Newsletter: April 2025
This month, we're taking a moment to say thank you to the incredible Hortis community. From our very first beta testers to the 150+ gardens now using the platform across six continents, your trust and partnership have shaped our journey so far and will take us where we’re headed next. This month, we're sharing new resources to help you make the most of Hortis, including helpful how-to videos and our webinar tomorrow, May 7th, on collaborative collection tracking. Below, you will also find a preview of the major conferences we’ll be attending in 2025 —we hope to see you there!
A Big Thanks to the Hortis Community
We usually like to spotlight the successes of the incredible community we serve, and we’ll continue doing so through our Success Story series—now nine articles strong—highlighting how botanical institutions around the world are transforming how they are tracking their collections. But this month, we’re breaking from that tradition to send a heartfelt thank you to all the gardens who have placed their trust in us by choosing Hortis.
Our journey began five years ago, in April 2020, with the first steps toward building a modern, accessible plant collection platform, which would become Hortis. In November 2021, our very first beta users, Dandenong Ranges Botanic Garden and Wilson Botanic Park Berwick—both proud BGANZ members—logged in for the first time. By June 2022, our first paying subscribers came on board, and during the following three-year period, we’ve welcomed over 150 gardens from six continents.
A special thanks goes to the BGANZ Plant Records Working Group, led by Tex Moon, for selecting Hortis as their preferred solution during the 2021 plant records tender process.
One of our core motivations in launching Hortis was to remove barriers—technical and financial—that prevent gardens from accessing professional record-keeping tools. Today, we are proud to say that over 85% of our subscribers have made the leap to our platform from spreadsheets or other basic systems, making it easier to unlock the full conservation potential of their living collections. With more than 80% of botanical gardens still operating without a professional system, there is much work left to do—but we’re making real progress.
In December 2022, Hortis joined Species360, and since then, our partnership with BGCI, has strengthened our commitment to helping gardens succeed by improving the outlook for successful, local, and global coordinated, data-driven species conservation.
As a nonprofit, you can rest assured that your subscription goes directly toward improving Hortis and supporting the wider community. Thank you again—for your trust, your feedback, and your partnership.
How to use Hortis Video Clips
As Hortis continues to grow in capability, we’ve launched a new series of “how-to” video clips to better support the onboarding of new users and help you get the most out of the platform. In addition to our Getting Started guide, we’ve recently added two new videos: one on using Rich Text Notes and another on Adding Photos and Observations. You can find these videos on our YouTube channel in a dedicated playlist, as well as on our support portal. As we continue to add more clips—stay tuned, and let us know what you think!
Webinar: Collaborative Collection Tracking: Simpler, Smarter, Together
Join us tomorrow for an inspiring webinar on Collaborative Collection Tracking. Discover how gardens are transforming their workflows by empowering horticulturists, educators, volunteers, and interns to actively contribute to more up-to-date plant collection information, both in the field and back at their desks. Whether you're from a small garden looking to modernize your process or a larger institution exploring ways to scale data input across teams, this session is for you.
Conference Agenda 2025
Face-to-face events are a valuable way to connect—and reconnect—with our community. They give us the opportunity to hear what’s top of mind, share ideas, and explore how we can help accelerate growth and impact at botanical gardens. Species360 has a long tradition of supporting the zoological and botanical community at these events.
In addition to participating in Zoolocal conferences and smaller local events across Europe and the U.S, we’re excited to participate in several major botanical conferences in 2025. We hope to see you there!
American Public Garden Association Annual Conference 2025
🗓 June 2–5, 2025 📍 Denver, Colorado 🔗 More information
10th European Botanic Garden Congress
🗓 September 22–26, 2025 📍 Rome, Italy 🔗 More information
Association of Zoological Horticulture Annual Conference 2025
🗓 October 17–20, 2025 📍 Tampa, Florida 🔗 More information
Botanic Gardens Australia and New Zealand Congress 2025
🗓 November 2–5, 2025 📍 Canberra, Australia 🔗 More information
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To access a complete list of all the updates, please visit the changelog page.