Adelaide Botanic Gardens Bicentennial Conservatory climate experiment, History Festival 2021

Ten years ago, heating was switched off in Adelaide’s Bicentennial Conservatory. Many tropical plants weren’t expected to live – but this weekend the survivors will be shown off.

Ten years after the heating was switched off to save power, some tropical survivors remain inside the Bicentennial Conservatory.

This weekend, the Friends of the Botanic Gardens of Adelaide are running History Festival tours called “Gardening under glass”.

The 90-minute tour includes the beloved “Bi-Con”, the Palm House and the Amazon Waterlily Pavilion.

Volunteer guide Greg Lane, 64, inside the Bicentennial Conservatory at the Adelaide Botanic Gardens. Picture: Tom Huntley

Volunteer guide Greg Lane likes to talk about how plants benefit from living inside a structure with a controlled environment or microclimate.

When management decided in 2012 to switch off the heating inside the Bi-Con, they embarked on “an experiment”. Some things changed, but remarkably, some stayed the same.

“It was built as a tropical glass house and it was uncertain, by switching the heating off, whether some plants would survive, a number of them have and some of them haven’t,” Mr Lane said.

“Those that survive are still very good specimens of a variety of different plants from different regions of the world.”

There are palms, ferns, cycads and even a pepper vine that you could get pepper from, “a variety of plants that can’t grow or wouldn’t necessarily grow out in the gardens, because the climate is just too cold”.

While the Friends group would always like more funds to develop and maintain the gardens, Mr Lane said he understood the limitations on the budget.

The Draft Adelaide Botanic Garden Masterplan 2020 includes several actions to “protect and conserve the important heritage values of the Bicentennial Conservatory building and continue to have living collections that enhance the visitor experience, learning and engagement”.

These include drafting a Conservation Management Plan and undertaking a review of the living collections. However Mr Lane said collections development officer John Sandham was constantly reviewing the status of trees and other plants.

Public consultation closed in November. The Environment Department recently completed a report on the consultation and prepared a Final Masterplan, which is ready to go to Environment Minister David Speirs.

On Wednesday the Board of the Botanic Gardens and State Herbarium announced the

appointment of new Botanic Gardens director Michael Harvey.

Most recently, he worked as assistant director and chief experience officer at the Australian National Maritime Museum, a role that blended history and maritime archaeology, Navy and defence, ocean science and sustainability, and First Nations and migration programs.

History Festival tours are also operating at Mt Lofty Botanic Garden this week and Wittunga Botanic Garden, next week.

Gardening Under Glass, Saturday and Sunday May 16, 2pm. Tickets $5 from [e-mail] or 8222 9367

Official opening of the Adelaide Bicentennial Conservatory on November 18, 1989. Premier John Bannon and the official party inspect the new tropical glass house. Picture: Brian Webber.