Orto Botanico dell'Università di Pavia

The Orto Botanico dell'Università di Pavia (20,000 m²), also known as the Orto Botanico di Pavia, is a botanical garden maintained by the University of Pavia. It is located at Via S. Epifanio, 14, Pavia, Italy, and open weekdays.

The garden was begun in 1773 as a successor to Pavia's earlier Orto dei Semplici (established 1558). By 1775 the garden was in use, with its first wooden greenhouses constructed in 1776. Nocca Domenico organized and expanded the garden 1797–1826, adding collections to exchange seeds and plants, and building a masonry greenhouse to replace the earlier wooden structures. The garden was extensively damaged in World War II, after which its greenhouses were relocated to the main building's south side.

Today the garden contains about 2000 taxa, with major collections of aquatic plants, conifers, hosta, hydrangea, magnolia, medical plants, peat bog plants, and a rose garden. Its four greenhouses are as follows:

• Arid greenhouse (Serre Scopoliane, originally dating to 1776, 171 feet (52 m) long by 23 feet (7.0 m) wide) — a good collection of succulents (more than 500 species) with notable specimens of Ariocarpus furfuraceus, Ariocarpus trigonus, Copiapoa cinerea, Lophophora williamsii var. Caespitosa, Obregonia denegrii, and Welwitschia mirabilis, and many species of Frailea, Lobivia, and Rebutia, as well as 30 species of Lithops.
• Orchidaceae greenhouse — orchids from Central America and North America, plus ferns, Araceae, Bromeliaceae, and Tillandsia.
• Temperate greenhouse — plants of economic importance, fruit, etc.
• Tropical greenhouse (built 1974) — Araceae, Arecaceae, Euphorbiaceae, Liliaceae, Marantaceae, and Pteridofitas.

See also

• List of botanical gardens in Italy

References

• Orto Botanico dell'Università di Pavia
• Horti entry (Italian)
• Georg Kohlmaier, Barna von Sartory, Houses of Glass: A Nineteenth-Century Building Type, MIT Press, 1986, page 362. ISBN 0262610701.
• A. Pirola, "Orto Botanico di Pavia: dal sistema linneano alle collezioni tematiche", Convegno di studio Le reti locali degli Orti Botanici: il caso della Lombardia, Bergamo, 3 – October 2002.
• G. Pollaci, "L’Orto Botanico di Pavia dalla fondazione al 1942", Ticinum, 6: 20–23, 1959.