Things to do / Travel Guide
It may be a desert, but the California Desert region is anything but dead when it comes to botanical gardens. Visitors will enjoy two especially-nice botanical gardens, located in Palm Springs. Watch out for those prickly cacti!
Living Desert Zoo and Botanical Gardens
More of an outdoor museum than anything else, the Living Desert Zoo and Botanical Gardens in Palm Springs celebrates the diverse plant and animal life of the desert and is a perfect place to gain a greater appreciation and understanding of the desert's ecosystem. The gardens showcase a wide variety of desert flora and fauna as well as amazing exhibits on the desert's geology, and native cultures. One of the showcases is the African wildlife exhibit, which features some famous African desert animals including gazelles, sand cats, camels, zebras, and warthogs. In the deserts of North America exhibit, you'll see all types of animals that live in the desert ecosystem of the region. A highlight is the after-sundown exhibit, showcasing nocturnal animals like owls, bats, and coyotes that hunt in the desert nights. The North American section also features a great variety of non-nocturnal animals, including birds like hummingbirds, falcons, eagles, and vultures. The largest exhibit of the North American section is Bighorn Mountain, which features endangered Peninsular Bighorn Sheep in a mock up of their natural desert mountain habitat. The botanical gardens are open daily from September 1st-June 15th, from 9 a.m.-5 p.m., and from 8 a.m.-1:30 p.m. in the summers.
Moorten Botanical Gardens
Located on Palm Canyon Drive, right in the heart of Palm Springs, the Moorten Botanical Gardens has been a favorite city destination for years. The botanical gardens are located on the grounds of a house once owned by Chester “Cactus Slim” Moorten, one of the original Keystone Cops, who moved out to the area in the 1930s, building the gardens inside an arboretum on the grounds in 1938. Today the gardens are home to more than 3,000 types of desert cacti and other plants grouped together by desert region: Arizona, Colorado, California, and other spots across the American West. The botanical gardens are open daily.
Palm Springs, Death Valley and the California Desert
Botanical-Gardens
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