Sichtungsgarten Weihenstephan

The Sichtungsgarten Weihenstephan (lit. 'Viewing Garden' or 'Sighting Garden') is a teaching and trial garden maintained by the Weihenstephan-Triesdorf University of Applied Science in Freising, Germany. It is, according to English horticulturist Noel Kingsbury, the leading institution of its kind in Europe.

The Sichtungsgarten Weihenstephan was founded in 1947 under the leadership of horticulturist Richard Hansen. It is used for testing the suitability of plants, chiefly herbaceous perennials, for cultivation in gardens and urban green spaces as well as their mutual compatibility and planting design possibilities. The garden displays contrasting and harmonious color schemes as well as monochromatic herbaceous borders, but is chiefly notable for researching and displaying Hansen's philosophy of designed plant communities, which calls for matching plants with those from the same habitat type. Low-maintenance and drought-tolerant compositions are particularly emphasized.

History
Horticulturist Karl Foerster called for the establishment of trial gardens in Germany as early as 1920, but initial attempts failed due to the Second World War. Foerster's student Richard Hansen succeeded in establishing a trial garden at Weihenstephan in the Bavarian municipality of Freising in 1947. The Institut für Stauden, Gehölze und angewandte Pflanzensociologie (Institute for Perennials, Shrubs and Applied Plant Sociology) followed in 1948. Hansen described the garden's purpose as: "... selecting the best breeds and species worthy of cultivation, but also ... determining the right planting location for each plant and thus, especially from an ecological point of view, suitable partners and neighbors for good community relationships at the planting site." Hansen sought to understand how different plants could be combined into designed plant communities with the goal of proposing low-maintenance solutions for urban green spaces. These efforts are evident in Weihenstephan's strong bias towards labor-efficient and naturalistic planting. Hansen managed the Sichtungsgarten until 1978, when it passed into the care of Peter Kiermeier. In 1981, Hansen summarized his findings from Weihenstephan in Perennials and their Garden Habitats, which was translated into English in 1993. Bernd Hertle took over the Sichtungsgarten in 2006.

The garden is today affiliated with the Weihenstephan-Triesdorf University of Applied Science. Along with Hofgarten (Court Garden), Oberdickgarten, Parterregarten, Kleingarten, and Arboretum, the Sichtungsgarten is part of a group of university-affiliated gardens known as the Weihenstephaner Gärten. Since the late 2010s, professional and recreational gardening associations have voiced concerns that the Bavarian government's austerity policy might lead to the deterioration of the state-funded garden. Hertle resigned as the garden's director in March 2022 in protest against the proposal of funding the garden through private sponsorship, fearing such dependency.

Uses
The task set out by Hansen continus to shape the Sichtungsgarten, which is today used for testing the cultivation suitability, compatibility, and aesthetic properties of thousands of herbaceous perennials, shrubs, and new cultivars of garden roses. Much attention is paid to creating attractive combinations of herbaceous perennials according to their habitat types.

Horticulturist Charles Quest-Ritson describes the Sichtungsgarten Weihenstephan as "the leading station in the country for horticultural trials of any kind". According to garden designer Noel Kingsbury, the Sichtungsgarten is "Europe's leading research and teaching garden" and "a unique institution, with no real equivalent in the English-speaking world". Most of the research work supporting Germany's ecological planting style comes from Weihenstephan. Kingsbury notes that the trialing process at Weihenstephan is slow due to its thoroughness, with few plants ending up trialled.

The Sichtungsgarten's role as a research and teaching garden is emphasized by the arrangement of plants into long experimental beds. Students are expected not just to identify the plants and their features but also to consider how the plants may be combined for use in public and private planting schemes. Kingsbury finds youthfulness and liveliness to be the garden's shaping qualities and attributes them to the presence of students and visitors.

Composition
The south-facing slope features steppe species arranged in the fashion of a heathland as well as rock gardens, a pond, and a pool. Shrubs, with a diverse herbaceous understory, dominate the western part of the garden. The main focus of the Sichtungsgarten Weihenstephan, however, are herbaceous perennials. According to Kingsbury, the garden's assortment of ornamental perennials is the largest in the world. Herbaceous borders occupy the center of the garden. They are infused with half-hardy tropical species such as Canna and Ricinus communis. While the perennials, particularly the grasses, provide continuity, the half-hardy species are used for structure throughout summer months and may be changed every year to trial new color and form combinations.

Contrasting or harmonious patterns are formed by combining different colors, textures, structures, and growth forms of foliage and flowers. Kingsbury finds the color scheme to be inspired by the designs of Gertrude Jekyll. The combinations range from complementary, such as orange Tropaeolum and purple Buddleia cultivars, to more analogous, such as orange Lilium and yellow Kniphofia, Eremurus, and Euphorbia cultivars set against grey-blue grasses and Nepeta planting. The Sichtungsgarten primarily displays combinations of colors and textures typical of various habitats, evoking the founder's belief in designing plant communities, but artistic compositions can also be found, including the 'Red Border', which contains only plants with flowers in the various shades of red.

The Sichtungsgarten contains a large collection of Paeonia and Hemerocallis species and cultivars, as well as other plants which require high maintenance when used in mass plantings, such as those in the Delphinium and Lilium genera. Hansen included these out of recognition of their historical and sentimental value. The first paeonies were planted in the 1950s, and some have surpassed the age of 60. According to Kingsbury, however, the garden's aim is to direct the visitors' attention to plants that thrive in public space with minimal care, such as ornamental grasses, Leucanthemum species, and xerophilic Salvia species. Dwarf Aster dumosus cultivars, used for filling in gaps and smothering weeds, are some of the prominent subjects that used to be more popular garden plants in the past.