Public tour planned at KU medicinal garden Oct. 4

LAWRENCE—The public is invited to the annual fall tour of the University of Kansas Native Medicinal Plant Research Garden at 10 a.m. Saturday, Oct. 4. The garden was established in 2010 and draws several hundred visitors each year.

Garden pathways are ADA-compliant, and the site is open to the public dawn to dusk. Kelly Kindscher, a senior scientist at the Kansas Biological Survey and a professor in the Environmental Studies Program, will lead the tour.

Features of the garden include research plantings, a large show garden and the KU Student Farm. In addition, several other research studies are based at the 5-acre site, including a collaboration with scientists from the University of California, Davis, on the Kansan brood of 17-year cicadas, due to emerge in 2015.

The garden serves as a gateway to the KU Field Station, as it is the first of several Field Station sites on East 1600 Road in Douglas County north of Highway 40. Land for the garden site was made available by KU Endowment.

The KU Field Station is managed by the Kansas Biological Survey, which was established at KU in 1911. The core area of the Field Station, north of Lawrence, consists of 1,800 acres with five miles of public trails. The Field Station is open to programs across the University as a teaching and research resource. Its best-known areas are the Fitch Natural History Reservation and the Rockefeller Native Prairie. The Field Station is devoted to scientific research and totals 3,400 acres across 10 tracts in Douglas, Jefferson and Anderson counties. 

For more information:

Garden information
Map and directions to garden (PDF)
Kansas Biological Survey website