The Jardin botanique Henri Gaussen is a botanical garden

Botanical garden

A botanical garden The terms botanic and botanical, and garden or gardens are used more-or-less interchangeably, although the word botanic is generally reserved for the earlier, more traditional gardens. is a well-tended area displaying a wide range of plants labelled with their botanical names...

 operated by the Université Paul Sabatier

Paul Sabatier University

Paul Sabatier University is a French university, in the Academy of Toulouse.Founded in 1229, the University of Toulouse is one of the oldest in Europe. Today’s Toulouse III was named for Paul Sabatier, winner of the 1912 Nobel prize in chemistry, when it was established on the foundations of the...

 at 39 allées Jules Guesde, Toulouse

Toulouse

Toulouse is a city in the Haute-Garonne department in southwestern FranceIt lies on the banks of the River Garonne, 590 km away from Paris and half-way between the Atlantic Ocean and the Mediterranean Sea...

, Haute-Garonne

Haute-Garonne

Haute-Garonne is a department in the southwest of France named after the Garonne river. Its main city is Toulouse.-History:Haute-Garonne is one of the original 83 departments created during the French Revolution on March 4, 1790. It was created from part of the former province of Languedoc.The...

, Midi-Pyrénées

Midi-Pyrénées

Midi-Pyrénées is the largest region of metropolitan France by area, larger than the Netherlands or Denmark.Midi-Pyrénées has no historical or geographical unity...

, 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...

. It is open weekdays in the warmer months.

The botanical garden was originally created by Philippe-Isidore Picot de Lapeyrouse

Philippe-Isidore Picot de Lapeyrouse

Philippe-Isidore Picot de Lapeyrouse or La Peirouse Philippe-Isidore Picot de Lapeyrouse or La Peirouse Philippe-Isidore Picot de Lapeyrouse or La Peirouse (20 October 1744, Toulouse - 18 October 1818, château de Lapeyrouse (Haute-Garonne) was a French naturalist.In 1782 he was elected a foreign...

 in the Jardin des Plantes

Jardin des Plantes, Toulouse

The Jardin des Plantes is a public park and botanical garden located on Allée Jules-Guesde, Toulouse, France.-History:The first botanical garden in Toulouse was created in 1730 by the Société des sciences de Toulouse and located in the Saint-Sernin district, not far from the Matabiau...

(7 hectares) established within the grounds of a Carmelite monastery requisitioned during the French Revolution. It was divided into sections (medicinal plants, industrial, edible), and eventually grew to incorporate more than 5000 species from the nearby Pyrenees

Pyrenees

The Pyrenees is a range of mountains in southwest Europe that forms a natural border between France and Spain...

 and around the world.

Today's garden is maintained by the Université Paul Sabatier

Paul Sabatier University

Paul Sabatier University is a French university, in the Academy of Toulouse.Founded in 1229, the University of Toulouse is one of the oldest in Europe. Today’s Toulouse III was named for Paul Sabatier, winner of the 1912 Nobel prize in chemistry, when it was established on the foundations of the...

 as an adjunct to the natural history museum of Toulouse. It contains about 2500 taxa

Taxon

|thumb|270px|[[African elephants]] form a widely-accepted taxon, the [[genus]] LoxodontaA taxon is a group of organisms, which a taxonomist adjudges to be a unit. Usually a taxon is given a name and a rank, although neither is a requirement...

 of plants in an ethnobotanical collection arranged into sections of medicinal, industrial, and edible plants, as well as six greenhouses (450 m²) and a herbarium

Herbarium

In botany, a herbarium – sometimes known by the Anglicized term herbar – is a collection of preserved plant specimens. These specimens may be whole plants or plant parts: these will usually be in a dried form, mounted on a sheet, but depending upon the material may also be kept in...

 with about 300,000 specimens. Of particular interest are its collections of toxic plants (840 species), tropical plants (145 species), epiphyte

Epiphyte

An epiphyte is a plant that grows upon another plant non-parasitically or sometimes upon some other object , derives its moisture and nutrients from the air and rain and sometimes from debris accumulating around it, and is found in the temperate zone and in the...

s (300 species), succulents (730 species), and carnivorous plant

Carnivorous plant

Carnivorous plants are plants that derive some or most of their nutrients from trapping and consuming animals or protozoans, typically insects and other arthropods. Carnivorous plants appear adapted to grow in places where the soil is thin or poor in nutrients, especially nitrogen, such as acidic...

s (90 species). Its collections also include about 4500 photographic plates and 35,000 diapositives taken by Prof. Henri Gaussen documenting the flora of the French Pyrenees. The Arboretum de Jouéou

Arboretum de Jouéou

The Arboretum de Jouéou , also known as the Arboretum Henri Gaussen, is an arboretum located on the Route de l'Hospice de France in Bagnères-de-Luchon, Haute-Garonne, Midi-Pyrénées, France...

is also administered as part of this garden.