Above you are vigorous familiar climbers such as wisteria, roses and clematis as well as many outstanding unusual varieties, scampering through centuries-old cedar, fir and hemlock. The gourd-shaped nests of the common bush-tit hang in the air as squirrels dart across your path.
You have entered the David C. Lam Asian Garden, largest component of the University of British Columbia Botanical Garden. From Tibet, Japan, China, Korea, Manchuria and other regions, some of the most ancient flowering plants, the magnolia, are gathered together in the greatest number on the continent. Here also is one of the continent's largest collection of rhododendrons. Paper-bark, snake-bark and many other examples of Asian maples add vibrant colour, shape and texture.
Shade-loving perennials, rare shrubs and lush ferns nestle within this peaceful forest. Plants previously considered not hardy in Vancouver thrive beneath the immense native canopy which provides shade and protection from northwest winds.
You are surrounded by the results of ongoing expeditions by botanists who have explored and collected in the farthest corners of Asia and the close and long-standing and ongoing association of the UBC Botanical Garden and Centre for Plant Research with other famed botanical gardens such as Edinburgh, Kew, Nanjing, Hokkaido and the Arnold Aboretum and Harvard.
Visitors are invited to undertake their own personal explorations and discoveries, or to arrange guided tours. There are few spaces between groupings of magnificent plants, but plenty of opportunities to get off main paths where rare plants are scattered and others spring from nurse logs that lay where they have fallen. Towhees, thrushes, robins and song sparrows scratch among the undergrowth.
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