Henry Nehrling's Palm Cottage Gardens

This site was home to Dr. Henry Nehrling (1853-1929), an internationally-renowned horticulturalist, naturalist, botanist, ornithologist, and writer known as the “patron saint of Florida gardens.” Here, and at his later Naples gardens, between 1886 and 1929, Nehrling introduced and tested over 3,000 new and rare species of plants and trees, as well as Florida native plants.

Over 300 of these became essential to the state’s ornamental horticulture, including caladiums, palms, bamboos, magnolias, amaryllis, Indian hawthorne, and crinum lilies. Nehrling’s gardens became a mecca for plant lovers and a tourist destination in the early 1900s, and were visited by many prominent people, including President Theodore Roosevelt and renowned horticulturists David Fairchild and Liberty Hyde Bailey.

Nehrling collaborated with the Office of Foreign Seed and Plant Introduction of the U.S. Department of Agriculture and, in 1929, was awarded the Meyer Agricultural Explorer Medal. He was a founding member of the American Ornithological Union and the Florida Audubon Society, and wrote extensively on plants and birds.

His most notable works include “Our Native Birds of Song and Beauty”, “The Plant World in Florida”, and “My Garden in Florida.”