the glasshouse with up to five litres of rainwater every day. You can visit the Cool Fernery now to see the new plant growth- and keep an eye out for the tadpoles as they grow into frogs! 

Glasshouse One and the Tropical Corridor were recently finished, and the keys were handed back over to our gardening team. They quickly got to work replanting. The new plants will take some time to settle in and to realise how much more space they have to grow in. For now, it looks sparse, but in a year’s time the plants will really have taken off.