New: The Native Plants Garden

On 11 June, Flemish Minister-President Matthias Diependaele officially inaugurated the Native Plants Garden. Together with the renovated Pachthof area of Meise Botanic Garden, it can now be admired in all its splendour. The Native Plants Garden pays tribute to local plant diversity and is inspired by more than 20 different natural landscapes found in our country — from salt marshes to Ardennes forests, via coastal dunes, heathlands, peat bogs… The rooftop garden of the new Pachthof restaurant showcases the rare grasslands of southern Belgium.

Making the decline and protection of our flora visible

The Native Plants Garden brings together more than six hundred native plant species — representing no less than one fifth of all wild plant species in our region. It is therefore a living catalogue of Belgian flora, with special attention given to the most threatened plants: 175 of the species planted are listed as threatened on regional Red Lists. These include arnica, the calaminarian pansy, the fragrant orchid, the grass-of-Parnassus, the round-leaved sundew and the Ardennes brome. You can easily identify rare species thanks to their striking red labels.

Inspiration for private gardens

Nature is highly fragmented in Belgium, and every green space counts. Private gardens can play a crucial role in supporting biodiversity. Many rare pollinators — bees, bumblebees, butterflies — depend on very specific native plants for food, as host plants or as winter shelter. With the ornamental borders of the Native Plants Garden, Meise Botanic Garden demonstrates that an ecological garden can be both lush and visually appealing. Visitors will find plenty of inspiration to transform their own gardens and support local nature.

Key figures

• 22 different habitats: beach, fixed dunes, salt marshes, dune grasslands and scrub, road verges, arable fields, dry heath, wet heath and peat bogs, tall-herb communities, purple moor-grass meadows, acidic forests, Atlantic beech forest, calcareous woodland edges and scrub, subalpine meadows, mat-grass grasslands, calcareous grasslands, metallophyte flora, limestone rocks, alluvial meadows.
• All habitats are accompanied by didactic information panels, making this garden perfectly suited for educational purposes.
• More than 600 plant species, representing over one fifth of all species recorded in Belgium.
• 175 species in the Native Plants Garden are listed as threatened on the regional Red Lists of Flanders and/or Wallonia.