The Arboreti di Vallombrosa (about 12 hectares) are seven arboreta

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 within the Forest Demaniale Vallombrosa near the historic Vallombrosa Abbey founded in 1036 by St. John Gualbert of Visdomini, heavenly patron of the Foresters of Italy. They are located in Vallombrosa, Reggello

Reggello

Reggello is a comune in the Province of Florence in the Italian region of Tuscany, located about 25 km southeast of Florence....

, Province of Florence

Province of Florence

The Province of Florence is a province in the Tuscany region of Italy. It has an area of 3,514 sq. km and a population of 933,860 in 44 comuni....

, Tuscany

Tuscany

Tuscany is a region in Italy. It has an area of about 23,000 square kilometres and a population of about 3.75 million inhabitants. The regional capital is Florence ....

, Italy

Italy

Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...

, operated by the Istituto Sperimentale per la Selvicoltura, and open daily upon prior request.

The arboreta date back to 1869 at another location, or to 1884 in the current location, when 230 plants were transferred in a move of the Regio Istituto Superiore Forestale's headquarters within the Vallombrosa forest. New sections were added in 1885-1886, and in 1891 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...

 was created; unfortunately it was abandoned in 1914 and nothing remains today but a tub. In 1894 another section was added on the Masso del Diablo to provide a suitable environment for Mediterranean species. Severe bombing during World War II

World War II

World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

 badly damaged the arboreta, but they have since recovered.

Today the arboreta currently contain more than 5,000 specimens belonging to more than 1200 species

Species

In biology, a species is one of the basic units of biological classification and a taxonomic rank. A species is often defined as a group of organisms capable of interbreeding and producing fertile offspring. While in many cases this definition is adequate, more precise or differing measures are...

 of trees and shrubs, representing 137 genera

Genera

Genera is a commercial operating system and development environment for Lisp machines developed by Symbolics. It is essentially a fork of an earlier operating system originating on the MIT AI Lab's Lisp machines which Symbolics had used in common with LMI and Texas Instruments...

, and claim to be Italy's most important collection of plants cultivated for scientific and experimental purposes. They encompass seven distinct arboreta organized into 50 sections. The arboreta are as follows:

• Arboreto "di Bérenger" (1869, area 1.32 hectares)
• Arboreto "Siemoni" (1880, area 0.34 hectares)
• Arboreto "Tozzi" (1886, area 3.00 hectares)
• Arboreto "Gellini" (1894, 3 hectares), on the Masso del Diablo
• Arboreto "Perona" (1914, area 0.97 hectares)
• Arboreto "Pavari" (1923-1958, area 2.10 hectares)
• Arboreto "Allegri" (1976, 1 hectare)