The Biodiversity Garden, part of the new Gateway at the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh, offers an intimate and accessible experience of plants and how they support life.
Anyone who is short of time or perhaps struggles to make it all the way round the Garden can experience biodiversity right alongside the new building.
Whether viewing the Biodiversity Garden from the large window, overlooking it from the café terrace or walking through it, visitors will see how ecosystems work and what they can do to encourage biodiversity in their own gardens.
The beds and four ponds will be planted to highlight the diversity of the earth's plant life, explaining how plants evolved from simple water-borne algae, into lichens, mosses, ferns and finally into complex flowering plants. The Garden will also provide habitats for wildlife such as beetles, bats, birds and butterflies, demonstrating the interdependence of plants and animals, and ultimately people too.
This microcosm of the Botanics will be visually appealing, changing with the seasons to offer a great daytime spectacle, and - through subtle lighting - a stunning night-time backdrop to restaurant visits and evening events. It will use exciting interactive devices too, such as seeing under water, looking inside a tree, touching and smelling soil, looking through a camera into nest boxes, seeing the roots of plants and watching earthworms, to name a few.
As we enter the final phase of our £15.7 million fundraising campaign to make The Gateway a reality, we need your help to find the final £750,000. We have just launched a Members' Appeal specifically to help find the remaining money needed for the Biodiversity Garden. We hope you will be able to help us open people's eyes to the splendour of plants and biodiversity.
To support this year's Appeal with an online donation or to make a donation by direct debit, cheque, or CAF voucher or card, please contact Sally McNaught on 0131 248 2942 or email s.mcnaught@rbge.org.uk.