About the Garden
Rooted in Nature Conservation
The mission of Sonoma Botanical Garden is to inspire an appreciation and understanding of the beauty and value of Asian and California native plants, and to promote their conservation in natural habitats and gardens.
Since its founding in 1987 by Jane Davenport Jansen, Sonoma Botanical Garden has been dedicated to celebrating and conserving the plant diversity of temperate East Asia. In 2021, this vision grew to encompass another biodiversity hotspot: the California floristic province. At first glance, the Garden is meandering pathways, seasonal features, and hidden picnic spots, but a closer look reveals there is so much more. Every plant is accounted for with unique identifiers (accession numbers), species name, and source information.
Seasonal changes of specific species are recorded, and data is added to a national community science effort that tracks the impacts of climate change.
Rare and endangered plants grown from wild-collected seed are carefully cultivated so their offspring can be sent to other botanic gardens increasing not only the genetic diversity in cultivated populations but as a safety measure against loss from fire or other natural disaster.
Cuttings and samples are sent to plant researchers around the world for analysis and study, enhancing our understanding of how to save these unique plants and minimize unintended consequences from humans such as introduction of invasive species.
Last, but not least, the Garden is a protected habitat for a variety of local wildlife. This corridor connects with the wildland interface along the Garden’s fence line to combat local habitat fragmentation and further ecosystem alterations.
The result – a unique, tranquil, immersive experience of conservation in action.
The Garden Bridge
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Staff
Executive Director
Director of Horticulture & Facilities
Salvador Calderon (he/him)
Gardeners
Guillermo Calderon
Baldo Larios-Moya
Ryan Nelson
Curator of Living Collections
Michael Wenzel (he/him)
Deputy Director
Kate Rabuck (she/her)
Visitor Experience Lead
Vanessa Gill (she/her)
Visitor Experience Associates
Valerie Brown
Roman O’Connor (he/him)
Social Media & Communications Assistant
Andrea Mae Udan (she/her)
Membership Associate
Sharon O’Neil (she/her)
Board of Trustees
Jerry Newell, Chair
Ricardo Capretta, Vice Chair
Mark Menke, Treasurer
Jenni E. Zaidi, Secretary
Kent Anderson
Carol Baker
Gabriel Campbell
Dana Dirickson
Linda Haake
David Lei
Paul Martinez
Kimberly S. Morris
Robert Patterson
Susan Peterson
Anderson Pugash
Paul Rozanski
Harvey Shein
Robert Smith
Contact Us
707-996-3166
info@sonomabg.org
PO Box 232, Glen Ellen, CA 95442