Visit to Missouri Botanical Garden.

01 November 2015 Since 13 till 27 of October at the invitation of the Missouri Botanical Garden, we visited the botanical gardens in the cities St. Louis and Chicago. We participated in the discussion on further joint work with the living plant collections in botanical gardens, plant exchange opportunities, seeds and participate in joint international expeditions.
The talks were attended by: Potapova S. A. (Moscow), Erst A. (Novosibirsk), Alexeeva N. B. and Volchanskaya A. V. (St. Petersburg).
In the period from 13-22 October occurred familiarity with the staff and collections of the Missouri Botanical Garden in St. Louis. In one of the first days of the director of the garden - Peter Wyse Jackson found the time to meet with us. He kindly questioned us work in our gardens and wished fruitful work in Missouri Botanical Garden.
On the first day of the garden staff told us about working with living collections Botanical Garden and showed how the accounting, documentation and labeling for scientific purposes and for visitors (Sucher Becky); how to work in the seed laboratory (Matthew Albrecht) and seed bank (Meg Engelhardt). We met with the public relations volunteers work on the preparation of labels and other locations (Brock Mashburn). On Friday (October 16th.) we visited the Herbarium (Jim Solomon) and Library (Linda Oestry) Missouri Botanical Garden. Here, the big work with the database, so the Internet is lined with 3 mil. herbarium plant species and 15 mil. pages of different books. Head of MBG Press Victoria C. Hollowell made me a very important gift - the book "The Iris Family Natural History and Classification". In the evening we were invited to the Beer Festival (Fest of Ale), held annually in the territory of the garden. We were kindly accompanied Donna McGinnis and Kate Brueggemann. Playing loud music and beer flowed the river a variety of different companies. The next day, the area on which it happened in the garden it was clean and did not say anything about that here last night it was very crowded.
At the weekend, we had the opportunity to visit some of the places - Arch, The Temple, Museum, Zoo, walked around the city center.
In the botanical garden very much Japanese garden (Jason Delaney), we went there twice. October 19 made two reports on the irises growing in the nature of Russian and Iridary (N. Alekseeva). Twice they went into nature, where they had an opportunity to gather for our botanical garden seeds and cuttings of living plants (25 species).  
Impressed seed laboratory, well equipped (Meg Engelgardt) and a visit to the nursery plants collected in nature (Scott Woodbury). Here I saw I. brevicaulis, I. cristata, I. fulva, I. virginica. Our guide through the nature reserve was James Trager. He is an entomologist, is engaged in ants, but loves plants and is well knows of them. I found Iris cristata and Sisyrinchium. We visited the Science Center for Biotechnology - Monsanto, where he conducted research on the cultivation of genetically modified plants and giving the mass of seeds, mainly maize, cotton and soya.
Friday from 22 to 25 October moved to Chicago. For a long time will remember the warm welcome with treats at home Tatiana Vladimirovna Shulkina, which was of great help in getting acquainted with the botanical garden. It was original roof gardens that grow and propagate in this garden. During the weekend carried out a walk around the city to explore with architecture it has been very well planned trip on a river boat. In the evening, we visited one of the world's tallest towers Skydeck Chicago (103 floors). One day, carried out leaving Morton Arboretum in an area about 700 hectares, it is noteworthy that in 1200 volunteers working here. It was an opportunity to collect cuttings and seeds. During the trip, we took care of Jason Delaney and Jen Smock.
We discussed the possibilities of further cooperation between the botanical gardens, of plant protection, the need for conservation, study and propagation. We agreed on the exchange of seed material, live plants. For the collection of the Missouri Botanical Garden passed 7 species of the genus Iris, growing in Russia. An exchange of peons rhizomes. US Leading expert on peons H. Hchotkowski gave as a gift to our garden 28 cultivars of American selection peons missing in Russian collections. We brought cultivars of peonies Russian selection and one species. Later, we received letters of thanks from the happy Henry of rare plants from Russia. With Andrew Wyatt discussed the possibility of joint expeditions and search for grants for their implementation.
On weekends and in the evening we walked around the city and having dinner at different institutions with colleagues from the Botanical Garden. very friendly environment has been created. We got acquainted not only with the collections and the work of various botanical institutions, but also with those who work there in an informal atmosphere.
During a trip around 5000 images were made. A small report on the visit was made for the staff of the Botanical Garden of Peter the Great.