In metropolitan Shanghai, residents say it's hard to find a good place to take a deep clean breath, and green has become a rare color in the city. That probably explains why so many flock to the Chenshan botanical garden during the Spring festival holidays.

After four years of hard work, Shanghai Chenshan botanical garden finally finished its landscaping makeover and opened its doors to the public just before the lunar new year break.

The gardens cover 207 hectares of green fields, mountains and plant exhibition areas. With 26 different themes in the exhibition rooms, Chenshan botanical garden has collected more than 9,000 species of plants.

Located in the northeast corner of Chenshan botanical garden, three newly built greenhouses are highlighted as the largest-scale greenhouses in Asia with a combined 12,000 square meters in total.

Shanghai has put lots of efforts on its nature reserves. There are about 4,000 types of plants uniquely found in eastern China and the garden has collected more than 1,500, including several rare island plants such as Lauraceae, a plant currently listed as endangered in China.

"I would like to bring my family here once a month," says 35-year-old Qi Yao, a nurse who at a private clinic in Shanghai, "Air quality is very good here and I hope my son can gain more knowledge about plants. There are lots of plants we've never heard of and it would help if there was more information on them."

There is also a special section for the visually impaired at the garden where all the plants on exhibition are non-toxic and thornless, "in order to prevent any accidents," says a staff member. Sidewalk ties for the blind and wheelchair accessible facilities are also available at the garden.

Audio guides are available in Chinese and English.

China Daily

(China Daily 02/20/2011 page15)