Botanical Garden of the SFU

Rostov-on-Don, Russia, Russia

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The Botanical Garden of the Southern Federal University (SFU) in Rostov-on-Don is a 200-hectare protected botanical garden located in the Temernik river valley in northwestern Rostov-on-Don, Russia, founded in 1927 by professors V. F. Chmielewski and V. N. Varshavski as the first botanical garden in South Russia's treeless zone.

After 75 years of existence, it has grown from its original 74 hectares into one of Russia's largest educational, scientific, resource, information, and cultural centers, housing over 6,500 species of trees, shrubs, and herbaceous plants across its diverse terrain.

The garden features four greenhouses totaling 1,064 square meters that contain the largest collection of tropical and subtropical plants in South Russia, with approximately 1,600 species from Africa, Southeast Asia, Central and Southern America, Australia, and New Zealand. 

A unique feature within the garden is a subterranean mineral spring named St. Seraphim of Sarov, recognized as an Orthodox Christian shrine with potable medicinal-and-table type water. The garden's distinctive layout mirrors the North Caucasus map, with pathways designed to represent the region's railway network, creating a geographical representation through landscaping, and it operates as a state budget educational and scientific unit of Southern Federal University.