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Description

The Bonsai Garden at Lake Merritt BGLM Celebrates its 20th Anniversary 2019. Thanks to all those volunteers and contributors who make it possible to operate the garden and continue to make it thrive!

The GSBF Bonsai Garden at Lake Merritt is the home to some of the finest Bonsai on the west coast. The BGLM, located at Oakland’s Lakeside Park, is the only major all-volunteer bonsai garden in the country and houses some of the most important bonsai in the US. It was built, is staffed and maintained by volunteers from throughout the greater Bay Area, and is supported entirely by donations from our visitors and the bonsai community.

Docents can point out the historic Daimyo oak tree that was presented by the newly opened Japanese government to the US Ambassador to China in the 1860s during Abraham Lincoln’s presidency. You can view the oldest tree in the collection – estimated to be over 1,600 years old and can see the pine tree that was featured at the 1915 Pan Pacific Exhibition in San Francisco.