Project Description:
The Red Butte Garden Horticultural Center will play a vital role in the garden’s conservation research and mission of connecting people with the beauty of living landscapes. Red Butte Garden has 18 acres of display gardens and over 5 miles of hiking trails. The Garden has grown into one of the nation’s pre-eminent botanic gardens with 200,000 annual visitors, over 9000 members, and over 300 active volunteers.
Red Butte Garden’s Conservation Department conducts research of the regional rare plant populations and the threats they face. They are stewards of the at-risk plants in this region, and protecting these plants is a key component of Red Butte Garden’s mission. The Conservation Department hopes to mitigate threats and preserve genetic information so that rare populations may recover in their native habitats, thereby conserving the diversity of our native fora. Working both out in the field and in the laboratory the Red Butte Conservation Department collects plant samples and seeds to study later, monitor populations, transplant endangered species out of harm’s way, re-vegetate with seeds or seedlings in their native habitats, storing seeds in seed banks to preserve the genetic material, testing seed germination and viability to better understand how to propagate a species, and caring for living specimens that have been propagated or salvaged from project sites. Red Butte Garden works in collaboration with other horticulture facilities around the West, sharing information gathered and specimens preserved.
