Suva Botanical Gardens in Suva, Rewa, Fiji | Botanical Gardens

Hello and welcome to the Suva Botanical Gardens, Suva, Fiji. The Suva Botanical Gardens occupy the site of the original Fijian town of Suva, whose former inhabitants moved across the bay in about 1882. Colman Wall, first Curator of the Fiji Museum in 1919 states: 'Twenty five years ago the moat and rampart were practically intact, but there are now no traces of them left, nothing to tell the visitor that this was once a busy fortified town, nor that in 1843 it was burned and was the scene of one of the fiercest and bloodiest fights in Fijian history'*.

In the early 1900's Suva City Council took over the development and maintenance of the Botanical Garden with a supervisor heading the entire operations with great involvement in a well-established world wide plant exchange network. In 1976 the globally known Suva Botanical Garden changed its name to Thurston Gardens. The relationship with other Botanical Gardens had already began to dwindle and slowly the development and maintenance of the Gardens also deteriorated. In 1998 the Suva City Council Gardens and Maintenance Department moved its headquarters from Suva to Samabula, and the annual government grant to maintain the gardens was stopped.

The Fiji Museum, which was built in the Suva Botanical Garden grounds in 1955, believes that the Garden has great potential to become a natural and cultural outdoor museum that compliments the existing exhibitions within the museum buildings.

Whilst the Suva Botanical Gardens lease has now been given back to the Suva City Council (SCC), the Fiji Museum staff have been doing their best to keep the grass short, the flowerbeds kept free of weeds and burning any rubbish left by the public. In 2004, the staff painted and repaired the clock tower, (built in memory of the first Lord Mayor of Suva), and the gazebo near the entrance close to Queen Elizabeth Drive.