Heritage gardens

The park at the estate was installed in the 1980s and is currently being restored.  There is a rosarium next to the guesthouse.  Only a few apple trees have survived, though one of them offers an outstanding healthy variety of apples, "Prinzenapfel." This rare and historical variety can be found in old gardens in Kurzeme.

The small garden has a large collection of herbs and medicinal plants from which herbal teas are produced.  There are also traditional vegetables, flowers, and three ancient varieties of strawberries.  The lady of the house offers lectures about life on the countryside, including medicinal teas, bee-keeping and traditional fence building.

Since late 18th century, the Blankenfelde Estate is surrounded by a large forest park (12 ha). The landscape park of 4 ha, with gravel paths has been renovated. The owners are proud of the old and new plantings of elder. There are young fruit and berry plantations. The harvest is processed into tasty juices, syrups, wine.

Established 1960. Number of species: ~100 species of trees and shrubs, including 25 local species, as well as 16 species of rhododendrons. Unique plants - Latvia’s oldest magnolia (50 y.o.), a Smoke Tree (Cotinus coggygria) that is 45 years old, a Gingko Tree (Ginkgo biloba), and others.

The Pope Estate and its park (1840) are among the best-preserved estates in the area.  Since 1940, it has housed a school and other institutions.  Most of the trees in the park are common, but there are a few rare ones, including five Crimean oak trees.  The largest copper beech in Latvia is in the yard, as is a large bed of traditional phloxes that are red and white.  During the Soviet occupation, Pope was proud of a large apple and pear orchard which covered 3.6 ha of land and featured a large variety of fruit trees that were collected by a gardener called Grīnvalds.  Today the garden is privately owned and is not available to visitors.  The managers of the garden have established a stock company which harvests fruits to be delivered to schools in Latvia.  An unexpected find involved ten large sweet cherry trees near the next door Rojnieki homestead.  Four of the trees are very old and were large 70 years ago.  The trees are covered with moss, but still produce high-quality fruit

The museum has an interesting exhibition about the vineyard, and it organises various events and wine tastings.  The garden is carefully nurtured by the Dviete parish workers, which has planted beds of flowers and herbs.  A rosarium is being established.  Perfect grape plants can be seen in the garden, all of them chosen by Sukatnieks and other selectors in Latvia.  There are also other plants chosen by Sukatnieks, including black currant, gooseberry and quince bushes.

The buildings are surrounded by landscaped planting in the area of 10 hectares.  Behind the mansion to the South is a planned Baroque garden with historical varieties of apple trees that were characteristic for the Kurzeme region in the 19th century.  To the West, there is an English landscape park (1.8 ha) that was planted in early 19th century. It was turned eclectic at the end of the 19th century. The park arrangements in the style of Romanticism included open areas, small architectural constructions, decorative bushes, contrasts of light and shadow, small ponds. The park is being reconstructed. Here groups of majestic ash trees can be seen along with lilac, honeysuckle and laurel bushes that have beautiful and aromatic blossoms in the spring to create a special atmosphere.  The estate and its gardens are a cultural monument of national importance therefore only historical cultivars belonging to the particular time and style are preserved and used here.
Tours are available in exchange for donations, but please contact the venue in advance.  A walk through the garden and park will take an hour or two, and the manager will tell you about the history of this estate and other nearby ones, the principles of historical gardens in Europe and the way in which these were brought to bear in designing the Tāšu Estate's garden and park. 

The Renaissance garden offers a look at the very beginnings of gardening in Eruope.  It has no flowers or blooming bushes, instead producing cabbages, beets, carrots and herbs.  These create an interesting variety of leaves an colours from the spring until the late autumn.  A rosarium with grape plants has been established more recently.  There are rare types of plants in there, including chestnuts.  The farm sells garlic, dried garlic chips and garlic powder.  Tastings are offered to larger groups of tourists.

Outside the house is a unique and impressive fruit orchards.  The father of the aviator planted fruit trees in the late 19th century to produce several types of apples.  Old decorative plants in the garden are typical of the region, and a new garden has recently been installed in the territory.

Museum employees tend to the garden, which is an inviolable part of the farm.  The garden was planted by the first employee of the museum around 1970 and has a variety of ancient apple trees.  The apples are stored for nearly one year and obtain a specific taste.  They are also perfect for drying.  The farm grows traditional flowers and medicinal plants.  There is no shortage of modern plants, because museum employees think that the lady of the house loved flowers and was forever planting new ones.

The garden has unique plants and Lithuania's largest orangery.  It offers exhibitions, meetings, flower weeks and educational programmes.  Ancient flowers are demonstrated in various flowerbeds in accordance with botanical classification.  There are more than 20 traditional and old types of vegetables that are grown in the educational garden.  Visitors to the garden can look at very rare types of apple trees.

To preserve the cultural and historical heritage, a cherry orchard was planted on the banks of the Švete River.  The cherry trees bloom during the first and second week of May, and guests and residents can go to an observation are and sink into the sea of blossoms with their eyes.  The cherries ripen in July, and a festival is organised at that time.

The largest outdoor collection of some 700 grape plants was established by Ēvalds Pūpols, who offers tours and talks about grape growing traditions in Latvia and at his vineyard.  You can purchase berries and plants.

The Kazdanga Castle park is huge (196 ha), and until recently it was owned by an agricultural school.  Kazdanga is the birthplace of once-famous sour cherries.  This variety has all but disappeared, but the park still features a few old apple trees, one of them with two grafted varieties of apples.  There are old hazelnut and other nut trees, including a Manchurian walnut tree and a hybrid with a royal walnut tree.  Recently, two royal walnut tree plants were gifted to the garden by selectionist Gunvaldis Vēsmiņš.  Other rarities in the park include bristly roses, a rare variety of mountain-ash (a new tree), a gingko tree, a katsura tree, a bladdernut tree, a birthwort plant, wild tulips, and a wild maple tree that is depicted in the herald of Kazdanga.  The aromatic garden of Baroness Lieven is being restored with lilacs, bird-cherries, magnolias, roses and others.  An old "rose hill" has been restored with varieties of roses from Salaspils.

The garden of the old farm is typical, with traditional flowers, medicinal plants and herbs in the style of the 19th century.  The 100-year-old apple tree has been grafted to produce four types of apples.  The only one that remains is the Antonovka apple.

There are two gardens in the territory, one planted by the poet's father and another by his sister.  There are old types of apple and pear trees, as well as decorative plants that are typical of gardens in Central Lithuania.  The poet was particularly fond of nasturtiums

The Rundāle place garden is remarkable as a fully completed project by the architect Rastrelli. The laying out the Rundāle Palace Garden took place by 1740 alongside the construction of the palace. The original planning was preserved to enable renovation in 1975. The Baroque garden in Rundāle Palace Park with its ornamental parterre, the Green Theatre, the labyrinth and 19 bosquets occupies 10 hectares. In front of the garden, there is a rose garden covering an area of 1 hectare and presenting a collection of ca 2230 historical and modern rose cultivars.

The grounds of Rundāle Palace ensemble amount to 85 hectares, of which 3.4 hectares is a forest park. It is also planned to create orchards to both sides of the palace with a collection of historical cultivars of trees and shrubs. The West side orchard is being developed under an EU Interreg project.   Today, the palace building complex enjoys an invaluable advantage of being situated in an untouched rural landscape.

More than 250 types of plants grow in the garden.  An ethnographic garden has been planted to typify such gardens in the coastal area of Lithuania, with various flowers that are characteristic of the region.  The garden has 14 different types of plants, including herbs.  The venue offers educational programmes and room for picnics.

There are two apple trees that are historically liked to Zukauskas-Vienuolis, and one of them is very rare and only found in the oldest orchards.  Outside the museum is an authentic flowerbed that recalls the era of author, as well as an exhibition of medicinal plants. 

The institute is proud of its vast collection of fruit trees and berry bushes, as well as of the research work. There are over 1000 different types of apples trees, 400 types of pear trees, 300 types of plum trees, 200 types of cherry trees, as well as vines, apricots, peaches and berry bushes. The research work is devoted for improvement of vegetable cultivation methods and expansion of the range of varieties. In spring, the visitors enjoy walks in the institute’s Lilac Park, one of the largest in Europe that offers a look at 240 different kinds of lilacs. In May/June the garden is beautiful with blossoming apricot, cherry, plum, apple, pear trees and quince bushes.

You will find a range of perennial flowers here and enjoy a decorative pond with water plants.  The botanical garden has a large collection of protected plants, herbs and medicinal plants.  Obelevičus often guides tours through the park.

The institute conducts agro-biological and ecological research, creates various technologies related to these processes, develops the biological and biotechnological foundations of the plants, selects plants, studies their genetics, protects and enriches them, examines the quality of fruits, berries and vegetables, seeks to optimise their storage and processing, and offers biologically valuable products from the biological diversity of the plants that are in the garden.  Visitors can purchase various fruit tree and bush plants, as well as seasonal fruits and vegetables.

The farm produces rhubarb, pumpkin and quince candies, apple chips, juices and jams, and tourists can purchase all of these.  It welcomes groups of children who can tour the orchard and taste the products.  The farm has several types of sweet cherry trees, and it is integrated on 24 hectares of land.  2.5 ha of this is devoted to the apple orchard, which produces 30 tonnes of fruit each year to produce apple chips, dried apples, apple juice, etc.  The owners will teach you to produce a crown from fruit tree branches.

These date back to the 19th and early 20th century, including homes, granaries, saunas, grain siloes and hay barns, 28 buildings in all.  Part of an apple orchard that reminds us of the interwar period has survived alongside one of the buildings.  The museum features local decorative plants, particularly focusing on dahlias.

The park was established in 1958 and has more than 4,000 types if plants.  The gardens in the park correspond to the pre-war interwar and post-war era.  The garden offers various events, including educational games and lectures.

The park (c 1830) covers 18 ha and has preserved its web of pathways.  At the front of the house is a large nut tree, and behind the building are old trees, including oak trees and several types of mulberry trees, one of them originating in North America.  A hybrid apple tree is near the paved road.  There is also a collection of flowers, vegetables and fruits, including an ancient type of rhubarb.

Upmaļi is a biological farm that specialises in medicinal plants that are used to produce teas, hydrolats, infusions, substances with glycerine, etc.  The garden covers eight hectares, including various uncommon useful plants such as the broad whitetop, various herbs, rhubarb plants that date back to the age of aristocrats, as well as old orchards, including a rare apple cultivar that is not found anywhere else in Latvia.  Four types of colourful wild apple trees have grown on the farm since the 1930s, and three of them still produce fruits.  Old gooseberry plants may also date back to the aristocratic era, as is the case with three types of lilac and some ten types of cherries.  The farm also has local types of apple trees, most of them planted by the owner of the farm in the 1930s.  More recent are Greek nut trees.

You will learn about how the medicinal plants are grown and processed.  The farm covers more than 30 ha and produces more than 15,000 kg of medicinal plants each year that are offered as teas and mixtures.  A sample garden offers medicinal plants and a bit of information about how they are used.