Kanapaha Botanical Gardens Field Trip report
I used to live in an apartment in Gainesville, Fl., and had no options for gardening (at the time, I do not think there was even a community garden). So, as often as I could, I went to one of three places to enjoy plants and nature: the Devil’s Millhopper (a sink hole with many plants exotic even to Florida), Payne’s Prairie (a grass and wetlands nature preserve, though I only went to a tiny part of it) and Kanapaha Botanical Gardens. I recently had the opportunity to make a quick visit to Gainesville and again visit the gardens. They have changed and are growing!
The word Kanapaha comes from the Timucua Indian words for "palmetto leaf" and "house" referring to the thatched homes of the original residents of a small Timucua village on the shore of Lake Kanapaha. The garden is 33 acres and was started in 1978. The garden has several theme gardens, and a large collection of bamboos. (It has generated some controversy in the past by selling spreading forms of bamboo during its annual sale. Bamboo can become invasive in FL. Even in Central VA, it spread and will even run under a roadway to come up on the other side! However, Kanapaha now mostly sells clumping varieties. Florida is home to many invasive, exotic plants and animals that threaten natives. To learn more about invasive species in all parts of the country, go to: http://www.invasivespeciesinfo.gov/plants/books.shtml )
The theme gardens at Kanapaha include a vinery, a hummingbird garden, and butterfly, herb, water, palm and rock (desert) gardens. One real pleasure for me was seeing some new varieties of Voodoo lilies (Amorphophallus plants that I have written about). Some beautiful pink ones were in bloom (perhaps bulbifers) in the front entrance to the garden, and a real oddball (A. paeonafolia) in the garden. I had a lot of fun showing these weird wonders of the plant world to friends who were with me. Both are pictured above. I also greatly enjoyed looking at the palms, palmettos and cycads, probably because I only get to see these under glass up north. The herb garden is beautifully arranged and well worth a close look. We were lucky to see a Century plant in full bloom- this “bloom” was a 30 foot tall flower spike!
If your only experience of Florida is Disney or south Florida, I encourage you to explore the back roads of northern Florida, from Ocala north and west. There are few crowds (except during football games), it is far less developed and has some incredibly lovely places! Kanapaha offers many unexpected pleasures.
(Be sure to avail yourself of the bug repellent offered in the visitors center during mosquito season to make our walk through the gardens more enjoyable).
Happy gardening and garden viewing!
I used to live in an apartment in Gainesville, Fl., and had no options for gardening (at the time, I do not think there was even a community garden). So, as often as I could, I went to one of three places to enjoy plants and nature: the Devil’s Millhopper (a sink hole with many plants exotic even to Florida), Payne’s Prairie (a grass and wetlands nature preserve, though I only went to a tiny part of it) and Kanapaha Botanical Gardens. I recently had the opportunity to make a quick visit to Gainesville and again visit the gardens. They have changed and are growing!
The word Kanapaha comes from the Timucua Indian words for "palmetto leaf" and "house" referring to the thatched homes of the original residents of a small Timucua village on the shore of Lake Kanapaha. The garden is 33 acres and was started in 1978. The garden has several theme gardens, and a large collection of bamboos. (It has generated some controversy in the past by selling spreading forms of bamboo during its annual sale. Bamboo can become invasive in FL. Even in Central VA, it spread and will even run under a roadway to come up on the other side! However, Kanapaha now mostly sells clumping varieties. Florida is home to many invasive, exotic plants and animals that threaten natives. To learn more about invasive species in all parts of the country, go to: http://www.invasivespeciesinfo.gov/plants/books.shtml )
The theme gardens at Kanapaha include a vinery, a hummingbird garden, and butterfly, herb, water, palm and rock (desert) gardens. One real pleasure for me was seeing some new varieties of Voodoo lilies (Amorphophallus plants that I have written about). Some beautiful pink ones were in bloom (perhaps bulbifers) in the front entrance to the garden, and a real oddball (A. paeonafolia) in the garden. I had a lot of fun showing these weird wonders of the plant world to friends who were with me. Both are pictured above. I also greatly enjoyed looking at the palms, palmettos and cycads, probably because I only get to see these under glass up north. The herb garden is beautifully arranged and well worth a close look. We were lucky to see a Century plant in full bloom- this “bloom” was a 30 foot tall flower spike!
If your only experience of Florida is Disney or south Florida, I encourage you to explore the back roads of northern Florida, from Ocala north and west. There are few crowds (except during football games), it is far less developed and has some incredibly lovely places! Kanapaha offers many unexpected pleasures.
(Be sure to avail yourself of the bug repellent offered in the visitors center during mosquito season to make our walk through the gardens more enjoyable).
Happy gardening and garden viewing!
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