Two predictable comments from visitors are most frequently heard by the staff at the Butchart Gardens outside Victoria, the capital of British Columbia:
No. 1: "That's sensational,'' says a guest. "Which one,'' queries the guest's companion.
No. 2: "I have this plant at home, but it doesn't grow like this!"
That's the way it is at Butchart Gardens, one of the brightest floral displays in its part of North America. Butchart is likely to give anyone "garden envy."
But is it the best garden around?
"We would never claim that,'' said Susan Wright, while giving a tour last September. "We may be the best known garden, because we put our name out there, but Vancouver Island has many other beautiful gardens, enough to have the Vancouver Island Garden Trail."
Wright calls herself one of the "junior gardeners" at Butchart, even though she has worked there 22 years. Several of the other gardeners have been there 50 to 55 years, she says.
Butchart is the kind of place an employee doesn't want to leave. It's been an island institution for a century and is moving into its fifth generation of the same family ownership. And there may not be a more beautiful place to work.
The bloom begins each spring with 300,000 tulips (right about now), narcissus and hyancinth, continues at the onset of summer with thousands of roses, followed by a blaze of Japanese maples and copper beaches in the fall. Then it offers holiday lights and an outdoor skating rink through winter, the least colorful season.
The first winter hanging baskets go up in February to renew the process each year. About 200 hanging floral baskets are displayed during much of the year, with another 250 waiting in the wings in the greenhouses out of public view.
Butchart Gardens has 250 full-time and 600 total employees to keep the garden blooming and welcoming visitors from every part of the globe. The grandson of the founders runs the garden these days after getting his start by running the parking lot.
The Butchart Gardens is rightfully one of the classic tourist draws of western Canada.
Here are some behind-the-scenes things that make it so.
* The garden got its start in an old quarry mined for lime to make Portland cement (named for the city in England, not Oregon).
* The garden is rain fed and uses its own water, thus water becomes precious during the drier summer season.
* The formal gardens are Sunken, Rose, Japanese and Italian. The Sunken Garden replaced the old lime quarry.
* The Butcharts stopped making cement 1919, though the garden had a good supply of drain tiles and flower pots by then.
* The garden staff works 6 a.m. to 2:30 p.m., trying to blend into the background when the first guests arrive at 9 a.m.
* Besides gardeners, the staff includes carpenters, plumbers, electrician, painters, mechanics, food preparation workers and its own pyrotechnician for the summer fireworks shows (Saturday nights in July and August).
* Just like in city parks around the Northwest, one of the biggest challenges is keeping on top of the invasive ivy that grows on the old walls of the quarry. The staff tries to remove it before it flowers.
* The garden was placed on the list of historic sites and monuments of Canada in 2004.
* Flower lovers share the garden with birders, especially those attracted by hummingbirds. The Anna's hummingbirds are known for making looping displays.
* Dogs are welcome in the garden, but must be kept on a short leash. The garden has five pet watering stations. The garden does not advise bringing dogs on fireworks evenings.
* Other animals you may see include otters, garter snakes, raccoons, gray squirrels and rabbits. The staff hopes you don't see deer.
* Deer are a nightmare, because they love to eat the shrubs. When deer get in the garden's fenced enclosure, the gardeners get together, join hands and drive them out an open gate.
* Plant labels are restricted to the rose garden. This is not a botanical garden, it's an ornamental garden. Visitors can take a photo of a plant and ask someone at the visitor center to identify it.
* The garden got started after a Japanese garden designer visited Victoria in 1907. His work was wildly popular, so Robert and Jennie Butchart decided to add a garden to their estate in 1909 when the limestone quarry was exhausted. They collected plants from their travels and received many donations after word got out that Mrs. Butchart had a place for plants from around the world.
* The metasequoias (dawn redwoods) were planted in Victoria, at the University of British Columbia and in the Butchart Gardens after the tree was rediscovered in 1944 in China.
* A popular activity for kids is to find mossy animals hidden here and there in the garden. They also love the Rose Carousel, with its 30 animals hand-carved from basswood.
* The two totem poles were done on sight by local carvers, with the raising in 2004. Look for images of a sea otter, frog, raven and otter.
* To help visitors from around the world navigate the garden, maps are printed in 21 languages. The garden has close to 1 million visitors each year.
* The saltwater Tod Inlet is just outside the garden, though you would hardly know it. The water access was used to ship cement in the old days. There is one view of the inlet cut through the garden's shrubbery. Part of the inlet is protected as Gowlland Tod Provincial Park and is known for great cold water diving in an old-growth sponge and kelp forest.
* The garden's coast redwood trees were planted in 1934, the rose garden in 1929-30.
* Lombardy poplars date to a 1910 plantings as a wind break for the cement plant. The species is not known for longevity, so these trees have to be climbed every year and trimmed to keep them healthy. The leaves turn bright yellow in autumn.
* The fountain is lit at night, with viewing in the dark during late hours of summer and during the Christmas holiday season. Gates close at 10 p.m. during summer, though those inside can linger an hour longer.
Loving Victoria
* Susan Wright's specialty is designing garbage can lid-floral arrangements. Each container top gets 16 succulents in a square that can be changed with ease. Not bad work if you can get it, but you may have to wait 22 years.
* Butchart Gardens staff appears at the Yard, Garden and Patio Show in Portland each year, usually the last weekend of February.
If you go: Butchart Gardens is 14 miles north of Victoria and 12 miles south of the Sidney ferry terminal. Parking is free. The gardens' website explains how to get there without a car, by local bus, sightseeing bus, bike and boat. Admission is Current adult admission is $29.30 CD; the price goes up a bit in summer and down in winter; 250-652-5256, butchartgardens.com.
COMING UP: Look for the top 10 things to see in Victoria this summer on this website (a half hour after this post).
Terry Richard
trichard@oregonian.com
503-221-8222; @trichardpdx