The MG Program Office offers selected garden or horticultural educational tours to various destinations. These tours have been offered in conjunction with the Missouri MG Program:
The primary objectives of this study tour are to provide participants with the opportunity to experience global horticulture and tropical horticulture production systems, and gain a new perspective on how the economy in another country and culture faces the issues of a global society. Costa Rica is considered a third-world country, but has a higher standard of living than most other Central and Latin American countries. Despite its size, it is an extremely varied country, ranging from dry deciduous forests and open cattle country to lush tropical rainforest on the Pacific side of the central mountains and lowland flooded forests on the Caribbean side. The mountains that run along the center of the country have active volcanoes and cloud forests. The Central Valley, where the capitol of San Jose is located, is a fertile plain surrounded by mountains. The difficulties of farming steep slopes or waterlogged areas and the inaccessibility of other locations have saved a considerable amount of natural habitat, which is now preserved in 26 National Parks (that cover 11% of the country) and numerous private reserves and buffer zones that together protect more than a quarter of the entire country. The unique geography of the area has created a range of habitats that resulted in an incredibly rich diversity of flora and fauna – well over 10,000 species of vascular plants have been described in this country; orchids account for about 1,300 of those and almost 2,000 tree species have been recorded. Annual trips to this fascinating country visit different locations for a variety of experiences in different habitats and locations.
The next MG tour of Costa Rica is planned for January
10-19, 2010. This time we will visit the cloud forest, the rainforest around Saripiqui and the lowland flooded forest of Tortuguero. Download the
registration brochure. Because of high demand, a second trip with the
identical itinerary has been added for Jan 8-17, 2010.
Download the
registration brochure for the Jan 8-17, 2010 tour.
The 2008 tour went to the eastern slopes, then headed northwest
into the dry tropical forest of Guanacaste. Read the
2008 trip journal.
The 2007 tour went south from San Jose, visiting cloud
forest and dry tropical forests.
The 2006 tour visited the Arenal Volcano area, the rainforest around Saripiqui and the lowland flooded forest of Tortuguero. Read a short summary of the 2006 trip.
In 2005, a group of 16 MGs and traveling companions had the opportunity to visit many public and private gardens on the 2 week tour that went from subtropical Auckland on the North Island to the spectacular vistas of the snow-capped mountains of the South Island. We saw the Botanic Gardens in Auckland, Hamilton, Wellington, Dunedin and Christchurch, and Otari Wilton’s Bush Native Botanic Garden in Wellington; several private gardens; and included additional stops such as the gannet colonies at Murawai Beach, glowworm caves, and a Maori cultural show. The lupines around Lake Tekapo were another highlight for the group. Despite the plethora of incredible gardens, my lasting impression of this trip is not the diversity and beauty of the gardens we saw, but rather how much I learned about native New Zealand plants, their relationships with other plants of the world, and garden design (as well as being jealous of the fabulous climate which allows everything to grow bigger and better in NZ).
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Wish you could have joined us? Read a short summary and see LOTS of photos of the trip (this page is rather long and contains 93 images, so may take a long time to load if you have a slow connection). The enthusiastic response of all the participants prompted us to begin planning similar trips for December 2007 and February 2008. The late November-early December 2007 trip will be focused on gardens that are at their peak in spring, while the 2008 trip will be more general interest (gardens aren't in quite as good shape in mid-summer) and not restricted to MGs. |
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