Garden of the Month – May 2025: Chihuahuan Desert Research Institute
We’re excited to launch a brand-new article series: Garden of the Month — a monthly spotlight celebrating the people, places, and plant collections that make up the Hortis community.
Each month, we will highlight a different botanical garden, offering a closer look at their unique stories, conservation work, plant records, and what makes them special to their local community and the world of plant conservation.To mark the beginning of this new series — and in celebration of the upcoming American Public Garden Association Annual Conference — we could think of no better garden to feature than the enchanting Chihuahuan Desert Nature Center & Botanical Gardens.
A proud member of the American Public Gardens Association, this site has supported plant education, appreciation, and conservation for over fifty years. With a mix of scenic trails, regional plant collections, and a new initiative to digitally document and manage their living collections, the Center offers a thoughtful balance between its long-standing mission and the evolving approach to collection management. As this multi-year curation project unfolds, CDRI provides a valuable example of how gardens can adapt and grow while staying rooted in place.
Featured photo : Desert Speciality Garden. Photo by Andy Morgan Photography
Where It All Began
Founded 52 years ago, the Chihuahuan Desert Research Institute (CDRI), also known as the Chihuahuan Desert Nature Center & Botanical Gardens, is located on 205 hectares (507 acres) in the high-desert grassland foothills of the Davis Mountains in Far West Texas, USA. It is situated 32 km (20 miles) from the artist community of Marfa, Texas, 32 km (20 miles) from the University of Texas McDonald Observatory, and 145 km (90 miles) from Big Bend National Park.
CDRI is a nonprofit organization with a focus primarily on education, the visitor experience, and the support of research. Its mission is to promote public awareness, appreciation, and concern for nature generally and the natural diversity of the Chihuahuan Desert region in particular.
The Center is vast, featuring stunning, rugged hiking trails across 8km (5 miles), along with an 8-hectare (20-acre) Botanical Garden, a Bird Blind, and a Visitor Center complete with a gift shop.
The Botanical Gardens feature a 0.8 km trail called the Trans-Pecos Natives Trail, showcasing plants native to the Trans-Pecos region, which extends from the Pecos River to the Rio Grande, covering an area of approximately 81,530 km² (31,479 sq mi).
Plant Collections
At the midpoint of the trail, visitors will find the Cactus Museum Collection, home to over 200 species, subspecies, and one of the largest collections of Chihuahuan Desert cacti. The gardens also include a Native Grasses Exhibit, which displays 26 out of the 268 grass species found in the region. Additionally, a Pollinator Garden set against a volcanic rock outcropping, a Scenic Vistas Trail, and an Overlook complete the Botanical Gardens.
Behind the Scenes: Records and Curation
A new multi-year project has started at CDRI to track and manage the full collection of plants in the botanical garden, cactus museum, pollinator garden, visitor center, and specimen plants throughout the facility.
Over fifty years of accession data have been collected in multiple formats to record the origin and placement of most plants in the collection. This new team project will centralize all this data using an online Hortis database.
This database will consolidate all institutional knowledge, make it accessible, and maintain its security well into the future. The information will be used by CDRI staff and volunteers to keep up to date with the whole collection, including detailed mappings of the locations of individual plants or mass plantings. The history of each plant will be easy to access, and current plant conditions will be continuously recorded with checkup reminders to ensure continued care.
Access to full accession details of the collection will be available to individuals or institutions on request.
The curated collection will also be shared freely with the public through the CDRI website or by accessing the data from a smartphone or tablet. When on site, anyone will be able to see their position in the gardens and access more information on any plant. https://cdri.hortis.com/public/site/cdri/browse
The data is connected to Hortis Shared Taxonomy, which ensures the use of valid scientific names. Each record entry pulls in information from Wikipedia while allowing for additional input from other online sources.
Looking ahead
This is a multi-year, collaborative project for CDRI, that involves several key steps to fully document and manage the plant collection:
- Identify and map each plant in the garden, recording its position and name. Status: In Progress
- Photograph plants throughout the seasons, capturing key features such as buds, leaves, and overall form. Hortis supports unlimited photo uploads allowing for ongoing visual documentation. Status: In Progress and Ongoing
- Refine procedures for staff and volunteers involved in planting and maintaining the collection, ensuring consistent record-keeping for new and existing plants. Status: In Progress and Ongoing
- Validate plant identifications and input historical accession records. This will involve collaboration with botanical experts and individuals who have contributed to the garden over the years. The aim is to update taxonomic classifications, include anecdotal context, and preserve the collection’s history. Status: Planned
- Produce updated plant labels to reflect the verified and enriched data. Status: Planned
Because the plant database is online, anyone can follow the progress of all these steps. Simply use the following link to access the public view of the Botanical Garden database: https://cdri.hortis.com/public/site/cdri/browse
Public views of the Cactus Collection, Pollinator Garden, and Visitor Center will also be available over the next few months.
Though the team note that their work only began in March and full data validation is still underway, the progress to date is nothing short of impressive. Fields like ‘Year Introduced’ will continue to be refined as more accession data is added, but the current site already offers an inspiring snapshot of their collection.
The Hortis team and everyone else at Species360, are very excited to see how the team at CDRI will continue to develop their work. Their progress so far has been inspiring - we’ve been completely starry-eyed gazing at the other worldly photos of the Nature Center!
