Donetsk Botanical Garden. The Green Wealth of a City of Metallurgists and Miners

In any city the botanical garden is an adornment and a place of rest for the townsfolk.

The green oasis in Donetsk is also the lungs by which the inhabitants of the industrial metropolis breathe.

It is one of the largest European botanical gardens by area, occupying 203 hectares.

70 hectares of its territory are given over to excursions.

For convenience, at the start of the promenade you can familiarise yourself with a plan of the garden, so as to have an idea of the layout and the placement of the exhibitions.

The garden may be considered young in comparison with its counterparts in other regions.

Its laying out began in 1965 in the Bohodukhiv gully, along the motorway leading to Makiivka.

Before that, neither the English capitalists nor the Party leaders in the years of the first Five-Year Plans had given a thought to founding a garden in a city that supplied the country with coal and metal.

The steppe zone is not very rich in the variety of rare plants, and other arboretums and parks shared their seedlings.

Botanical garden. First steps

Within a few years, amid the slag heaps and factory chimneys, a wonder of nature appeared, created through the considerable efforts of professionals.

Natives of the tropics and subtropics have taken root in the greenhouses and astonish you with their variety.

Botanical garden. The greenhouse

The green plantings not only saturate the industrial conglomerate with oxygen but also allow one to derive aesthetic pleasure.

Like enormous green corridors, the spruce, linden, chestnut and walnut avenues alternate and intersect with one another.

Under the branches you can meet the characters of fairy tales. The sculptures were made and donated by masters of wood carving.

The stone compositions under the birch and maple canopies also look very organic.

A monolith of black Donetsk gold framed by plants. Donetsk — a green and industrial city.

It is well known that Donetsk is a city of roses.

Mosaic on the facade of the botanical garden building

The wrought-iron bouquets of the queen of flowers have not disturbed the natural beauty of the garden.

The fly in the ointment turned out to be the birdhouses nailed to the trees. This is a display of a lack of love for nature.

Beneath the crowns of the trees, the great chemist D. I. Mendeleev calls for the afforestation of the southern steppes and regards this as an important task of the state.

 Monument to D. I. Mendeleev

Not forgotten, either, is the former director of the garden, Ye. M. Kondratiuk, a luminary of the botanical field, who gave many years of his life to his beloved work.

Monument to Ye. M. Kondratiuk

Undoubtedly, it is the flowering plants that always attract visitors.

In May the lilac grove lures you to itself with its lush bloom.

The autumn palette is represented by mottled sheets of dahlias, asters, cannas, chrysanthemums and other annuals.

Throughout the warm season, right up to the frosts, the garden is drowned in the fragrance of Donetsk's floral symbol.

The enchanting collection of the rose garden captivates and inspires with its riot of colour.

The corners of the arboretum deserve special attention in the garden.

Cypress, coniferous and deciduous beauties, differing in colour and size, are gathered into small communities, yet each specimen is not smothered by its neighbours and can be seen from any point of the avenue.

The labyrinths of evergreen shrubs, trimmed using the topiary technique, are executed flawlessly.

A large area of the garden is set aside for scientific research work and for the nursery.

An enormous number of species of flora are listed in the Red Book.

It is characteristic of this garden that 7 ponds wash its borders.

In the summer heat you can sit on the bank and watch the waterfowl.

In the T. H. Shevchenko garden are gathered the plants whose names the poet and artist mentions in his works.

 The garden and the monument to T. H. Shevchenko

A lawn requires constant watering and care, and, in the words of the English, only then will it become a lawn — in 100 years.

On the cornelian cherry avenue the crop has ripened, but in the garden nothing may be gathered or picked.

Botanical garden. Cornelian cherry

You are permitted to be a consumer of aesthetics and to treat with care the living beauty created with great difficulty by human hands over half a century.

Donetsk. The botanical garden