Jardín Botánico del Soconusco of ECOSUR
Institution Code:
BGCI Member: Yes
About the Jardín Botánico del Soconusco of ECOSUR
Mexico is considered one of the five megadiverse countries of the world with 12% of global biodiversity, and the southeast of the country, where we are situated, connects with the Mesoamerican biodiversity hotspot. Within that scenario, Soconusco, in the extreme southeast of Mexico, includes one of the national priority regions for terrestrial biodiversity, the Tacaná-Boquerón corridor, which, in particular, is the second most important region for orchid species richness in Mexico, and one of the most important collections in this botanic garden is that of the Orchidaceae. The Soconusco region also coincides with all, or part of three Biosphere Reserves: Volcán Tacaná, La Encrucijada and El Triunfo.
Development of the Botanical Garden of the Soconusco Region (BGSR) started in 1994, in a one hectare abandoned cocoa plantation, at 80 m, in the municipality of Tuzantán on the coastal plain of Chiapas. This garden is dedicated to the vegetation of the Soconusco region in general, with a growing collection of well over 600 species represented, several of which are still to be identified, and including 200 orchid species. The annex to the garden, and more specifically the mid-altitude orchid collection, Orchidarium ‘Santo Domingo’, was set up several years later, in 2008, in the municipality of Unión Juárez, at 1,100 m in a plot covering nearly a third of a hectare near the Tacaná Volcano. There has been little funding available for the development of our botanical garden, but technicians and students have helped at different times with planting, maintenance, pest control, inventories and various scientific studies.
We include a preliminary plant list, as we have many species still to be identified. The sp. included are those that are the only representatives of their genera. Our collections include several endangerd species (our list is based on the Mexican NOM-ECOL-059-2019), and we also include introduced species which are now common in gardens and cultivated areas, and are now effectively part of the Soconuscan landscape.
Main Address:
Jardín Botánico del Soconusco of ECOSUR
Carretera Antiguo Aeropuerto km. 2.5
Tapachula
Chiapas 30700 Mexico
Telephone: 962 628 9800 ext. 5300
Fax:
URL: www.ecosur.mx
Primary Email: adamon@ecosur.mx