Date posted: 15 January 2018
It's a two-horse race for the most popular sight at Adelaide Botanic Garden right now - our Nelumbo Pond or the ever-popular Dahlia Garden.
Have a look during your next visit and let us know your favourite. The Dahlia Garden can be found a short stroll east of the Santos Museum of Economic Botany.
Every year, members of the Dahlia Society of South Australia Inc. and our horticultural staff, come together to prepare and maintain Adelaide Botanic Garden's dahlia display, which typically looks its best around February.
The parents of these much-loved perennial herbs came from Central and South America.
Dahlias were an important food and medicinal crop to the Aztec people, while these ingenious people also used the sturdy, hollow, 10-metre long stems of Dahlia imperialis as pipes, supplying villages with water from mountain streams.
Today dahlias are grown for their decorative flowers. Over the past three centuries hybridisation (combining different varieties) has given rise to a range of fascinating flower types.
As a general rule of thumb, the first week of November is a good time to plant dahlias. Choose a spot that has morning sun and afternoon shade. Visit the Dahlia Society of South Australia's website for more growing information.
20 April 2023
Have you noticed a strange looking unit near the First Creek Wetlands at Adelaide Botanic Garden? Did you know this machine is collecting valuable biodiversity data which will be used to safeguard South Australia's Myrtleceae trees against a deadly disease.
03 April 2023
We caught up with Mount Lofty Botanic Garden horticultural supervisor Mark Oborn to get some insider tips for visiting the garden during autumn colours.
