Botanical garden

A botanical garden or botanic garden is a garden with a documented collection of living plants for the purpose of scientific research, conservation, display, and education. Plants in larger gardens are often labelled with their botanical names and additional information. It may contain specialist plant collections such as cacti and other succulent plants, herb gardens, or plants from particular parts of the world. There may be glasshouses or shadehouses with special collections such as tropical plants, alpine plants, or other exotic plants that are not native to the local region. Most are at least partly open to the public, and may offer guided tours, public programming such as workshops, courses, educational displays, art exhibitions, book rooms, open-air theatrical and musical performances, and other entertainment. Botanical gardens are often run by universities or other scientific research organizations, and usually have associated herbaria and research programmes in plant taxonomy or some other aspect of botanical science. In principle, their role is to maintain documented collections of living plants for the purposes of scientific research, conservation, display, and education, although this will depend on the resources available and the special interests pursued at each particular garden. The staff will normally include botanists as well as gardeners. Many botanical gardens offer diploma or certificate programs in horticulture, botany and taxonomy. There are many internship opportunities offered to aspiring horticulturists, as well as opportunities for students and researchers to use the collection for their studies.