Botanical gangrene
Editorial
Stabroek News
April 29, 2003
Perched on the edge of the Amazon, one of the world’s largest rainforests and home to thousands of species of rare and valuable plants, Guyana seemed to be the ideal place to establish botanical gardens. So it was that 124 years ago the colonial government acquired the 75-hectare, abandoned Plantation Vlissengen, appointed a board of directors, borrowed $240,000 and transformed the swampy estate into a viable botanical enterprise.
In those times, such gardens were not a novel idea. For centuries, most civilized states possessed botanical gardens and in the age of the British Empire, botany - the study of plants - played an important economic role in augmenting the production of food crops and other agricultural commodities.
Everywhere else in the world, botanical gardens serve as large collections of plants for scientific study, research and breeding. Plants are important sources of food and medicine and, in well-run gardens, they are usually catalogued and labelled with their common and scientific names, places of origin and other data useful to students and researchers.
Originally, Guyana’s Botanical Gardens were laid out in various well-kept sections such as the parklands, flower garden and nursery. These were intersected by broad avenues and roadways with patterns which could be seen best on a town plan. Canals contained various aquatic lilies including the national plant - the Victoria regia. Trees formed a natural sanctuary for a variety of birds, especially Bird Island where the white Egret nested.
Specimens of trees and plants were brought from all over Guyana and from Africa, Australia, India and the Caribbean. As much emphasis was placed on the Gardens’ scientific role as its aesthetic appeal.
Located in the middle of Georgetown at the eastern end of Regent Street, the Botanical Gardens were also an important resource of cultured urban society, offering an escape from noisy downtown at the western end of Regent Street. It used to be a place of leisure, learning and bird-watching. The elegant bandstand at which the Police Force band played seemed to complement the pleasant landscape.
Gradually, however, the tide seems to have turned against botany and even beauty. A zoological park was carved out of the western end. The northern section, known as the ‘Shelter Belt’ and intended to be a ‘sheltered nursery’ for plants went to the Georgetown Water Works.
Bits of the southern section became the sites of a hydrometeorological station and the final resting places of Guyana’s first governor-general, national poet and two presidents. And, finally, the entire eastern section was lopped off and allocated for diplomatic and commercial development when the Sheriff Street-Mandela Avenue bypass was constructed.
Even with those changes, the Gardens’ scientific focus could have been saved but now neglect is evident everywhere. The majestic Victoria regia has disappeared from the canals. The parklands are more frequently overgrown with tall grass inviting pasturage by herds of buffalo and cattle which cool themselves by wallowing in the canals and destroying the lilies.
Much of the north-eastern section has become a wilderness, overtaken by tangled bush. Motor cars find parking on the grass verges in the south-eastern section which is the preferred picnic spot and where styrofoam food boxes can be found after the fun.
The inventory of trees has shrunken and those trees which have been uprooted and fall are chopped up for removal and frequently remain in situ long afterwards. Fires are frequently lit to burn waste. Appropriately, the vegetation on Bird Island has been chopped down and even those birds which survived the smoke of the fires, have migrated.
Except for the western section which retains its attractiveness as the destination of wedding parties in search of a colourful background for their photographic moments, the gardens, once intended for the scientific collection and cultivation of plants, have become something of an eyesore.
A sort of gangrene has spread over Guyana’s Botanical Gardens that were once the living repository of some of this continent’s most quaint and rare botanical specimens.
