A Visit to the Botanical Gardens in Bucharest in May

The first botanical garden of the city was inaugurated in 1860 by Dr. Carol Davila. At that time the garden occupied 7 ha, and the area was decorated under the overseeing of botanist Ulrich Hoffmann. In 1866 directorship is passed to Romanian botanist Dimitrie Grecescu. As the Royal family wanted the grounds for a royal park, the botanical gardens moved to a new space in University Square. At that time the institution became part of the University of Bucharest under the leadership of Prof. Dimitrie Brândza, who founded in 1892 the Botanical Institute, under whose authority functioned the Botanical Museum and the first Herbarium.

In 1884 the gardens moved to the current location, where they now occupy 17.5 ha. The first glasshouses were modeled on those from the Botanical Gardens in Liège. Between 1932 and 1954 the Botanical Gardens were managed by City Hall before becoming the property of the University again. Since 1994 the Bucharest botanical gardens are known as the Dimitrie Brândza Botanical Gardens.

I tried to photograph the labels for further reference, but not all plants and trees had these labels. So I don’t know the name of all the plants I’m showing here. I’m hoping some of you may help me identify the unlabeled photos. If you click on the photos shown as half-width, you can see the large, 800-pixel versions.