The National Botanic Garden of Nepal

Abstract

The National Botanic Garden of Nepal (NBG) lies 16km south of Kathmandu, at the base of Phulchowki, the highest mountain in the Kathmandu Valley. It was inaugurated in 1962 by King Mahendra and since that time the collections have developed, many of them into named areas and groupings. The year 2016 was the bicentenary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between Nepal and Great Britain, and this was marked in the NBG with the development of a Biodiversity Education Garden. This was created in collaboration with the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh (RBGE), and the occasion signified a revitalisation of collaborative relations between the NBG and British botanic gardens which started in the early 1960s with the appointment to NBG of British horticulturists Geoffrey Herklots and, later, Tony Schilling. The history of the garden, its layout and collections, and the activities and outcomes of the recent collaborations are described and illustrated with colour photographs.