Joseph William "Jimmy" Mathews (7 April 1871 - 23 September 1949) was a horticulturist and gardener from England who served as the first curator of the Kirstenbosch national botanical garden in Cape Town, South Africa.
Horticulture has been defined as the culture of plants, mainly for food, materials, comfort and beauty. According to an American horticulture scholar, "Horticulture is the growing of flowers, fruits and vegetables, and of plants for ornament and fancy." A more precise definition can be given as "The cultivation, processing, and sale of fruits, nuts, vegetables, and ornamental plants as well as many additional services". It also includes plant conservation, landscape restoration, soil management, landscape and garden design, construction and maintenance, and arboriculture. In contrast to agriculture, horticulture does not include large-scale crop production or animal husbandry.
Kirstenbosch is an important botanical garden nestled at the eastern foot of Table Mountain in Cape Town. The garden is one of ten National Botanical Gardens covering five of South Africa's six different biomes and administered by the South African National Biodiversity Institute (SANBI). Prior to 1 September 2004, the institute was known as the National Botanical Institute.
Mathews was born in Bunbury, Cheshire to Robert Mathews and Mary Elizabeth. He trained in horticulture at the Kew botanical gardens and went to work in the Cape Town public gardens in 1895. In 1913, the botanical garden at Kirstenbosch was established and Mathews was appointed the curator under the directorship of Professor H.H.W. Pearson. Mathew cultivated and encouraged the use of numerous local plants including several bulbs. He published notes on the culture of many of the local plants. He retired in 1936 but continued to write and published on the Cultivation of non-succulent South African plants (Cape Town, 1938). [1]
Bunbury is a village in Cheshire, England, south of Tarporley and north west of Nantwich on the Shropshire Union Canal. At the 2011 Census, it had a population of 1,195.
Henry Harold Welch Pearson, was a British-born South African botanist, chiefly remembered for founding Kirstenbosch National Botanical Garden in 1913.
The rockery at Kirstenbosch is named after him as are the plant species Geissorhiza mathewsii and Tritonia mathewsiana . [2]
Joseph Henry Maiden was a botanist who made a major contribution to knowledge of the Australian flora, especially the Eucalyptus genus. This botanist is denoted by the author abbreviation Maiden when citing a botanical name.
Thomas Robertson Sim was a botanist, bryologist, botanical artist and Conservator of Forests in Natal, best known for his monumental work The Forests and Forest Flora of The Colony of the Cape of Good Hope which appeared in 1907. He was the eldest of five children of John Sim (1824-1901), a noted bryologist and Isabella Thomson Robertson (1823-).
Aloidendron barberae, formerly Aloe bainesii and Aloe barberae, also known as the tree aloe, is a species of succulent plant in the genus Aloidendron. It is native to South Africa northwards to Mozambique. In its native climes this slow-growing tree can reach up to 60 feet (18 m) high and 36 inches (0.91 m) in stem diameter. Aloidendron barberae is Africa's largest aloe-like plant. The tree aloe is often used as an ornamental plant. Its tubular flowers are rose pink (green-tipped); it flowers in winter and in its natural environment is pollinated by sunbirds.
Robert Harold Compton was a South African botanist. The Compton Herbarium at Kirstenbosch National Botanical Garden, which he founded in Cape Town in 1939, was named in his honour.
Edwin Percy Phillips, was a South African botanist and taxonomist, noted for his monumental work The Genera of South African Flowering Plants first published in 1926.
The Durban Botanic Gardens is situated in the city of Durban, KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. It is Durban’s oldest public institution and Africa's oldest surviving botanical gardens. The gardens cover an area of 15 hectares in a subtropical climate.
Edward (Ted) George Hudson Oliver, is a South African Botanist and author. He is an expert in heathers. He has discovered and named several species. Oliver is the recognized world authority on the subfamily Ericoideae.
Murray Ross Henderson (1899–1982) was a Scottish botanist who did most of his botanical work in the Straits Settlements and South Africa. He took a position as a botanist in Malaya in 1921 and became curator of the herbarium in the Singapore Botanical Gardens in 1924.
Harriet Margaret Louisa BolusnéeKensit was a South African botanist and taxonomist, and the longtime curator of the Bolus Herbarium, from 1903. Bolus also has the legacy of authoring more land plant species than any other female scientist, in total naming 1,494 species.
Erica verticillata is a species of Erica that was naturally restricted to the city of Cape Town but is now classified as Extinct in the Wild.
Arderne Gardens is a public park and arboretum in Claremont, Cape Town, located in the Western Cape of South Africa. It was established by in 1845 by Ralph Henry Arderne, a timber merchant originally from Cheshire, England. In 1979, the park was named a South African Provincial Heritage Site. It is now a popular venue for wedding photographs.
Encephalartos latifrons is a species of cycad that is native to Eastern Cape province in South Africa at elevations of 200 and 600 meters.
Margaret Lawder (1900-1983) was an Irish and South African botanist known for her conservation work. In 1922, at the age of 22, she emigrated to the Cape of Good Hope with her husband Commander Edward Francis Lawder R.N. and they became official plant collectors for the Kirstenbosch National Botanical Garden in Cape Town. Edward took pictures of the flowers and Margaret wrote the descriptions of them.
Peter Goldblatt is a South African botanist, working principally in the United States.
Graham Dugald Duncan(born 1959) is a South African botanist and specialist bulb horticulturalist at the Kirstenbosch National Botanical Garden, Cape Town, South Africa.
Harry Hall, was a British-born horticulturist, botanist and succulent plant authority. Hall attended Cheshire Agricultural College for one year (1925–26), Reading University in (1926–27) and two years at the John Innes Horticultural Institute in Wimbledon (1927–29). He then enrolled for a further three-year course (1930–1933) at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, followed by being an exchange student for one year (1931–1932) at the Hanbury Botanical Garden in La Mortola in Italy. Here his passion for succulent plants was ignited, and on his return to Kew headed the section dealing with the cactus and succulent collection.
John Patrick Rourke FMLS is a South African botanist, who worked at the Kirstenbosch National Botanical Garden and became curator of the Compton Herbarium. He is a specialist in the flora of the Cape Floristic Region, in particular the Proteaceae family.
Dierdré "Dee" Anne Snijman is a South African botanist and plant taxonomist who is notable for studying and writing extensively on bulbs. She has described over 120 species and has written comprehensive works on South African flora. She received the 1997 Herbert Medal from the International Bulb Society for her research on Amaryllis.