The National Botanical Garden has outdoor and indoor collections.

In the photo, the pavilion destined to expose cacti and succulents.

Photo: Abel Padrón Padilla/ Cubadebate.

Rosalina Berazaín Iturralde arrived at the National Botanical Garden in March 1968, 55 years ago.

Precisely, this Friday, March 24, the 55th anniversary of the foundation of the Garden is celebrated.

PhD in Sciences and professor of merit at the University of Havana, she is one of many people who have dedicated their lives to the National Botanist and to whom this natural laboratory, green lung and site for conservation, science, recreation and environmental education in the periphery of Havana has given a lot humanly and professionally.

“I arrived as a student.

I was going to join an expedition with Professor Johannes Bisse, founder of the Garden.

With him I did my doctorate, and I worked with him until his death”.

Bisse (1935-1984), who arrived in Cuba in the mid-1960s, had a profound knowledge of Cuban flora (his book

Árboles de Cuba

was published in 1988 ), was an advisor and enthusiastic promoter and developer of the great scientific and social work of the JBN.

He trained many prominent botanists on the Island.

Dr. Rosalina Berazaín Iturralde: “It is not easy to have all the plant formations in Cuba, more than 20, represented in one place.

We cannot represent that of Pico Turquino, we do not have the weather or height conditions.

Mangrove swamp is very difficult, we need a constant estuary, with salt water.

Those that we can represent are well represented”.

Photo: Abel Padrón Padilla/ Cubadebate.

“The area was part of the Cordón de La Habana, but at the request of Fidel, who wanted to make a larger botanical garden for the city –because we had the Quinta de los Molinos–, these lands were destined for the National Botanical Garden, which would be attached to the University of Havana”, recalls Dr. Rosalina.

“The official foundation occurred on January 6, 1968. There is a small note, from that date, that says that the works of the Garden were beginning.

The opening to the public was on March 24, 1984.

“What was here were pigsties, agriculture, livestock… Marabú too.

We, people from the Faculty of Medicine, from the Faculty of Biology, university students together with workers who were part of the Cordón, worked clearing the fields of marabou and other plants, extracting stones.

“There were old stone fences and we had to remove them to allow the tractors to enter, for cutting and preparing the land… It was hard work, days and nights.

And the nurseries had to be built to feed the plants that would later be planted in the Garden area.

“Of course, the project entailed prior design work on the paths, the zones into which the Garden would be divided, in accordance with the ideas of our German professor.

“Those initial jobs included what we call 'moteo', going to different areas of Cuba, taking the plant from nature, making a ring around it and pulling it out by the roots, but with the speck of earth and tied in sacks so that it wouldn't lose substrate and moisture.

We brought them, they were conditioned in the nurseries and over time they were planted in the Botanical areas, according to the previous design”.

In 50 ha, the Palmetum allows to appreciate more than 200 species of palms from Cuba and tropical regions of the world.

Photo: Abel Padrón Padilla/ Cubadebate.

Rosalina also mentions the exchange of seeds with botanical gardens in other countries.

In addition to the expeditions, “an important source was going to the Cienfuegos Botanical Garden, which is centenary, with palms, ficuses and many other species.

The postures or the seeds were brought, and here they were fueled”.

Bisse trained several doctors, Rosalina was the first.

She accompanied him on several expeditions around the country, a key job in the development and maintenance of a botanical garden, as well as in the studies and conservation of flora.

And not free of adventure and risks, as on that occasion when they got lost in the Sierra Maestra.

“We spent one night sleeping outdoors.

The other night we arrived at a camp in Pino del Agua, which had been destroyed. We slept there on top of some boards...

“When they saw that we were not returning to our camp, they notified the university.

Chomy [Dr. José Miguel Miyar Barrueco] was the rector, he mobilized everything, they went out to look for us by helicopter and they found us.

They took us to a place where we could eat and rest until we returned to the camp, which was in El Uvero, on the southern coast of the Sierra”.

“The Garden is my whole life, my children were born and raised here.

Here I have had my students.

My daughter is a botanist;

my son, carpenter.

They are different paths, but both love nature.

Here I have learned everything, I was a student, I graduated with a degree, I became a doctor.

“I have been able to do many things.

I love expeditions.

Due to age, today I feel more restricted from going to the countryside, but I have been able to get to know all of Cuba and its flora, collect plants, identify, and work in the herbarium.

The training I had for my doctorate I have been able to transfer to young people.

We have continued to train doctors and teachers in Botany, and more graduates in Biology”, says Dr. Rosalina Berazaín Iturralde.

Spaces covered by dense forest and areas of more spaced vegetation where there are thousands of species and many wonderful flora.

Photo: Abel Padrón Padilla/ Cubadebate.

Today, 55 years after those first days of 1968, the National Botanical Garden covers some 500 hectares covered by more than 40 km of roads, where hundreds of thousands of trees of some 3,000 species are planted and the flora of Cuba and other countries are represented. the tropical regions of the world, organized into scientifically ordered zones and collections.

In a recent meeting with the press, the director of the Garden, the M.Sc. Carlos Manuel Pérez Cuevas, spoke of the work involved in maintaining the Garden, taking into account research, the extensive networks for the distribution of water, electricity and other services , 1,200 seats in restaurants and large areas that require attention and extensive gardening resources (nurseries, pruning, phytosanitary attention, collection of plant waste, use of large volumes of specific substrates, chapea).

According to the director, all the resources that the JBN captures with its services are added to the budget that the State dedicates to it.

In 2022, spending amounted to 72 million pesos, of which 66 million were generated by the Garden.

The purpose in 2023 is to generate 100 million and not require state funds.

“It is one of the objectives, economic sustainability,” he said.

Pond next to the exhibition pavilions.

Photo: Abel Padrón Padilla/ Cubadebate.

Living laboratory, research and teaching, taxonomy and conservation

In the recent meeting with the press, the director of the JBN affirmed that "the dream of the national school of botany has come true", in reference to the initial conception of the Garden as a study and recreation center;

to the integrating vision of the founders and their vocation to investigate and contribute to conserving the Cuban flora in a place open, at the same time, to leisure and environmental education of the citizenry.

National Botanical Garden of Cuba:

It is one of the main institutions for the study of flora in Cuba.

It has the only master's degree in Botany in the country, which has already reached its eleventh edition.

It publishes the

Magazine of the National Botanical Garden

, founded in 1980, the one with the greatest international scope among Cuban scientific publications.

In its faculty there are 23 doctors and masters, both undergraduate and postgraduate professors as well as researchers, who publish both in the JBN journal and in high-impact international journals (27 publications in 14 journals during 2022).

It has an internationally recognized herbarium, in which some 250,000 specimens of Cuban and Antillean plants and fungi are preserved, and the most important botanical library in the nation.

As a project of the Cuban botanists, it publishes the work

Flora de la República de Cuba

, which in 2021 reached its 26th issue.

It is the governing institution of the Red List of the flora of Cuba (with editions in 2005 and 2016), in which more than 40 experts from botanical gardens and other similar institutions of the country collaborate in the Group of Specialists of Cuban Plants, attached to the Species Survival Commission of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).

It has collaborative relationships with important centers in other countries, such as the Nong Nooch Tropical Botanical Garden (Thailand) and the Berlin Botanical Garden.

Its specialists have collaborated in the construction of gardens such as the Atlantic Botanical Garden (Gijón).

Added to this are agreements with universities in Germany, Mexico, France and other nations.

Recently, the National School of Horticulture and Landscaping has been incorporated into its projects.

Flowers abound in the National Botanical Garden.

Photo: Abel Padrón Padilla/ Cubadebate.

The Garden's team of specialists is in charge of teaching all the botanical profile subjects received by the students of the University of Havana.

The M. Sc. Alelí Morales Martínez, president of the Cuban Botanical Society, explains that they are subjects such as Botany, Systematics, Ecology... "In total, some 17 subjects that we teach in the Faculty of Biology."

In addition to participating in research, Morales Martínez is the director of the new National School of Horticulture and Landscaping, a project that seeks to rescue a teaching that was lost in the seventies, vital not only in botanical gardens, but in the effort to rescue and promote urban greens to make cities friendlier and healthier.

“We are starting the National School of Horticulture and Landscaping, where a specialty course is taught to middle technicians in Agronomy and Forestry who graduate from the Rubén Martínez Villena Technological Institute.

“Those who wish to do so, study our specialty as part of their pre-professional practice, graduating with their corresponding technical degree, that of Agronomy or Forestry, with a specialization in Horticulture and Landscaping.

And the Garden functions as a natural laboratory for them, as well as for the university students”.

According to the attached researcher, there have already been two graduations among the JBN staff, they are in the process of presenting the higher graduate program in Horticulture and Gardening and editing the higher technical manual.

“We want to reintroduce the specialty at all levels, recover this practice.

Extend the teaching of botany, in association with the Mined, to all the technological ones in the country”.

Currently, the installation in the JBN of a nursery that will contribute to projects to reinforce or restore urban green areas is in the final phase.

“We have opened up to the city, from ecological projects to the most aesthetic ones.

We are part of the government advisory group for the formation and increase of urban green spaces, and the School of Horticulture and Landscaping itself can contribute to what we are proposing for the city of Havana," the director of Horticulture and Landscaping recently told the press. Landscaping of the JBN, Larisa Castillo Rodríguez.

The M. Sc. Alelí Morales Martínez, president of the Cuban Botanical Society and director of the National School of Horticulture and Landscaping, highlights the weight of botanical research in the Garden.

Photo: Abel Padrón Padilla/ Cubadebate.

The Cuban flora groups around 7,500 species, with an endemism of around 50%, which gives it an important value at the Caribbean level, which, at the same time, is considered one of the biodiversity hotspots on the planet.

"In this environment, Cuba, as the largest island, plays a relevant role," says Alelí, who highlights the development of taxonomy and phytogeographic studies among the strengths of the faculty and the work of the institution.

“The JBN has remained as the leading center for botanical research in the country, especially those referring to the Cuban flora.

We publish

The flora of the Republic of Cuba

, which already exceeds 20 fascicles, distributed by families, where the taxonomic information of the species is collected in an orderly manner.

It would be, let's say, the crowning work of taxonomic works in the nation”.

Another relevant line is the Red List of the flora of Cuba (with editions in 2005 and 2016), a kind of barometer of the state of the flora in which the JBN is the coordinator and dozens of experts from all over the country collaborate, gathered in the Group of Specialists of Cuban Plants (GEPC).

The work –explains Dr. Rosalina Berazaín Iturralde– is to evaluate the species according to the conservation categories of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).

“There they are evaluated in categories such as extinct, vulnerable, endangered, critically endangered, of least concern... They say the plant formation where they live.

It is the official list of Cuba.

It is updated again after 10 years.

We are already working on that.

“We have goals and in annual meetings we classify Cuban plants.

In 2023 and 2024, the goal is to classify half of the endemics of Cuba, some 1,500 species”.

Morales Martínez points out that the GEPC is one of the oldest groups of the IUCN, and the only one in the Caribbean area specialized in plants.

Cuban experts celebrate 20 years of efforts to conserve native flora

It adds that "the group's studies and their results, in addition to contributing to the preparation of the red list, help the country's authorities in decision-making processes and, in fact, are part of Cuba's commitments as part of international conventions related to biological diversity”.

A project of great interest is the one focused on the study of hyperaccumulator plants.

Morales Martínez explains that within the range of soils that make up the largest island of the archipelago, there are outcrops of ultramafic rocks on which serpentine soils are generated.

These soils “are rich in heavy minerals.

All plants are not adapted to living there.

But it is in those soils where, precisely, most of our endemic flora settles.

The main mountainous massif of our country, which is of this type, is Nipe-Sagua-Baracoa, one of the main biodiversity nuclei in the region.

“These hyperaccumulator plants have evolved along with the soils, they have adapted and accumulate heavy metals in their tissues.

The biological function, which is part of the study, could be resistance to herbivory: by accumulating heavy metals, generally toxic to animals, they avoid predation.

It is what the plant does naturally.

“But we could make use of what they have learned as they evolved, and that is where soil bioremediation would come in when, for example, their use for mining ends.

At the same time, the use of native plants, adapted to these soils, would contribute to the reforestation of devastated areas.

It is a project in which JBN specialists work together with the Ministry of Energy and Mines”.

Japanese Garden of the National Botanical Garden of Cuba.

Inaugurated in 1989, it has an area of ​​5 ha, with traditional Japanese design, plants from the tropics and a 1.2 ha artificial lake.

Photo: Abel Padrón Padilla/ Cubadebate.

Research is daily and an inseparable part of the processes in the National Botanical Garden.

“Scientific work started from the very beginning and has not stopped.

We have never stopped doing research or teaching”, says Dr. Rosalina.

“The organization, growth and maintenance of the herbarium is fundamental.

Is very large.

A job that has implied collections throughout Cuba to have that collection updated.

Some 120,000 specimens of herbalized, pressed plants, organized by families, of the Cuban flora”, he points out.

“Last year we obtained an award for the contributions of the Garden, especially to the taxonomy of the Cuban flora, from the year 98 to the present… We have worked hard on conservation, two red lists have been published, with very good quality.

The inventories of all the species registered in Cuba have been published, the third edition is from 2022. They are transcendental works for the study of our flora”.

The M. Sc. Morales Martínez adds that the herbarium “is the basis of flora studies.

You go to the bush, collect the plant once, but every time you need information about the plant, you can't go to the bush.

So, that's what the herbarium collection is for, which is important in studies."

In two pavilions, vegetation of humid tropical forests and humid mountain forests are exposed.

Photo: Abel Padrón Padilla/ Cubadebate.

Offering an overview of the JBN collections, the president of the Cuban Botanical Society affirms that, “with more than 400 ha of land, as a botanical garden, it is one of the largest with that area dedicated to collections.

Because there are huge gardens, but they include natural areas.

Here everything is planted in scientifically organized collections.

“Approximately half of the land is dedicated to world tropical flora, and the rest covers a representation of Cuban forests.

That works like an

ex situ

conservation collection.

We have the reserves of plants and seeds of all the species represented in the garden.

In the Cuban part, we have the area of ​​serpentines, a small cuabal;

the pine forests, even with the oaks, the true oaks…

“That of mogotes, including the ceibón (

Bombacopsis cubensis

), and that of coastal jungle.

Most of the rocks that formed the fences were poured there and the vegetation that is next to our high coastline, which is dry, rocky, has been represented.

“In addition, we have indoor plant collections, including those in the exhibition halls and the scientific collections in nurseries, which are living collections.

There are species in which conservation care is more focused, part of the projects of the National Network of Botanical Gardens, through which we exchange species that have been identified with some degree of threat in flora and conservation studies.

“In botanical expeditions, sometimes one goes to look for certain species and sometimes we find and collect others that are scarce in nature.

Propagation protocols are established, it is reintroduced into nature and, in addition, we try to distribute among botanical gardens that may meet the conditions for its survival, in

ex situ

collections .

“In the Garden there are cultivated, alive, about 3,000 species.

They are important collections.

There are plants that have been brought from other botanical gardens, which have then been lost there.

We can function as a germplasm bank for them.

It works like this internationally.

Historically, the gardens have, free of charge, a process of exchange between institutions”.

Cork palm (Microcycas calocoma) in one of the exhibition pavilions of the National Botanical Garden.

Photo: Abel Padrón Padilla/ Cubadebate.

According to international estimates, there are some 2,500 botanical gardens in more than 150 countries, where some 80,000 species are cultivated, about a fifth of the recorded flora.

Of the total species represented in the gardens, around 20% are threatened.

They are sites with a wide range of functions and values, ranging from

ex situ

conservation , phytogeographic and taxonomic studies, categorization and red lists, teaching and everything related to botany and ecology, to healthy recreation and the environmental education of people through their experiential experience there.

They are also valuable gene banks, effective green lungs of cities and sites that guarantee the habitat of numerous animal species.

Undoubtedly, its importance is multiplied in the midst of the current climate and environmental crisis.

Butterflies also find habitat in the National Botanical Garden.

Photo: Abel Padrón Padilla/ Cubadebate.

National Botanical Garden of Cuba:

A complex of plant collections, scientifically organized, in phytogeographic and thematic zones.

25 outdoor collections in an area of ​​approximately 480 ha, of the Cuban flora and the tropical regions of the planet (Asia, Australia, Africa, Central America, South America, Antilles, Mexico, Oceania).

The Palmetum (more than 200 species of palms from Cuba and tropical regions in 50 ha), the Archaic Forest (ancient trees), ornamental plants, fruit trees and the Japanese Garden are added.

The areas dedicated to Cuba (about 120 ha), are distributed in a sheet of jucaros and palms, pine forest, vegetation on serpentines, semi-deciduous forest, mogotes vegetation, dry forest and coastal jungle.

15 indoor collections, including exhibition pavilions (Cactus and Succulents, Tropical Humid Forests and Mountain Humid Forests) and nurseries.

More than 125 species of birds (Cuban and Caribbean endemic, migratory and partial migratory) have been recorded in areas of the Botanical Garden.

Cabrero (Spindalis zena), permanent resident species, one of the dozens that can be observed in the National Botanical Garden.

Photo: Karen Aguilar Mugica/ Book “Birds of the National Botanical Garden of Cuba”.

Appeared from San Diego, among the 125 species of birds registered in the JBN, together with jabado, verde, scapulario and paso woodpeckers;

warblers, muleteer, cartacuba, banana siju, mountain and long-tailed hawk, curlews, herons, kestrel, pitirres and vireos.

Photo: Karen Aguilar Mugica/ Book “Birds of the National Botanical Garden of Cuba”.

Bird ecology at the National Botanical Garden: "A natural laboratory that gave us much more than a place to investigate" (+ Photos)

Outdoors, canopy, recreation with environmental content

Mario Hernández Pita, main guide of the JBN canopy and specialist in environmental education, explains that it is conceived as an educational project, to show the visitor the tree canopy around the exhibition pavilions.

The canopy station is precisely at the end of the tour through the pavilions that display collections of cacti and succulents, humid tropical forests, and humid mountain forests.

“Normally, people come to the pavilions, they appreciate the plants along the way, but not the canopy, the treetops.

For this we designed this canopy, with an extension of about 800 meters, five cables, a suspension bridge and 10 platforms, ”he says.

The route, or a look from the platforms, allows you to appreciate from another angle, on another level, some 30 species of trees and the associated fauna around the pavilions, although the view actually covers much more.

Suspension bridge between two impressive specimens of Cavanillesia platanifolia.

Photo: Abel Padrón Padilla/ Cubadebate.

“For example, jutías, some chameleons, tree frogs, bird species that are permanent or transitory residents are seen more closely… That makes the experience more significant.

It is not only the adrenaline of living the adventure of traveling through the cable, it has content.

“We have the fastest cable in Cuba, 300 m long.

It is the last stretch, it goes from a 21 m platform to another 3 m high”.

Hernández Pita apunta que, en la preparación del visitante, los guías preguntan sobre la salud o alguna condición médica que pueda tener la persona. “Ofrecemos una explicación previa en un cable escuela con una plataforma, y luego, durante el recorrido, constantemente vamos rectificando todo lo que hacen las personas allá arriba”.

Las alturas de las plataformas varían: desde una de 5 m a otra de 15 m, en el puente; a 13 m, y luego hasta 21 m para descender a 3 m.

“Las plataformas están en árboles de interés para nosotros. Partimos de una caoba (plataforma 1), llegamos a un roble de Cuba (2); luego, en el puente (3 y 4), donde también hay una escalera de 46 pasos para quienes quieran bajar a tierra, dos ejemplares de Cavanillesia platanifolia [especie originaria del trópico americano, de grueso tronco y que puede alcanzar hasta 30 m de altura. Se usa, entre otras cosas, para construir canoas], al igual que en la plataforma 5. Son muy robustos.

“De la plataforma 5 a la 6, se aprecia un árbol bala de cañón, y después se llega a un bosque de anacahuita [árbol nacional de Panamá, también de grueso tronco, que puede superar los 30 m de altura]…

“Todo esto lo vamos explicando. En el caso de la anacahuita, también se hace una degustación de la semilla cuando está en fruto, pues es muy parecida al maní”.

Cuenta que han tenido experiencias muy emotivas. “Hemos atendido a niños con necesidades especiales, síndrome de Down, espectro autista… Personas obesas. Hemos hecho cumpleaños, damos recorridos a niños pequeños.

“Vino un niño al que todo le provocaba temor: subirse en una silla, que la gente hablara alto, cualquier cosa. Tenía tratamiento, la psicóloga había dicho que donde él decidiera romper el miedo, ahí pasaría, fuera en un río o en una bicicleta.

“Les dijo a sus padres que quería romper el miedo en el canopy. El papá vino y nos lo pidió, lo hicimos en tándem, con mucho cuidado, en el primer tramo. El niño decidió continuar y, cuando terminó, comenzó a gritar ‘rompí el miedo, rompí el miedo’. Y todos nosotros lloramos. Tenía siete años.

“Luego vino con sus hermanos mayores. Yo no lo recordaba. Se acercó y me preguntó: ‘¿Tú no te acuerdas de mí?’. ‘No’, le dije. ‘¡Yo soy el que rompió el miedo! Vine a traer a mis hermanos’. Esa vez se volvió a tirar, muy bien. Hizo tres cables en tándem, y dos, solo”.

“A mí me han pasado muchas cosas aquí, llevo años trabajando en el Jardín, pero esta experiencia del canopy ha sido muy bonita. La gente piensa que este trabajo es fácil, pero no, es muy complejo, lleva una responsabilidad tremenda. Hay quienes suben con una disposición enorme, y a mitad de recorrido entran en pánico”.

Zunzún en uno de los jardines del Jardín Botánico Nacional. Foto: Abel Padrón Padilla/ Cubadebate.

El año récord de visitantes al Jardín (300 000) fue 1989. En 2022, en medio de fuertes limitaciones en el transporte, llegaron allí 75 000. También es un importante centro de convenciones en la ciudad: el pasado año fue sede de unos 400 eventos.

Cuenta con cuatro restaurantes con 1 200 asientos y otros servicios, parque infantil, rutas y senderos, espacios de bosque denso o de vegetación más abierta. Es posible hacer un picnic en familia, explorar a pie, en recorridos en vehículos con guías, o, si lo desea y decide ir en bicicleta, pedaleando. Darse un baño de bosque y naturaleza, aprender, admirar plantas y paisajes u observar y fotografiar aves, que son muchas y diversas.

Por estos días, he hablado con varias personas acerca del Jardín Botánico Nacional. Todas afirmaron que sí, quisieran ir, pero que es “complicado”. La del transporte y las conexiones es un área que trasciende al JBN; otros organismos e instituciones, empresas, autoridades, podrían colaborar en facilitar el acceso –más y mejores conexiones, preferente e idealmente, sostenibles–, o ampliar la disponibilidad de paquetes para visitas.

Lo que sí es un hecho es que es necesario “acercar” más el Jardín a la vida de la ciudad y sus habitantes, conectarlo orgánicamente con el tejido urbano de la capital. La gente necesita más opciones como esta.

Aire libre en el restaurante El Yarey, con vista al Palmetum. Foto: Abel Padrón Padilla/ Cubadebate.

En una entrevista reciente, la Dra. en Ciencias Lourdes Mugica, que por cuatro décadas ha estudiado la ecología de las aves asociada al proceso de sucesión en el JBN junto al Dr. en Ciencias Biológicas Martín Acosta, se refería a los valores del Jardín y todo lo que puede dar a las personas.

“En la medida en que las personas se apropian de eso, crecen espiritualmente y comienzan a sensibilizarse, a comprender cuánto puede darles y mejorar su calidad de vida este sitio, que no es disfrutar solo de las plantas, sino de las aves y demás especies, de todo lo que aporta al ser humano estar en un medio natural”.

Estanque en el Jardín Botánico Nacional. Foto: Abel Padrón Padilla/ Cubadebate.

Jardín Japonés en el Jardín Botánico Nacional de Cuba. Foto: Abel Padrón Padilla/ Cubadebate.

In one of the exhibition pavilions of the National Botanical Garden of Cuba.

Photo: Abel Padrón Padilla/ Cubadebate.