The Arboretum de l'Hort de Dieu is an arboretum

Arboretum

An arboretum in a narrow sense is a collection of trees only. Related collections include a fruticetum , and a viticetum, a collection of vines. More commonly, today, an arboretum is a botanical garden containing living collections of woody plants intended at least partly for scientific study...

 located on the southern flank of Mont Aigoual

Mont Aigoual

Mont Aigoual is the highest point of the Gard département, France. It is part of the Massif Central, and it is located within the Cévennes National Park....

 about 39 km north of Le Vigan, Gard

Gard

Gard is a département located in southern France in the Languedoc-Roussillon region.The department is named after the River Gard, although the formerly Occitan name of the River Gard, Gardon, has been replacing the traditional French name in recent decades, even among French speakers.- History...

, Languedoc-Roussillon

Languedoc-Roussillon

Languedoc-Roussillon is one of the 27 regions of France. It comprises five departments, and borders the other French regions of Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur, Rhône-Alpes, Auvergne, Midi-Pyrénées on the one side, and Spain, Andorra and the Mediterranean sea on the other side.-Geography:The region is...

, France

France

The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

, at the border of Gard and Lozère. It is open daily without charge.

The arboretum was created in 1902 by Charles Henri Marie Flahault

Charles Flahault

Charles Henri Marie Flahault was a French botanist, among the early pioneers of phytogeography, phytosociology and forest ecology...

 (1852–1935) and Georges Fabre

Georges Fabre

Georges Fabre was a French forestry engineer, now best known for his role in creation of the Forêt Domaniale de l'Aigoual and the weather observatory atop Mont Aigoual....

 to help reduce the effects of excessive grazing and timber production. It was planted with spruce

Spruce

A spruce is a tree of the genus Picea , a genus of about 35 species of coniferous evergreen trees in the Family Pinaceae, found in the northern temperate and boreal regions of the earth. Spruces are large trees, from tall when mature, and can be distinguished by their whorled branches and conical...

, larch

Larch

Larches are conifers in the genus Larix, in the family Pinaceae. Growing from 15 to 50m tall, they are native to much of the cooler temperate northern hemisphere, on lowlands in the north and high on mountains further south...

, black pine

Black Pine

Several trees are referred to as black pine:* The European Black Pine.* The Japanese Black Pine.* The Jeffrey Pine in North America.* Matai, a New Zealand conifer.* Miro, also a New Zealand conifer.The band The Black Pine...

, etc., and is accessible via a hiking path from the Observatoire de l'Aigoual.