May 2006 - La Concepcion Historical and Botanical Gardens, Malaga

The botanical gardens at Málaga contain plant species from all over the world. To fully appreciate them, since they flower at different times of the year, it is necessary to visit the gardens a number of times. Our previous visits, in August and November 2005, reported in September and December, indicated that the 'jungle' created in the gardens, through which you wander, are at their best from May to September. It is an ideal place to visit during the hot summer since the paths offer shade ranging from dappled to dense.

This final visit for the magazine took place in mid April. Newly planted, near the entrance, is an area of palms from all over the world; Taiwan, Japan, Mexico, Honduras, Australia and South Africa amongst others. Over the years they will extend the canopy and encourage shade loving ground cover. Behind this display was the first treat of the visit, a drift of Calla Lilly. These plants are popular at the moment in the garden centres.

As you explore deeper into the gardens you will notice the delicate scent of orange and lemon blossom wafting up on the warm breeze from the orchard at the bottom of the gardens and the amazing palette of colour, from the deepest orange of the Phoenix rupicola from the Himalayas, offset by deep green leaves on the jungle floor, to the sky blue feathery fronds of Ceanothus. Interspersed are more unusual plants like the Justicia brandegeeana with its cascades of shrimp like flowers that give rise to its common name of Shrimp Bush. In the ponds the first early water lilies are a promise of a splendid summer show.

Spring and early summer are of course when reptiles, birds and butterflies are at their most active. The ponds are full of newly hatched frogs and terrapins with the more adult frogs producing their cacophonous, explosive, croaks hoping to attract a mate for a second hatching. In sun-dappled areas butterflies of all sizes and colours dance together in their intricate ritual and birds, heard but not often seen in the high canopy, add their own voices to the music of the jungle. Blackbirds, thrushes and buntings seem to favour the area set aside for the black bamboo, a dense impenetrable stand, for humans at least, of shiny five metre high black stalks and green spiky leaves that allow no light to penetrate to the ground.

For adults the gardens are a place of wonder and the nearest most will get to a jungle without donning a pith helmet and taking up a machete. For children it is a magical place, their imaginations filling it with demons and fairies reminiscent of tales told in the nursery, and, who knows, there could easily be a goblin beneath that bridge over the dashing stream in the gloom of the metre wide leaves of the Monsteras rambling up the Ficus trees.

December 2005

The second of three visits to the gardens took place in November after the first of the autumn rains when it was expected to see some flowering trees and exotic ground plants from the jungles of South America and Africa. You will not be disappointed if you visit this month.

Before even out of the car there could be seen an unusual tree in full flower, a succulent, deciduous, flowering tree from Argentina and Brazil. The Chorisia has a fleshy trunk and branches with huge thorns to ward off any animal likely to consider it a meal. The flowers are large funnel shaped and in shades of pink and white.

Inside the gardens, luxuriant after the rains, it resembled wandering through a jungle with tall palms and bare trunked exotic trees and their high branches, closely planted beneath with plants normally found on the jungle floor, there was a second unusual flower near a 12 foot high poinsettia with its brightly coloured bracts, a creamy coloured flower on a Monstera deliciosa. This is a real treat since the Monstera only flowers when the plant is well established and then only infrequently. There are hundreds of Monsteras in the gardens, climbing the trees and the sides of waterfalls so the chances of finding one or two in flower is good. The flowers are 20 to 30cm high, creamy coloured spathes hidden beneath the large pinnate leaves. The fruit is edible, cream in colour and cone shaped. Within minutes there was another flowering jungle floor plant from South America, a Zamia. The flower is a tall, felted, cone-like flower spike rearing up from the centre of a whorl of primitive looking leaves.

Between these treasures there is a host of flowering mid level shrubs, all striving to find a little ray of sunshine, including the spectacular Erythrina or Coral Tree, and a lovely double flowered, deep red Hibiscus.

Back to ground level there are any number of more common flowering plants and a favourite on this visit, a perfect specimen of a Strelitzia that appears on the front cover this month.

September 2005

In the 19th Century the Marquis of Casa Loring built a country house and planted the gardens with tropical and sub tropical flora from America, Asia, Africa and Oceania. In 1943 it was declared a historical and artistic garden. In 1990 it was purchased by Malaga City Council and opened to the public in 1994.

Today for a small fee you can wander around an oasis of tranquillity and admire the hundreds of species gathered from around the world. In fact it is an ideal place to visit during the summer as the foliage shades the majority of the paths and you are never far from the tastefully created ponds and waterfalls that form a backcloth to many of the plants.

We are going to take you to these gardens three times over the next year to catch the best of each flowering season and look at some of the native fauna that abounds in this man-made jungle.

Undoubtedly the water plants provided the best displays in August. Around the gardens are pools, waterfalls and streams. Some provide a setting for plants like Monstera deliciosa (Swiss Cheese Plant) that are allowed to use their aerial roots to good effect clinging to the massive trunks of ficus trees or rocks alongside the waterfalls. Native to the tropical rainforests of the Americas these plants thrive here. Others are stocked with various water plants. The Nymphaea (Water Lilly) in white and pink provided a stunning display in a number of the pools and the European Pond Terrapins (Emys orbicularis) were using their leaves to sunbathe. These creatures can be found throughout the Mediterranean but are rarely seen, as they are very shy. Another amphibian seen taking advantage of these natural sun beds were the Painted Frogs (Discoglossus pictus) that are mainly restricted to the South and West of the Iberian Peninsula.

The most spectacular displays however came from the Nelumbo nucifera (Sacred Lotus). These aquatic plants from Australia and Asia have leaves up to 80 cms wide and 2 metres high. The peony like flowers in shades of pink and white are up to 30 cms across with a large, deep yellow, solid, stamen.

How to get there Take the A7 to Malaga and then follow the signs for Cordoba and Granada. About 2 kilometres on you pass a service station, take the junction off immediately after signposted 'Botanical Gardens'. Follow the signs for the gardens to the car park. Opening Times The gardens are open Tuesday to Sunday 10am to 7.30pm until the 10th September to 5.30pm until the 20th October, to 4.30pm until the 10th December and until 4pm thereafter. Prices 3.10 Euros for adults, 1.60 Euros for those over 65 and under 16, free to under 6's.