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Our Location
Hours
The garden is open all year, from dawn to dusk.
Please contact us by email info@frederictonbotanicgarden.com if you are interested in a private tour.
Admission is free.
Garden Highlights
A brook with a variety of founder Hal Hinds' favourites; primulas.
The Entrance Garden
This Entrance Garden with its oval lawn, circling pathway, sugar maples and benches provides a place for relaxation and contemplation as well as an introduction to the rest of the Garden. It is also a multi-use open space for community outdoor functions.
The Entrance Garden was officially opened on June 23, 2007 by the Honourable Herménégilde Chiasson, Lieutenant-Governor of New Brunswick at the time, and honourary patron of the Fredericton Botanic Garden, and Cindy Sheppard, Executive Director of the Fredericton Community Foundation.
The Fredericton Botanic Garden Association is grateful to the Fredericton Community Foundation whose major grant, awarded to mark the Foundations 50th anniversary, made the Entrance Garden possible. The Association also recognizes support received from the City of Fredericton and Association members in creating the garden.
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The trees, shrubs and other plantings of the entrance berm serve to separate the Botanic Garden from Prospect Street and the public parking lot.
Woodland Fern Trail
The Woodland Fern Trail follows along the base of a north northwest facing escarpment. The exposed bedrock is a reddish sandstone of Pennsylvanian age deposited about 200 million years ago. In other places these rocks contain fossils of giant horsetails, clubmoses, ferns and seed ferns and are the principal coal-bearing rocks of the Minto and Chipman areas.
The escarpment has been actively eroding and has shed numerous bolders which are strewn over the hillside through which the trail meanders. The sandstone has weathered to form a rich sandy loam supporting a great variety of trees, shrubs wildflowers and ferns.
Different kinds of fern are especially well represented along the trail because of the dense shade and the cool moist northern exposure. These conditions are important to the life cycles of many ferns.
Tree species such as White Spruce, Balsm Fir, Black Ash and Mountain Maple are indicative of this northerly exposure. In spring, the snow remains in these woods longer than in more southerly and open sites.
The River Valley Kiosk
The River Valley Kiosk is located on the shortcut path above the Rhododendrons, with a nestled view of the valley. It presents a detailed illustrated summary of the natural and human history. The text (see below) is also illustrated.
St. John River Valley Ecosystems
From its headwaters in the Appalachian mountains of northern Maine and eastern Quebec to the Reversing Falls in Saint John, New Brunswick, the St. John River winds 673 km through a region of varied climate, geology and land-use history. Along the central Valley tributaries enter the St. John River through steep valleys and rolling hills with hardwood and mixed forest. Below the Mactaquac Dam constant reworking of river sediments maintains a shifting chain of alluvial islands. The lower reaches include large and important wetlands. The central valley has a great diversity of habitats and plants species.
Rhododendrons & Azaleas
Rhododendrons are a very diverse group of ornamental landscape plants. They have a worldwide distribution with a concentration of species native to south-east Asia. Rhododendron canadense (Rhodora) and close relatives Kalmia (Laurel) and Ledum (Labrador-tea) occur in New Brunswick.
While most Rhododendron species cannot survive our winters, plant breeders have produced many hardy varieties with a wide range of plant types and flower colours. A protected location and well drained organic, acid soil usually assure good performance. Rhododendrons that lose their leaves in winter tolerate more open sites and are less susceptible to winter injury.
Most of this collection was donated in 2000 by the New Brunswick Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Aquaculture on the completion of evaluation trials conducted in Hoyt, New Brunswick.
The New Brunswick Literature Garden, opened in 2018, celebrates the rich and diverse literary history of our province. Each plant species in the Literature Garden is mentioned in a work of prose or poetry by an author from, or connected to, New Brunswick. Signage for each plant includes a quotation from the literary work, biographical information about the author, and information about the plant (and the signage can be seen at the NB Literature Garden website). The works celebrated are old and new; fiction and nonfiction; poetry and prose; French and English; and for children and for adults. This unique garden weaves together the natural world and the cultural one, and the combination is fascinating.
The Hal Hinds Memorial Garden
This garden was created in honour of the man who envisioned and helped create the Fredericton Botanic Garden Association. Harold Royal Hinds was a man who loved his plants and in particular those of the primula family. This garden was built by friends and volunteers as a fitting memorial to Hals contributions to the Botanic Garden and the horticultural world.
Situated in a small hollow, the Memorial Garden takes advantage of a small spring and intimate topography to provide a home for a diverse variety of plants including primula, hosta, ferns and rhododendrons, in addition to rare and unusual perennials and shrubs. Some of the plants are from Hal's own garden. This Garden was built in 2003 to provide a place of contemplation and beauty and will continue to be developed further for many years to come.
Daylily Bed
The Garden’s daylily collection includes many named and unnamed varieties, with a wide range of blooming times and a variety of colours. The peak display is in June and early July. The daylily bed was given a major expansion in 2018, with hundreds of new plants in dozens of new varieties.
Daylilies (genus Hemerocallis) are members of the family Asphodelaceae, related to the true lilies (family Liliaceae). They are perennials native to eastern Asia but planted throughout the temperate world. They are drought- and frost-tolerant. The name “daylily” refers to the short life of an individual flower, which usually opens one morning and withers the same night. With hundreds of plants, though, our daylily bed mounts an impressive floral display.
Peony Bed
The Peony Bed was planted in autumn of 2018, and promises spectacular displays with over 50 species and varieties blooming in many colours. Peonies (genus Paeonia) are native to temperate Asia, Europe, and North America, and have been cultivated in China and Greece for thousands of years. Our Peony Bed includes both herbaceous and woody “tree” peonies, and both hybrids and unmodified “species peonies”. And from above, the bed is in the shape of – you guessed it – a giant peony flower!
Pollinator Garden
The Pollinator Garden was started in 2019. Many of the plants you love wouldn’t be here without their pollinators: hummingbirds, butterflies, bees, and other creatures. These pollinators, however, are under threat and many species are in decline. The Pollinator Garden will provide habitat and floral resources (pollen and nectar) for native pollinators, and will show visitors what they can do in their own gardens to help preserve these important organisms.
Wabanaki Healing Garden
Begin in fall 2020, this garden celebrates Indigenous Knowledge, culture, history and tradition. The goals of this project include educating visitors about the various uses, purposes and cultural importance of medicinal and edible plants to Indigenous life. The aim of this garden is to be a place of healing for individuals as well as a place for educational workshops, walks and programming by community groups.
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​This Garden is an approximately 300 m2 installation that, when completed, will be comprised of planted garden beds, semi-natural plantings in a forested section, wheelchair-accessible pathways, benches, and informational signage. Plantings will include both native and cultivated species that have been used by indigenous people as either medicine or food or both.
Memorial Grove
The Memorial Grove, created in 2007, features a collection of magnolias, most of which are new to the Fredericton area.
This small grove offers peace and tranquility to those remembering loved ones. The large granite boulder records memorial inscriptions. This, and the dedication of benches located throughout the Garden, are components of the Memorial Program established by the Fredericton Botanic Garden Association in response to requests from the public seeking ways to remember family members, friends or special events.
Odell Park
Odell Park is adjacent to the Fredericton Botanic Garden and is the centerpiece of the City of Fredericton's parklands. The Fredericton Botanic Garden and Odell Park are linked by several public hiking trails.
For more information about Odell Park and the other public parks in Fredericton see the City of Fredericton Parks web page.