NATIONAL BOTANIC GARDEN

Otago Daily Times, Issue 20317, 27 January 1928, Page 10

NATIONAL BOTANIC GARDEN

QUESTION OF SITE. DR HffiL’S SUGGESTION. (Special to Daily Times.) WELLINGTON, January 26. A national botanic garden for Now Zealand was favoured by Dr A. W. Hill, director of Kew Gardens, in a speech before the New Zealand Institute to-day. The matter was raised by Dr J. Thomson, who said that he hoped that the establishment of such a garden would follow Dr Hill's visit to the Dominion. The word " national ” raised some of the difficulties and jealousies of the position, said Dr Hill. The position was somewhat similar to that in South Africa, where rival gardens had been established by two cities, while a third place had a bettor herbarjiuni than cither. It had struck him that a southern garden might he made in Dnncdin. or a northern garden in Auckland, for in Dunedin things could be grown that it would be impossible to grow in Auckland, and vice versa. There might be a scientific • head of the whole, and two first-class curators, one in each city. Whether those two gardens would meet the situation he did not know, for he had not yet been in Christchurch, and did not know the position, but Wellington was fortunate in its possession of the Otari Reserve. The flora of the Dominion was remarkable, and the country was fortunate in getting a public which was becoming really interested in native plants.

Already there was on foot an Auckland movement to establish a botanic garden. said Professor F. P. Worley, of Auckland. He did not think that they aspired to having the finance provided by the country, however.