A free winter garden display with poinsetttias and evergreens can be seen at the Bellagio Resort & Casino’s Conservatory and Botanical Gardens in Las Vegas.
The Bellagio Resort & Casino, in Las Vegas, Nevada, will have on display their winter garden in the hotel’s conservatory and botanical gardens. The winter exhibit is filled with penguins, polar bears, reindeer and traditional Christmas toys of gargantuan size complemented with equally impressive evergreen trees. The animated display floats above a carpet of red and white bedding plants.
The Bellagio Conservatory and Botanical Gardens is open to the public 7 days a week, 24 hours each day. The conservatory is among a number of free botanical gardens in the Las Vegas area that are decorated for the holidays.
Winter Scene Exhibit in a Vegas Casino
The Bellagio, a Las Vegas Casino, is well known for its conservatory and creative botanical garden exhibits. Beyond the Bellagio’s grand lobby on the first floor, visitors are immediately drawn to the botanical gardens by the jawing- dropping displays of living flora and simulated fauna. The rectangular glass-topped conservatory has arching doorways on all sides from which visitors can enter.
The animated winter scenes depict penguins on faux ice floats surrounded by 20’ tall pine trees and mother and baby polar bears with fur of 16,000 carnations against a backdrop of Manzanita trees. In the sky, reindeer covered with pecan fur, 110 pounds worth, and dressed for the holidays with braided cranberry velvet harnesses jingling with silver bells are seen flying overhead. Shimmering clouds of enormous ornaments float from the ceiling.
Surrounding the 42’ tall fir Christmas tree is a 15’ tall wood toy solider, a 7’ tall rocking horse and a five-car toy train. The winter garden is set in planting beds filled with poinsettias, mums and roses.
Evergreen Christmas Tree and Poinsettias at the Bellagio
The evergreen symmetrically pyramidal Christmas tree is a massive western native Shasta fir tree, Abies magnifica var.shastensis, closely related to the noble fir. The stiff branches are made up of soft deep green to bluish needles that give off little scent. The Christmas tree is decorated with 7,000 white bulbs and 18,000 silver and gold ornaments.
Among the mass plantings of red and white poinsettias, the Poinsettia ‘Ice Punch’ is featured with the giant tree ornaments and streaming water feature.
Although most of the watering is done by hand, the carnations on the polar bears are watered with an internal drip irrigation system. The winter garden plants are switched out every two weeks, the old plant material is recycled, into compost, later used as mulch for future garden displays. In total, 90 percent of the materials used in the conservatory are recycled.
The Bellagio Conservatory and Botanical Gardens facility includes a 40,000 square foot off-site greenhouse. Underneath the conservatory, tunnels are used to facilitate quicker access to the plant displays.
Free Botanical Gardens to Visit in Las Vegas Nevada
There are several botanical gardens free to visitors in the area surrounding Las Vegas, Nevada. The collection includes native plant displays as well as seasonal exhibits.
The botanical gardens in the glass covered conservatory at the Bellagio Resort & Casino can be found by entering the main entrance. The equally grand Dale Chihuly hand-blown glass ceiling highlights the hotel’s grand lobby, as does Chihuly glass art collections in many public buildings.
Located in nearby Henderson is the Acacia Demonstration Gardens, part of the Conservation District of Southern Nevada. This small botanical garden is a series of plantings meant to show native plant ideas that can be used by local home gardeners.
Ethel M Chocolates Botanical Cactus Garden is a native planting of succulents grown in southern Nevada. During the winter holidays, the plants are decorated with lights and are kept company by several Christmas characters. The store, factory and gardens at Ethel M Chocolates are open to the public and free to enter.