In ten years, twice as many people have visited Meise Botanical Garden. This was evident from the 2023 annual report on Monday. In 2023, the garden had more than 246,000 visitors, a record, compared to about half ten years ago.
Monday April 15, 2024 at 5:48 PM
The Botanical Garden has been breaking its record in terms of visitor numbers again and again in recent years. In 2019 there were just over 183,000 visitors, last year the number grew to more than 246,000.
The Botanical Garden attributes the increase to the investments that have been made in recent years, such as the renovation of the greenhouses of the Plant Palace, which took twenty years in total. Furthermore, the Amelvonnesbeek regained its old meandering structure, and the Culinary Garden and the Island Garden were further planted. The Botanical Garden wants to put the new greenhouses ‘De Groene Ark’ into use before 2024, give the seed bank a new home and open the new visitor car park. The opening of the Pachthof, the new catering point, is planned for 2025.
In 2023, researchers at Meise Botanical Garden documented 63 new species, according to the annual report. This involved 22 algae, 7 lichens, 13 fungi and 23 higher plants. In 2022, that number of approximately 100 was much higher than in other years, when an average of around seventy new species are described.