Botanical Garden
The 17.2-hectare botanical garden is located on the territory of the University of Sopron, in the part bordered by Ady Endre Road–Bajcsy Zsilinszky Street –Honvéd Road –Panoráma Road – Deákkúti Road and has been protected since 1978.
The foundations of the botanical garden were already established with the launch of the military school that started its operation in 1897 on the site of the lower garden. The design of the garden at that time was primarily determined by military training and aesthetic needs. This was the time when today's old plane trees, horse chestnut trees and maple trees were planted.
After World War I, in September 1922, the Academy of Mining and Forestry of Selmecbánya moved in the vacant buildings, which had had a European-famous arboretum elaborated in a scientifically sophisticated way in Selmecbánya. In the spring of 1923, under the leadership of Ferenc Kövessi, the transformation into a botanical garden began on an area of 17.2 cadastral acres.
Its main purpose was to help education by presenting the Hungarian forest flora, but great emphasis was placed on physiological and genealogical research as well as on breeding. The propagating material used to create the garden partly came from Selmecbánya, but species were continuously collected from the forested areas of Hungary and Europe. Before World War II, the botanical garden had already nearly five hundred species of trees and more than a thousand herbaceous species, some of which were dormant in greenhouses. After the war destruction, the reconstruction of the garden began under the leadership of Ferenc Tuskó. In 1958, the area of the botanical garden was increased by 4 hectares with the support of the town council, and then in 1965 by another 4.5 hectares. The thematic transformation of the garden also started in the 1960s, when the walkways, the alpine rock garden on the side of Panorama Road and the sub-areas presenting the species of each continent were created. Visitors can see about two dozen species of fir, more than thirty spruce species, more than thirty juniper species, barberries and hundreds of deciduous tree species and shrubs.
Today, the Botanical Garden is maintained by the Faculty of Forestry of the University of Sopron.
