User:Keitarowo/Honolulu Botanical Gardens

The Honolulu Botanical Gardens is a system of botanical gardens that are located in Honolulu County, Oahu, Hawaii. There are a total of five Botanical Gardens that comprise the Honolulu Botanical Gardens: Foster Botanical Garden, Hoʻomaluhia Botanical Garden, Koko Crater Botanical Garden, Liliʻuokalani Botanical Garden, and Wahiawā Botanical Garden, which are owned and operated by the Department of Parks and Recreation of the City and County of Honolulu. There are several groups that support the Botanical Gardens every year, with special events, garden tours, and plant sales being offered.

The stated mission of the Botanical Gardens is to plan, develop, grow, curate, maintain, and study documented collections of tropical plants in an aesthetic setting for the purposes of conservation, botany, horticulture, education, and recreation. Together, the Honolulu Botanical Gardens comprise the largest and most diverse tropical plant collection in the United States.

Foster Botanical Garden
The Foster Botanical Garden is a 13.5 acre garden located near Chinatown between Nuʻuanu Avenue and Vineyard Boulevard. The oldest botanical garden in Hawaii, Foster Botanical garden is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Originally leased to German physician and botanist William Hillebrand by Queen Kalama in 1853, the garden was eventually sold to neighbors Thomas R. Foster and wife Mary E. Foster (née Robinson) 31 years later before Hillebrand returned to Germany.

Mary Foster later bequeathed the land to the City and County of Honolulu after her death in 1930 under the provision that the city will continue to nurture the lands as a public space known as Foster Park. By that time, the garden was expanded to roughly 5.5 acres. Brief periods of development were made throughout the next three decades. Air raid shelters were built during World War II, as well as work that was done to formalize water rights, as there was an Awai (ancient water way) in the garden. Paul Weissich, director of the Foster Garden from 1957 to 1989, expanded Foster Garden to its final size of approximately 14 acres of native plants, as well as developing an additional four gardens on the Island of Oahu to create the Honolulu Botanical Gardens system.

Hoʻomaluhia Botanical Garden
The Hoʻomaluhia Botanical Garden comprises around 400 acres of windward, Oahu. The garden was opened in 1982 and was built by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to provide flood protection for Kāneʻohe. Hoʻomaluhia, or "a peaceful refuge", features plants and flora from many geographical regions across the world, including the Philippines, Malaysia, Polynesia, Africa, etc. There is a special emphasis that is placed on the conservation of native plants from Hawaiʻi and Polynesia, as well as plants that belong to the arecaceae, aroid, and heliconia families. The garden is open daily and free for entry to the public except during Christmas Day and New Year's Day.

Several features within Hoʻomaluhia include a 32 acre lake and walking trails, campgrounds, a visitor center, a botanical library, and an exhibition hall.

Koko Crater Botanical Garden
The Koko Crater Botanical Garden is a 60 acre botanical garden located within Koko Crater on the eastern side of Oahu. First established in 1958, its hot and dry climate allows for the cultivation of rare and endangered dryland plants. Koko Crater uses a style of gardening called xeriscaping, which reduce the need for irrigation and allow for desert-like plants to flourish in the dry landscape.

Liliʻuokalani Botanical Garden
The Liliʻuokalani Botanical Garden was once the property of Queen Liliʻuokalani, the last reigning monarch of Hawaiʻi. She later gave the land to the City and County of Honolulu for public usage in 1912, five years before her death, which eventually became the Botanical Garden known today. Containing both the Nuʻuanu Stream and the Waikahalulu waterfall, the garden is still under development to exclusively feature Native Hawaiian plants. Located across the H-1 Highway from Foster Botanical Garden, the 7.5 acre garden was originally part of the Foster Botanical Garden, before being divided into two from the construction of the H-1. Liliʻuokalani Botanical Garden was listed alongside Foster Botanical Garden on the National Register of Historic Places in 1993.

Wahiawā Botanical Garden
The Wahiawā Botanical Garden is a 27 acre garden located between the Waiʻanae and Koʻolau mountain ranges. Near the complete middle of Oʻahu, the "tropical jewel" of the Honolulu Botanical Gardens was started in 1957 as part of the Honolulu Botanical Garden System. Originally, the lands that the garden is built on were part of an experimental arboretum used by the Hawaii Sugar Planters Association experimental program in the 1930's. With an environment focused on that of a tropical rainforest, the plants featured in this garden are ones that are best suited to cooler upland environments and shady humid habitats.