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Published: July 11th 2007
Ginger Flower
Huge ginger flower in botanical garden One morning in Ubud we visited the Botanical gardens which is celebrating its first anniversary in June of this year. There we met German born Stefan Reisner, botanist and co-owner of the Ubud Botanic Gardens who acquired the land from the Indonesian Government. He stated they didn't think the land was worth much and I guess the locals thought bad spirits dwelled on the 5 hectares. In two short years Stefan and his partner, Faizah, a business woman from Java, have created this most wonderful space. A meditation grotto, Islam garden, pitcher plant area with over 200 pitcher plants of the tropical variety. Most originating from Borneo (Kalimantan), Sumatra and Papua, New Guinea. A stone path winds among different varieties of bamboo and you'll see hundreds of butterflies of every color! The gardens are just 1.5 kilometes north of Ubud. website: www.botanicgardenbali.com. We had the good fortune of encountering Stefan, in the Islam garden and related that Victor Mason, author of "Butterflies of Bali" told us not to miss the Botanic Gardens. He ended up giving us a personal guided tour. Along the path you'll find a little tea house built from an original Balinese home where you can get
Botanical garden path
Path coming from Meditation garden refreshments. If you're ever in Bali, it's worth the visit. A short stroll down a winding path lead us past a lotus/lily pond, around the medicinal plant area. We then crossed a bridge where a waterfall cascaded into a ravine. We skirted around Bali's first shrub maze for fear of getting lost in the mid day Indonesian heat. They had an intriguing variety of trees such as fig, banana, coconut, cinnamon as well as spice & coffee plants. In the orchid garden, Faizah displays her collection in an 'open' enclosure. Specimens originate from all over Indonesia and are exhibited under a huge canopy of ancient trees.
Their vision of making this garden which is a forever ongoing project, as he is getting in plants from all over the world, is to help educate and bring environmental awareness to Bali.
Two gardens adjacent to the Islam garden is a small orchard of fruit trees & a vegetable garden. Tucked into a hill side by the bridge are the succulent and bomeliad gardens. After having refreshing hibiscus tea in the tea house next to the flowering ginger, Stefan showed us the pitcher plants. For those of you that don't know, these
plants eat meat. One was as large as my hand. Some species are so large they can capture small monkeys, birds or bats. Most though prey on bugs, small frogs and flying insects. The plant lures the prey by secreting a nectar. When they land on the plant & start sucking the nectar, they become intoxicated and tumble into the plants inter sanctum and immediately become devoured by its enzymes. Bristly hairs preclude any chance of escape. Even the beating of an insects wings desperate in their last attempt at survival create a vacuum within the pitcher sucking the victims deeper into the plant whereby the enzymes digest the prey into a nutrient filled soup to feed the plant. Each plant has a very small leaf strategically placed on a stem just above the opening. If it gets too much rain, which would dilute the enzymes, it quickly turns itself around and creates an umbrella shedding off the raindrops.
Stefan was quoted in an article as saying "Travelers can come to a standstill here after thousands of miles of noisy travel. Our Botanic Garden is like a palace with the sky as roof and many different rooms, secret chambers, galleries
and staircases. The visitor wanders through changing vistas and experiences, encouraged to trespass into nature. This is the message of our garden"
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