The green-fingered descendants of a Tayside botanist have put down roots in a garden dedicated to five “plant adventurers”.
Monifieth man James Meikle planted a flower in a memorial to globe-trotting Angus men George and David Don, their father George Sr, and brothers James and Thomas Drummond.
The latter’s great-great-grandson attended at the Myre in the centre of Forfar with his daughters Louise and Katherine, and said he was very pleased to be part of something he “didn’t know anything about” 20 years ago.
Mr Meikle, a grower of ericaceous plants like heathers, said: “I think it’s brilliant but it’s early days yet, it’ll look great when everything has grown.”
The legacy of 19th-Century natural scientist George Don, his sons David and George Jr and the Drummond brothers of Inverarity, is now cemented with the Forfar Botanists’ Garden, built on waste ground.
The garden was initially conceived to be unveiled next year, the 250th anniversary of George Sr’s death, but a preview event was held yesterday as part of Angus Heritage Week.
Forfar was put on the horticultural map by the Dons and the Drummond brothers in the 19th Century, when plant cataloguing was still in its infancy.
The Courier previously revealed plansto turn waste ground in Forfar town centre into a green space dedicated to their legacy.
After they formed, the Friends of the Forfar Botanists received designs from gardening expert and former artist for DC Thomson, Inglis Thorburn.
Friends of the Forfar Botanists chairwoman Eleanor Gledhill thanked the garden’s main sponsors Angus Environmental Trust, local businesses and a couple of private benefactors, and local councillors Glennis Middleton and Lynne Devine.
“The ground belongs to Angus Common Good and we are leasing it from them,” she said.
Louise Meikle said the family began researching their history in 1995 and found out about Thomas Drummond.
“We remembered hearing stories about the phlox drummondii that was named for him, so we just on to researching more from there,” she added.