1. HIMALAYA

From Grøtfjorden on Kvaløya near Tromsø, and designed and constructed by Bjørn M. Thon in 1990, assisted by Jan Sørensen.

Blå valmuesøster/ Himalayan blue poppy (Meconopsis baileyi)

From Grøtfjorden on Kvaløya near Tromsø, and designed and constructed by Bjørn M. Thon in 1990, assisted by Jan Sørensen. Here you will find plants from Himalaya and neighbouring mountains, in particular those of the western provinces Sichuan and Yunnan in China, which are extremely rich in plants. The southern parts of these mountain chains are dominated by monsoons, and the area has a lot of rain during summer and much snow during winter. No wonder plants from high altitudes here (3500−5500 m) do very well in Tromsø! 

Important genera in Himalaya, such as rhododendrons, primulas, saxifrages and gentians are mostly planted in their own systematic collections elsewhere in the 

Garden. Predominant plants here are therefore poppyworts (Meconopsis), Cremanthodium daisies and shrub-forming rowans (Sorbus). The poppyworts are famous for their large flowers in blue, violet, red, yellow or white, and they are a major attraction in early summer. The perennial Tibetan blue poppy (M. grandis), the Himalayan blue poppy 

(M. baileyi) and the intensely blue M. ‘Lingholm’, the latter derived from garden material in Britain, have flowers in different shades of blue. However, most of the 78 species in the genus are monocarpic, i.e. they die after flowering. Thus we need to harvest their seeds to maintain our own garden populations.