Natural History Wanderings

Friday, May 1 Chris Gardner will be giving an informal lunch-time talk and slideshow at Jepson Herbarium weekly botany lunch on

Flora of the Silk Road: assembling an illustrated Flora

The Botany Lunch meets Fridays at noon during the academic year. Talks are in 1002 Valley Life Sciences Building (entrance in small corridor by north entrance on ground floor) at the University of California in Berkeley

Chris and his wife Başak organize and lead a wide range of botanical, garden and photographic tours both in Turkey and around the world. They have been our guides on a number of our favorite natural history trips.

To learn more about Chris and Başak click read more

Christopher Martin Gardner (born 1967), is a plant world all-rounder, naturalist and semi-professional photographer.  Originally from Essex, England, he gained a BSc in Horticulture from Reading University, England and spent fifteen years as a professional horticulturist and garden designer.  In 1998 he co-authored the bestselling book ‘The Plant Hunters’. However, a lifelong birdwatcher and naturalist his fascination with travel brought him into contact with the wildlife, flora and cultures of many exotic countries and in 1999 he began guiding botanical and wildlife tours.  Horticulture has now taken a back seat and he guides and arranges botanical tours throughout Turkey, near and Central Asia, China, Chile, Morocco, Borneo and many other countries, having led over a hundred tours.  At the same time his photographic interest and ability has grown immensely leading to the publication with his wife Basak Gardner of ‘The Flowers of the Silk Road’ (May 2014) a collection of 530 species of beautiful flowers from Turkey to China.

Basak Güner (born 1979), qualified with an MSc in Botanical Taxonomy at İstanbul University. Always fascinated by flowers she worked at the Nezahat Gökyigit Botanic Garden in Istanbul and then in 2004 she started leading botanical tours in Turkey and then many other countries. Basak is also a good botanical artist and has painted flowers in Turkey, Chile and Colombia. She has also studied publishing and in 2014 designed ‘The Flowers of the Silk Road’ a major photograhic book with her husband Chris and is now very much involved with the design of the revised ‘Illustrated Flora of Turkey’ an exciting new ten year project. She speaks fluent English and Turkish and moved to Beycik in 2010.