Plant lovers, you’ll want to check this out!
Point Defiance Zoo & Aquarium is home to over a dozen Nolina hibernica ‘La Siberica.’ Right now, guests can see five of them sending up giant flowering stems 5 to 6 feet tall and covered with tiny white flowers that bees buzz about.
These massive succulent-looking plants can reach over 15 feet tall. Their native habitat is in the high elevations near Siberia, Mexico, making this a unique opportunity to see them in the Pacific Northwest.
“Being from high elevations gives them inherent characteristics that allow them to grow so far away in our cooler maritime climate successfully,” said lead horticulturist Bryon Jones.
Jones hopes the abundance of plants flowering simultaneously will produce seeds that can produce more plants.
Guests can see Nolina hibernica in these areas of the zoo:
- Southern Borders (along the paths above and below Kids’ Zone)
- Desert Garden (near the entrance to Kids’ Zone)
- Baja Garden (near the entrance to the Pacific Seas Aquarium)
- Wild World Wonders (from the zoo entrance down to the Wild Wonders Outdoor Theater)
To learn more about the zoo’s incredible botanical garden collection, take a Botanical Garden Tour with Jones on the first Sunday of each month at 10 a.m.
